What is Nvidia GeForce Now, is it free and what devices does it work with. What is geforce now

Optionally, you can also connect a Bluetooth keyboard and mouse to your device, which should work for games that require a keyboard and mouse to play.

What is Nvidia GeForce Now, is it free and what devices does it work with?

(Pocket-lint) – Nvidia has its own cloud gaming service in the form of GeForce Now, but it’s different from most of the others.

For starters, there’s a free plan that gives you access to Ubisoft’s own cloud games, Epic Games Store, GOG and UPlay, all running on the very latest PC gaming hardware.

So how do you get GeForce Now, and on what devices does it work? Read on.

What is Nvidia GeForce Now?

Nvidia GeForce Now is a cloud gaming service that lets you play games hosted on remote services and streamed over the internet to one of the supported devices – like Google Stadia, Cloud Gaming with Xbox Game Pass, Shadow, or PlayStation Now.

All the controller (or mouse) codes go the other way, while you get gameplay video back up to 1080p 60fps (it will be expanded to 1440p 120fps soon).

It works with over 20 data centers located around the world, and you have access to the closest one. And, depending on the membership plan you choose, the games run on the best Nvidia (RTX) graphics cards available, so they’ll look their best no matter what hardware specs at your end.

Unlike most of its rivals, GeForce Now does not sell games or provide access to its own curated library of titles. Instead, it connects to your Steam, Epic Games Store, GOG, or Uplay online accounts to play games you already own or purchase through these digital storefronts.

Not all games are available – some publishers block most of their titles from being used through GeForce Now – but there are still thousands of them.

So there are a few exceptions. But these restrictions are quite minimal. Basically, you have the option to play all the games you already own on your phone or computer. And if it’s a phone you want to use so you can play games on the go, you have a wide selection of devices to choose from.

What is Nvidia GeForce Now?

Before we get into more detail on how to play the latest AAA rated games on any PC, regardless of specs, let’s first explain what Nvidia’s cloud-based GeForce Now is for PC and Mac.

First unveiled at CES 2017, Nvidia GeForce Now gives gamers the ability to remotely stream gameplay, eliminating the need to worry about local PC requirements – all you need is a fast enough internet connection! Nvidia recommends a download speed of around 25-50Mbps, although it can work on a connection as low as 15Mbps.

Unlike Google Stadia, which requires you to buy games from the platform store, GeForce Now lets you play games you own through Steam, Epic Games Store, GOG, and Uplay.

This allows you to play together with your friends as usual without having to register them with another online store to continue playing together.

However, not every title is in service; some publishers block their games from being used through GeForce Now, meaning there are skips in the GeForce Now library, but the company regularly adds new titles to keep things fresh and interesting.

As mentioned, games are rendered remotely on one of Nvidia’s 20 servers scattered across Europe and the US, and deliver graphical performance similar to a high-end gaming PC.

In fact, if you opt for the Priority plan or the Enhanced RTX 3080 plan, you’ll be able to play real-time ray traced games through the enhanced RTX servers.

You’re limited to protecting your email while streaming through the Free or Priority tiers, but if you wish to take advantage of the RTX 3080 Advanced Tier, you can upgrade to email protection on supported devices and up to 4K on an Nvidia Shield TV.

How can I access Nvidia GeForce Now?

The best part about cloud gaming is their availability, and GeForce Now is a great showcase of cloud gaming technology. The Nvidia GeForce Now app is available for download on PC, Mac, Android, Shield TV, and Chromebook.

There is no native iOS app due to Apple’s limitations on cloud gaming apps, but Nvidia has provided a workaround in the form of a web app accessible via Safari, allowing you to play AAA games on your iPhone or iPad without needing a dedicated app.

The NVIDIA GeForce NOW RTX 3080 Membership is now available without a waiting list. This means you can subscribe and access right away to start streaming your games.

More than just a new plan

In addition to the new subscription plan, Nvidia’s server-side adaptive synchronization technology has been added, which aligns the frames that appear on the screen with the screen update rate to reduce the number of screen artifacts, introduces support for Microsoft Edge, and adds Amazon New World’s noisy MMO to its letters. (This way, it can mess up Nvidia GPUs instead of yours!)

	Free	Priority	RTX 3080
Price	Free	$ 50 for 6 months or $ 10 a month	$ 100 for 6 months
Availability	Now	Now	Order now, premiere mid November 2021
Maximum quality	1080 / 60p	1080 / 60p, RTX ray tracing acceleration	1440p / 120fps on PC and Mac (1600p on MacBooks), 4K HDR / 60fps with 7.1 surround sound on Nvidia Shield, 120fps on selected Android devices; RTX ray tracing acceleration

Unlike current service plans, you will initially only be able to pay in six-month increments at twice the value of the next best priority option. Pre-orders are open to everyone, but availability is limited as Nvidia is increasing its server resources. Founders get a 10% discount on their subscription, and if they choose not to renew, they can go back to their old plan and price.

