Best CPU for Team Fortress 2

Best CPU for Team Fortress 2? Let's find out

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The much-loved multiplayer FPS Team Fortress 2 has been around since 2007. The game is hailed as a classic and held in high regard by gamers for the personality featured by its well-written characters. The action-packed gameplay is pretty fun too of course!

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If you want to experience Team Fortress 2, you’ll need a process capable of running it at a steady 60FPS at your desired resolution. 

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What are the CPU requirements for Team Fortress 2?

The good news is that Team Fortress 2 is very undemanding on your computer’s hardware, and you would expect it to be since the game is over a decade old now. 

Valve recommends you have the following specs for Team Fortress 2. 

• OS: Windows® 7 (32/64-bit)
• Processor: Pentium 4 processor (3.0GHz, or better)
• Memory: 1 GB RAM
• DirectX: Version 9.0c
• Network: Broadband Internet connection
• Storage: 15 GB available space

As you can see, these are pretty barebones specs. The officially recommended Pentium 4 processor is a single-core CPU with a 3.0GHz boost clock, which is setting the bar really low here. 

Any Core or Ryzen processor released within the last few years will face no problem running Team Fortress 2. 

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Best CPU for Team Fortress 2 – Intel i3-12100F

Our top pick for the Best Team Fortress 2 processor is the Intel Core i3-12100F. 

Believe it or not, the Core i3-12100F is actually a rather competent gaming processor. It’s a hyperthreaded quad-core, meaning it has 4 cores and 8 threads. That seems pretty low by modern standards, but 8 threads are really all you need for 1080p gaming. Games don’t utilize many threads very efficiently. 

Intel Core i3-12100F

Core (threads)

4/8

Boost clock

4.3 GHz

Socket

Lga 1700

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The 12th generation Core i3 processor will not only give you a top-tier Team Fortress 2 gaming experience, but it will also run your other more demanding titles at a comfortable 60 FPS or above. 

You can pair it up with an entry-level to mid-range GPU, such as the 1660 Ti or RTX 3050, to end up with a very budget-friendly, price-efficient setup that’s perfect for games like Team Fortress 2. 

AMD Ryzen 3 5300G

While the i3-10100 is the best CPU for Team Fortress 2 overall because it can run the game as well as any other at the cheapest price point, it would be unfair not to give an honorable mention to the Ryzen 3 5300G. 

The processor is a hyperthreaded quad-core, much like the above Intel i3. It offers nearly identical performance, but it stands out in one way. 

The Ryzen 3 5300G is an APU (accelerated processing unit). That’s a fancy way of saying that it has built-in graphics. In this case, Vega 6 Graphics. 

The iGPU here is strong to offer you 60FPS or above at 1080p in Team Fortress 2 at medium to high visual settings. This means you can get by without having a dedicated GPU at all. 

I should mention here that the only reason Vega 6 is able to offer such performance here is because of the title’s old age and low graphical demands. You will be restricting yourself to older titles like TF2 without a dedicated GPU.