Beautiful graphics and broad GPU support - Anno 117: Pax Romana technical test

iGPUs left behind?

This technical test assesses hardware and GPU performance for Anno 117: Pax Romana across multiple systems, resolutions and upscaling options. The pre-release benchmark reveals striking visuals but high system demands, with smooth play requiring modern dedicated GPUs or effective upscaling.
Christian Hintze, 👁 Christian Hintze, ✓ (translated by DeepL / Ninh Duy) Published 11/15/2025 🇩🇪 🇫🇷 ...
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Verdict - Pretty and sophisticated

This technical test evaluates Anno 117: Pax Romana across multiple systems and GPUs to determine playable settings and hardware requirements. Ubisoft’s minimum recommendation is an RTX 2070 for 1080p at high details, but real-world testing shows modern dedicated GPUs perform much better. An RTX 4050 can handle FHD at lower settings, while QHD generally requires upscaling or an RTX 5070-class card for acceptable frame rates. UHD/4K is limited to top-tier models and still often needs DLSS or other upscalers; the RTX 5080 reached just under 35 fps with DLSS Max Quality. Integrated GPUs currently struggle and showed inconsistent results, especially on AMD iGPUs. Overall, the game is visually impressive and feature-rich, but its demanding nature means many players will need recent dedicated GPUs or upscaling to get smooth gameplay.

Technology, settings & benchmark

Detailed cities and buildings, close zoom levels, flowing water, and dynamic day, night, and weather changes make Anno 117 visually impressive, even downright stunning in places if you have the right hardware. Whether the game also delivers on the gameplay side is something our colleague Silvio explores in his Pre-release test article. How we fared as total Anno beginners can be seen in the demo featured in this article. However, we’ll now focus on which hardware is best suited for playing the new Anno and which settings work best.

The two-part options menu (display and graphics settings) offers all the usual choices and, fortunately, applies changes without requiring a restart. Applying new settings for the first time can take a bit longer, though; in our case, we had to wait up to a minute.

Alongside resolution, you’ll find options for a frame-rate limiter, AI upscalers (DLSS, FSR, XeSS) with three quality levels, texture quality, and more. Frame generation, however, is not yet available.

Detailed settings without restarting - just be ready to wait

Anno 117: Pax Romana includes an integrated benchmark that you can launch from the main menu or directly from the graphics settings.

You’ll need a bit of patience, though, since a single run takes about four minutes. In return, it covers a wide range of scenarios: an island surrounded by the sea, sweeping city panoramas, rain-soaked hillside settlements, and night scenes. Pretty much every typical use case is represented.

Results

FHD / 1,920 x 1,080

Anno 117 is quite demanding. With integrated graphics, you really have no chance of a smooth Full HD experience. We also ran into major issues with AMD iGPUs. Our Radeon 780M in the Ryzen 7 260 (Asus TUF Gaming A18) theoretically delivered higher frame rates than the Intel Graphics in the Core Ultra 9 275HX according to the results screen, but the benchmark itself ran like an absolute slideshow and was slower than the supposedly weaker Intel iGPU. Odd. Maybe driver updates at release or later will improve the situation.

There should be potential for iGPUs, since even an RTX 4050 pulls off almost 84 fps in FHD Low. On the other hand, Anno 117 on Ultra Max already overwhelms an RTX 5070, and even an RTX 5080 can’t reach 40 fps anymore. With upscaling (DLSS Max Quality), our Scout E20 with an RTX 4050 at least climbs from 26 fps to nearly 36 fps.

