What Is Tick Rate in Games? Server Tick Rate Explained (2026)

Tick rate is how many times per second a game server updates the world and sends the result to players. A 64 tick server simulates the game 64 times a second, so each update is about 15.6 ms apart. Higher tick rates make movement and hits feel more precise, and cost more CPU.

Below: what a tick actually does, why the number feels different in a shooter and a factory game, real tick rates for popular games, and how to tell if your server is falling behind.

What happens in one tick

Each tick, the server runs one full step of the game:

1. Reads the inputs players sent since the last tick: movement, shots, clicks.
2. Moves everything: players, creatures, items on belts, projectiles.
3. Resolves what happened: hits, damage, crafting, block changes.
4. Sends players a snapshot of what changed.

Then it waits for the next tick. The time between ticks is 1000 / tick rate milliseconds:

Your game client draws frames much faster than the server ticks. It fills the gaps by smoothing between the snapshots it receives, which is why a 20 tick game can still look smooth at 144 FPS.

Tick rate vs FPS vs ping

These three get mixed up constantly:

• FPS is how many frames your PC draws per second. It is your hardware.
• Ping is how long a message takes to travel between you and the server. It is the network and the distance.
• Tick rate is how often the server updates the world. It is the server's settings and CPU.

A 128 tick server does nothing for you if your ping is 150 ms. Low ping matters more for feel than tick rate in almost every case.

Tick rates of popular games

Two different ideas hide in that table. In shooters, tick rate is about precision: how exactly the server knows where you were when you fired. In simulation games like Minecraft and Factorio, the tick rate is fixed and the real question is whether the server can keep up with it.

Why tick rate matters in shooters

In a shooter, everything happens on tick boundaries. At 20 tick, the server checks the world every 50 ms, and a lot can happen in 50 ms. Players notice it as:

• Getting killed after reaching cover.
• Shots that looked on target not registering.
• Peeking players seeing you before you see them.

Higher tick rates shrink those windows. CS2 took a different route with sub-tick: the server still ticks 64 times a second, but every shot and movement is timestamped to the exact moment it happened, so the server can resolve it as if it ran between ticks. The details are in CS2 server tickrate and sub-tick explained.

Why tick rate matters in survival and factory games

Here the tick rate is part of the game's rules. Minecraft's crops grow, redstone fires and mobs move per tick. Factorio's belts run per tick. Nobody wants a higher number. They want the server to hit its target every single tick.

When a tick takes longer than its budget, the server falls behind:

• Minecraft: the server drops below 20 TPS, everything slows down and the console prints Can't keep up! Is the server overloaded?. See Minecraft can't keep up, is the server overloaded.
• Factorio: UPS drops below 60 and the whole game runs in slow motion for everyone, because multiplayer Factorio is deterministic and every player simulates the same ticks.
• Satisfactory and other Unreal games: players see rubber banding and delayed interactions. See Satisfactory server lag fix.

The cause is almost always CPU. One tick runs mostly on one thread, so what matters is single core speed, not core count. A huge redstone machine or megabase can overload a server that has plenty of free RAM.

How to check your server's tick rate

Minecraft: on Paper, run tps in the console for the 1, 5 and 15 minute averages, and mspt for milliseconds per tick. Under 50 ms per tick is healthy. Vanilla 1.20.3 and newer also has tick query. For a breakdown of what is eating the time, use spark: spark profiler start, wait a few minutes, then spark profiler stop.

Factorio: in game, press F4 and enable show-fps to see FPS and UPS in the corner. Anything below 60 UPS means the save is too heavy for the CPU.

Rust: check server.tickrate in your server.cfg or startup command. It is read at startup, so changing it on a running server does nothing.

CS2: there is nothing to tune. Valve fixed the tick rate at 64 with sub-tick.

Should you raise the tick rate?

Usually no.

• In fixed tick games like Minecraft and Factorio you cannot, and should not try. Mods that change tick speed change the game's rules.
• In Unreal games, raising NetServerMaxTickRate costs CPU on every tick and can make lag worse on a busy server. Only raise it if the server has headroom and you have a specific complaint you are fixing.
• In Rust, values above 30 are widely discouraged. The default is fine for most community servers.

If players complain about lag, check ping, RAM and CPU first. Why is my game server lagging is the right starting point.

FAQ

Is a higher tick rate always better?

For precision, yes, but it costs CPU every tick. A server that cannot hold its tick rate feels worse than a stable server at a lower one. Stable beats high.

Does tick rate affect ping?

No. Ping is network travel time. Tick rate can add a few milliseconds of delay before your action is processed, which some people feel as extra latency, but your ping number does not change.

What is a good TPS for a Minecraft server?

A steady 20. Anything from 19.5 up is fine. Below 18 players will notice slower mobs, delayed block breaking and rubber banding.

Can I change the tick rate on a hosted server?

Where the game allows it, yes, since it is a config file or launch setting. On our servers you edit the file in the Files tab or over SFTP and restart.

Servers that hold their tick

Tick rate problems are almost always CPU and memory problems. Every GamezServers plan reserves its RAM for your server alone, and you can upgrade in Settings if a growing world needs more. Pick a game on the games page.