NVIDIA Introduces 'Smooth Motion': AI-Powered Frame Generation for RTX 50 Series GPUs

Nvidia's answer to AMD Fluid Motion Frames works on all DX11 and DX12 games

In brief: Buried near the end of the description for the Nvidia App update that introduced support for RTX 50 series graphics cards, multi-frame generation, and DLSS 4, is a little-noticed new feature: driver-level single-frame generation for any DirectX 11 or DirectX 12 game running on Nvidia's latest GPUs. Early testing suggests that the company's "Smooth Motion" AI model significantly boosts perceived frame rates in Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2, with only minor visual artifacts. The few users who have managed to get their hands on a GeForce RTX 5080 or 5090 can engage frame generation in most games released in the past 15 years through a new Nvidia App setting. A future update will extend the functionality to RTX 40 series GPUs. Dubbed "Nvidia Smooth Motion," this driver-level model interpolates one AI-generated frame between every two traditionally rendered frames in DirectX 11 and DirectX 12 titles that lack native DLSS or frame generation support. Similar to AMD's Fluid Motion Frames, it extends the benefits of single-frame generation - originally introduced with RTX 40 series cards - by bringing it to back-catalog games. The Smooth Motion setting is located in Graphics > Driver Settings for both individual program settings and global settings in Nvidia App version 11.0.2.312 or later, just below the DSR Factors setting. According to PC Games Hardware, which tested the feature on a pre-release build of Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2, toggling Smooth Motion on or off requires rebooting the game. When enabled on an RTX 5080 at 4K DLSS quality mode under the game's maximum "Experimental" graphics preset, Smooth Motion increased the average output frame rate from 83.3 fps to 135 fps - a 62% uplift. However, capping the frame rate at 120 fps and enabling variable refresh rate resulted in significantly smoother frame times while reducing the rendered frame rate to 60 fps. Fortunately, latency remains largely unaffected, especially if Nvidia Reflex is activated. However, Smooth Motion introduces more noticeable artifacts than full native frame-gen implementations because it applies interpolation uniformly rather than selectively. For instance, interface elements like subtitles may appear distorted in AI-generated frames. Additionally, the feature remains active during Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2's cutscenes, which are normally locked at 30 fps. While visual flaws such as blurred characters are less apparent at higher frame rates, they become more pronounced when 30 fps cutscenes are interpolated to 60 fps. More in-depth testing will likely emerge as RTX 50 series GPUs reach more consumers in the coming weeks and Smooth Motion rolls out to RTX 40 series cards.

NVIDIA Adds Smooth Motion, a Driver-Based Frame Generation AI Model for RTX 50 GPUs

Today's NVIDIA app and GeForce Game Ready driver update had a lot of big stuff, like the release of DLSS 4 Multi Frame Generation for 75 games and apps, the new Override functionality, and more. However, NVIDIA has also sneaked in a brand new feature they hadn't previously disclosed: Smooth Motion. Essentially, this is driver-based frame generation that owners of the new GeForce RTX 50 graphics cards can toggle globally or per game. Here's what NVIDIA said about it: NVIDIA Smooth Motion is a new driver-based AI model that delivers smoother gameplay by inferring an additional frame between two rendered frames. For games without DLSS Frame Generation, Smooth Motion is a new option for enhancing your experience on GeForce RTX 50 Series GPUs. To enable Smooth Motion, select a compatible DirectX 11 or DirectX 12 game in Graphics > Program settings of NVIDIA app. Scroll down the list of options on the right to reach "Driver Settings", and switch Smooth Motion on. Smooth Motion can be applied to games running at native resolution, with super resolution technologies, or other scaling techniques, typically doubling the perceived frame rate. This sounds like the NVIDIA equivalent of AMD's Fluid Motion Frames 2, although, in this case, it's a full-fledged AI model, which is not surprising given the company's focus on artificial intelligence. Sure, there are already ways to inject frame generation in games that do not support it natively, like Lossless Scaling. However, we're definitely eager to check out Smooth Motion and see how well it handles frame generation across several older games. Stay tuned for our impressions. Today's Game Ready driver is also optimized for Kingdom Come: Deliverance II, which launches in a few days with DLSS Super Resolution support, and Marvel's Spider-Man 2, which is out today on PC with DLSS Super Resolution, Frame Generation, Ray Reconstruction, DLAA, Reflex, and Ray Tracing for ambient occlusion, shadows, and reflections. DLSS 4 Multi Frame Generation will be added in a future update. By the way, there are improvements to RTX Video Super Resolution as well, thanks to a more efficient AI model that NVIDIA says uses up to 30% fewer GPU resources at its highest quality setting. RTX Video Super Resolution now also upscales HDR videos, so when viewing HDR videos below your display's resolution in the browser, they will be automatically upscaled to your native display resolution. NVIDIA also added a GPU Utilisation feature for RTX video when Quality is set to Auto. Setting GPU Utilization to High will use as much GPU power as necessary to provide the best quality super resolution available on the installed graphics card.