Anno 117: Pax Romana
1920x1080 Low AA:T 1920x1080 Medium AA:T 1920x1080 High AA:T 1920x1080 Ultra High AA:T 2560x1440 Ultra High AA:T 3840x2160 Ultra High AA:T 2560x1440 Ultra High DLSS Max Quality 3840x2160 Ultra High DLSS Max Quality
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5080 Laptop, Ultra 9 275HX Asus ROG NUC 15-90AS00I1	152.2 fps ∼100% 121.6 fps ∼100% 96.9 fps ∼100% 55 fps ∼100% 38.3 fps ∼100% 21.1 fps ∼100% 55 fps ∼100% 34.5 fps ∼100%
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Ti Laptop, Ultra 9 275HX Schenker XMG Pro 16 (E25)	142.3 fps ∼93% 107.2 fps ∼88% 84.4 fps ∼87% 47.4 fps ∼86% 34.3 fps ∼90% 19.3 fps ∼91% 48.7 fps ∼89% 30.5 fps ∼88%
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 Laptop GPU, i9-13950HX Razer Blade 16 Early 2023	79.8 fps ∼82% 48.2 fps ∼88% 35.2 fps ∼92%
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Laptop, Asus A18 (RTX 5070 Turbo Mode)	122.2 fps ∼80% 96.7 fps ∼80% 75.6 fps ∼78% 40.4 fps ∼73% 27.6 fps ∼72% 14.3 fps ∼68% 41.2 fps ∼75% 25.1 fps ∼73%
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Laptop, R7 260 Asus A18 (RTX 5070 Performance Mode)	107.6 fps ∼71% 85.5 fps ∼70% 66.2 fps ∼68% 34.3 fps ∼62% 25.3 fps ∼66% 38.2 fps ∼69% 23.2 fps ∼67%
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 Laptop GPU, i9-13900HX XMG Pro (E23)	113.3 fps ∼74% 89.2 fps ∼73% 66.9 fps ∼69% 36.3 fps ∼66% 25.7 fps ∼67% 13.8 fps ∼65% 36.4 fps ∼66% 22.6 fps ∼66%
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4050 Laptop GPU, i7-13700H Medion Erazer Scout E20	83.6 fps ∼55% 64 fps ∼53% 47.8 fps ∼49% 26.2 fps ∼48%
AMD Radeon 890M, Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 Sapphire Edge AI, Ryzen AI 9 HX 370	33.6 fps ∼22% 19.3 fps ∼16% 13.2 fps ∼14% 8.3 fps ∼15%
Intel Graphics 4-Core iGPU (Arrow Lake), Ultra 9 275HX XMG Pro 16 (E25) iGPU Intel Graphics	15.4 fps ∼10% 10.9 fps ∼9%

QHD / 2,560 x 1,440 (+ upscaling)

Therefore, QHD is already the end of the line for most graphics cards, at least at ultra-max settings. Even an RTX RTX 5070 can’t deliver smooth, truly playable frame rates anymore.

If you switch to DLSS, frame rates climb back above 30 fps on the RTX 5070. Using DLSS Performance instead of DLSS Max Quality pushes things even further and feels noticeably smoother. However, we wouldn’t recommend QHD on anything below an RTX 5070, even with DLSS enabled.

Anno 117: Pax Romana
2560x1440 Ultra High AA:T 2560x1440 Ultra High DLSS Max Quality
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5080 Laptop, Ultra 9 275HX Asus ROG NUC 15-90AS00I1	38.3 fps ∼100% 55 fps ∼100%
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Ti Laptop, Ultra 9 275HX Schenker XMG Pro 16 (E25)	34.3 fps ∼90% 48.7 fps ∼89%
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 Laptop GPU, i9-13950HX Razer Blade 16 Early 2023	35.2 fps ∼92%
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Laptop, R7 260 Asus TUF Gaming A18 FA808UP-S8022W	25.3 fps ∼66% 38.2 fps ∼69%
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Laptop, Asus TUF Gaming A18 FA808UP-S8022W	27.6 fps ∼72% 41.2 fps ∼75%
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 Laptop GPU, i9-13900HX XMG Pro (E23)	25.7 fps ∼67% 36.4 fps ∼66%

UHD / 3,840 x 2,160 (+ upscaling)

And so UHD or 4K is really only an option for the absolute top-tier models, and even they can’t handle the game without an upscaler. The RTX 5080 in the Asus ROG NUC 15 reaches just under 35 fps with DLSS Max Quality.

Anno 117: Pax Romana
3840x2160 Ultra High AA:T 3840x2160 Ultra High DLSS Max Quality
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5080 Laptop, Ultra 9 275HX Asus ROG NUC 15-90AS00I1	21.1 fps ∼100% 34.5 fps ∼100%
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Ti Laptop, Ultra 9 275HX Schenker XMG Pro 16 (E25)	19.3 fps ∼91% 30.5 fps ∼88%
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Laptop, Asus TUF Gaming A18 FA808UP-S8022W	14.3 fps ∼68% 25.1 fps ∼73%

Test systems

Overview

As gaming benchmarks take a lot of time and can sometimes be delayed due to activation restrictions, we can only present a limited number of results at the time of publication. More GPUs will follow.

