7 secret PS4 tricks that allow you to improve the graphics of videogames

You can just plug-and-play your PS4 or PS4 Pro and have a great experience, but if you really want to get the most out of it, you’ve got to tinker with a handful of settings. .

Some of these may vary a bit depending on your brand of TV, the lighting in your room, and other things, but in general – these settings will have you hitting peak performance on your Playstation. If any of the settings are labelled slightly differently on your TV, you’ll be able to figure it out.

Let’s start by going over some settings that are specifically for the PS4 Pro, and then we’ll get into some more generic stuff…

1. Enhanced Format

If you’re using a PS4 Pro, make sure you’ve enabled the Enhanced Format input setting to enable 4K display (You’ll need a 4K TV for this to work.) Most of these are just staying on auto, because the Pro does a good job of recommending what you should be using, but feel free to play around with them, just don’t change too many settings at once or you won’t know which ones are working or not.

2. PS4 Pro Video and Audio Settings

For your video output settings, here are some recommendations:

Resolution: Auto (It will default to 4K for you)

Auto (It will default to 4K for you) TV Size: Enter your TV size

Enter your TV size RGB Range: Auto

Auto HDR: Auto

Auto Deep Color Output: Auto

Next up, let’s quickly go over a couple of audio settings for crystal clear sound. If you’re using the speakers built into your TV, you’re never going to have very good sound, just about any set of external speakers you pick up will be better than the ones built into nearly any TV.

Primary Audio Output Port: HDMI Out (Unless you’re using a sound system that uses something else)

HDMI Out (Unless you’re using a sound system that uses something else) Audio Format: Bitstream (If your sound system supports it.)

3. Best Picture Settings for Gaming

There are a lot of settings to go through on your TV, a lot of them can stay at default, and there are others that you’ll want to max out. The “Light Sensor” feature causes the TV to automatically adjust brightness based on how bright your room is, for example as it switches from day to night (And back to day again for those marathon sessions), but it can also be kind of annoying.

Let’s start by going over the basic settings on a Sony TV…

Picture Mode: Game

Game Auto Picture Mode: Off

Off Color: 50

50 Light Sensor: Off

Off Brightness: 50 (Aka max, or lower it if you’re in a dark room. )

Now that we’ve got the very basics out of the way, let’s go into some deeper settings to really get your gaming experience looking as good as it can. For settings we’ve already covered, we won’t be repeating them, for instance brightness and color show up a few times in the other menus, but we already covered them in the basic settings.

4. Brightness Settings for Gaming

Contrast: 100

100 Gamma: 0

0 Black Level: 50

50 Black Adjust: Off

Off Advanced Contract Enhancer: Off

5. Color Settings for Gaming

Hue: 0

0 Live Color: High

High Color Space: Auto

Auto Color Temperature: Expert 1

Expert 1 Advanced Color Temperature: Ignore it

6. Clarity Settings for Gaming

Sharpness: 50

Reality Creation: Off

Random Noise Reduction: Off

Digital Noise Reduction: Off

7. Sony Motion Settings

Motionflow: You can leave this one off, it could add lag and it’s not really necessary anyways, it can interfere with how the game is meant to be played.

You might be wondering why some of these settings even exist if we’re just leaving them “off” or “default”. That’s because some of these settings can be useful for different media, but for gaming they can get in the way. For a movie, or watching sports, or something else, you may very well want to change some of these. But remember, one of the first settings we edited was to put the TV in game mode, which does a pretty decent job of trying to set things up for you, the rest is just a matter of tweaking for your own room and your TV.

For instance, some rooms might have warmer lighting, some rooms may have very white colored lights, and some people might play in pitch blackness. These will all have an impact on which settings you should choose.