NVIDIA reveals a surprise: Smooth Motion frame gen for all games, but it's RTX 5000 GPUs only

TL;DR: The NVIDIA App has been updated, and there's a new graphics driver for RTX 5090 and 5080 GPUs, plus DLSS 4 has been officially introduced for 75 games and apps. An unexpected addition is the Smooth Motion feature which is driver-level frame generation in the same vein as AFMF from AMD, but this is exclusive to RTX 5000 GPUs (another surprise - and not a pleasant one for some gamers). NVIDIA has released a new graphics driver for its RTX 5090 and RTX 5080 GPUs which came out today - well, which sold out today - alongside a big update for the NVIDIA App that packs an interesting surprise. Turn on Smooth Motion under 'Driver Settings' (see the full instructions below) (Image Credit: NVIDIA) Team Green announced support for its Blackwell graphics cards in the new driver, which is a given - those who were lucky enough to get one would be a bit stuck without that - and DLSS 4 officially came into play. To begin with, there are 75 games (and apps) which support DLSS 4, and all RTX graphics cards can benefit from this - except for the MFG component, the new Multi Frame Generation feature, which is for RTX 5000 GPUs only. Interestingly, MFG isn't the only exclusive power for Blackwell graphics cards, as NVIDIA has introduced something called Smooth Motion (the surprise we mentioned at the outset - well, it's new to us). Team Green tells us: "GeForce RTX 50 Series gamers can now also enable NVIDIA Smooth Motion, a new driver-based AI model that delivers smoother gameplay by inferring an additional frame between two rendered frames." In other words, any games that don't support frame generation with DLSS can now use this Smooth Motion driver-level tech (with RTX 5000 GPUs). The question is: how good is Smooth Motion? We wouldn't get our hopes up, but on the other hand, the other tricks NVIDIA has pulled on the software side with this new generation of graphics cards have been seriously impressive. So, you never know, and there are already a bunch of gamers who aren't best pleased that this has been reserved for RTX 5000 only. There may be a good reason for that, of course, in terms of the hardware (though cynics will argue NVIDIA needs more selling points for Blackwell, no doubt). If Smooth Motion sounds familiar in its concept, that because AMD already does this driver-level, system-wide frame gen, and it's called AMD Fluid Motion Frames (AFMF). Any extra options to get additional frames are always welcome, of course, and even if this kind of tech is wobbly in its initial implementation, it may well get better in time. And if you don't like it, you don't have to use it. For those who have an RTX 5000 graphics card (yes, you fortunate few out there, we'll say it again), you can enable NVIDIA Smooth Motion if you head to Graphics > Program settings, then you can select any compatible DX11 or DX12 game. In the options on the right you need 'Driver Settings' and then you can turn on Smooth Motion, it's as easy as that. NVIDIA notes that the feature can be applied to games running at the PC's native resolution, or with super resolution tech applied (or other upscaling). We can expect a doubling of the frame rate, apparently, in a typical scenario.