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Editor of the original article: Christian Hintze - Managing Editor - 2191 articles published on Notebookcheck since 2016

A C64 marked my entry into the world of PCs. I spent my student internship in the repair department of a computer shop and at the end of the day I was allowed to assemble my own 486 PC from “workshop remnants”. As a result of this, I later studied computer science at the Humboldt University in Berlin, with psychology also being added to my studies. After my first job as a research assistant at the university, I went to London for a year and worked for Sega in computer game translation quality assurance. This included working on games such as Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed and Company of Heroes. I have been writing for Notebookcheck since 2017.

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> Expert Reviews and News on Laptops, Smartphones and Tech Innovations > Reviews > Beautiful graphics and broad GPU support - Anno 117: Pax Romana technical test

Christian Hintze, 2025-11-15 (Update: 2025-11-19)

Pos	Model	< Prev Next > Anno 117: Pax Romana (2025)
Pos	Model	low 1920x1080 Low TAA	med. 1920x1080 Medium TAA	high 1920x1080 High TAA	ultra 1920x1080 Ultra High TAA	QHD 2560x1440 Ultra High TAA	4K 3840x2160 Ultra High TAA
1	NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090				114.6	90.6	57
2	NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090	256.2	193.6	138.1	100.4	77.2	47.6
3	NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5080	233.6	178.2	133.7	87	64.6	37.8
5	NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Ti	215	160.8	123.3	76.5	55.4	32
16	NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5080 Laptop	152.2	121.6	96.9	55	38.3	21.1
23	NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090	144.8	118.5	91.2	55.2	41	24.6
30	NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 Laptop GPU			79.8	48.2	35.2
31*	NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 Ti	137.4	112	86.5	45.7	32.3	18.1
35	NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Ti Laptop	142.3	107.2	84.4	47.4	34.3	19.3
47	NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Ti	126.6	108.2	78.8	45.4	33.2
49	NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060	124	102.6	76.4	39.8	27.6
52	NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Laptop	114.9ⁿ²	91.1ⁿ²	70.9ⁿ²	37.35ⁿ²	26.45ⁿ²	14.3
54	NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 Laptop GPU	113.3	89.2	66.9	36.3	25.7	13.8
61	NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 Laptop		73.8	55.4	28.4
66	NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060	104.5	80.3	59	31.7	22.2
83	NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5050 Laptop		65.4	47.9	23.9
89	NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060	95	72.8	53	28.8	20.3
112	NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Laptop GPU	80	59.2	44.6	24.3	17.2
122	Intel Arc A770M	54.6	40.5	30	19.2	13.8
Pos	Model	< Prev Next >Anno 117: Pax Romana
Pos	Model	low	med.	high	ultra	QHD	4K
147	NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4050 Laptop GPU	83.6	64	47.8	26.2
216*	AMD Radeon 890M	33.6	19.3	13.2	8.3
238	Intel Arc Graphics 140V	23.3
392*	AMD Radeon 840M	17.2	11.4	8.1
394*	Intel Graphics 4-Core iGPU (Arrow Lake)	15.4	10.9

Legend
5	Stutters – This game is very likely to stutter and have poor frame rates. Based on all known benchmarks using the specified graphical settings, average frame rates are expected to fall below 25fps
	May Stutter – This graphics card has not been explicitly tested on this game. Based on interpolated information from surrounding graphics cards of similar performance levels, stutters and poor frame rates are expected.
30	Fluent – Based on all known benchmarks using the specified graphical settings, this game should run at or above 25fps
40	Fluent – Based on all known benchmarks using the specified graphical settings, this game should run at or above 35fps
60	Fluent – Based on all known benchmarks using the specified graphical settings, this game should run at or above 58fps
	May Run Fluently – This graphics card has not been explicitly tested on this game. Based on interpolated information from surrounding graphics cards of similar performance levels, fluent frame rates are expected.
?	Uncertain – This graphics card experienced unexpected performance issues during testing for this game. A slower card may be able to achieve better and more consistent frame rates than this particular GPU running the same benchmark scene.
	Uncertain – This graphics card has not been explicitly tested on this game and no reliable interpolation can be made based on the performances of surrounding cards of the same class or family.
The value in the fields displays the average frame rate of all values in the database. Move your cursor over the value to see individual results.