That’s $ 16.67 / month, which is significantly more expensive than $ 6 / month Amazon Luna, $ 10 Google Stadia Pro, and even $ 15 / month Microsoft Game Pass Ultimate (including Game Pass Cloud Gaming), all of which include games. GFN takes a “bring your own game library” approach and requires your games to be explicitly supported. This means it only allows you to play free games normally for free, and even then you will still subscribe to sessions longer than an hour.

Pre-orders will be active in November for North America and December for Western Europe. Implementation in other regions will start in 2022.

See also

The RTX 3080 plan will be rolled out gradually as the new GeForce Now SuperPods platform, featuring the latest generation A10G Ampere GPU (server equivalent RTX 3080) with 24GB of VRAM and AMD Threadripper Pro CPUs, is online. They will complement the Turing-based servers that power older and less energy-intensive subscription plans. The backend difference between the RTX 3080 and Priority plans is more than just newer GPU hardware. Thanks to the SuperPod architecture, Nvidia dedicates 100% of the GPU to a given subscriber for the duration of the session, instead of virtualizing and sharing it with others.

Dealing with delays

All GFN players, regardless of plan, will benefit from Nvidia’s new adaptive sync support, available now by downloading the latest version of GeForce Now or using a compatible browser. Traditional adaptive sync technology requires frequent communication between the GPU and the monitor to dynamically match the game’s FPS to the speed at which the monitor can refresh the screen; mismatch can cause display artifacts such as image tearing, which occurs when parts of the screen show different frames.

While the Balanced setting should automatically use the better options, you can manually set the resolution and frame rate to 1440p at 120fps. You don’t have to use Adaptive Sync if you don’t want to.

Screenshot by Lori Grunin / CNET

Nvidia’s adaptive refresh solution for GFN uses a Reflex Latency Analyzer to gather information typically determined by the graphics processor and monitor interactions. In cloud gaming, everything is rendered on a remote server and the “silly” rendered version is streamed to the device, essentially as video. Your device sends back controller, mouse and keyboard responses, allowing the server to determine when the frame was rendered in relation to its GPU rendering time as well as known information gathered by the software (such as monitor specs) and compensate for it accordingly.

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Paired with the RTX 3080 back-end hardware, Nvidia says it can reduce latency to 60ms or less for some subscribers with 144Hz monitors.

Latency remains an annoying but occasional problem with my setup – high bandwidth, but crowded Wi-Fi frequencies and a suboptimal router that can cause spike in packets – but now they’re short enough to keep me from going crazy, giving up frustration (at least not with reason for the service).

On the other hand, while the Guardians of the Galaxy’s slower moments were pretty good, the racing to build and avoid deadly aliens in The RiftBreaker felt a bit less fluid. I haven’t tried this with DLSS or over Ethernet yet, which can make a big difference. But I think the need to recommend Ethernet for cloud gaming on anything other than a desktop console in your living room or a device like the Shield is a hit to all of these services as it’s inconvenient or impossible for most gamers. My router is in the living room, but far from where you can play comfortably without running a cable across the room (waiting for hospital appointment). Nvidia has a recommended router program for GeForce Now, but the list looks old.

Even with these stats across many games – almost consistently 120fps or more, ping under 20ms, and no packet loss – I was still experiencing relatively minor glitches in audio and screen rendering.

This allows you to play together with your friends as usual without having to register them with another online store to continue playing together.

PlayStation Now’s November games leak

A leak from DeaLabs says Sony will be adding at least two new games to PlayStation Now this week, both of which are noteworthy titles. If the leak happens, we’ll see Mafia: Definitive Edition and Celeste on PlayStation Now in the coming weeks.

What’s more, Sony this week confirmed that GTA III – The Definitive Edition will be on the December list.

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Nvidia GeForce Now is a cloud gaming service that lets you play games hosted on remote services and streamed over the internet to one of the supported devices – like Google Stadia, Cloud Gaming with Xbox Game Pass, Shadow, or PlayStation Now.

How GeForce Now fits into the stream-iverse

The catch, of course, is that GeForce Now is still the most bulky cloud gaming option on the market. Admittedly, the service is also the most flexible and independent of the store.

So before I move on to the best parts of Nvidia’s new “GeForce Now 3080” option – its higher performance, higher peak resolution, and higher maximum FPS – I should be setting the stage for the service and comparing it to its peers, so stick with me.

To add a game to your GeForce Now library, manually search for it, then “add to library”. You’ll have to buy it elsewhere. Nvidia GeForce just checks to see if you’ve paid for it – although it conveniently downloads the save file from the cloud save feature of these storefront.

Use the Steam Library Scanning feature in GeForce Now to automatically accumulate games purchased through Steam. This does not work with EGS, Ubisoft Connect, or EA Origin. (Artifact? Does it work in GeForce Now? Huh.)

Enter something like “free-to-play” and GeForce will give you the gameplay without the purchase.

Most cloud gaming services require one way or another to rely on their store ecosystems. You can only play games on Google Stadia if you buy the versions that are exclusive to those games (or get access to giveaways through the Stadia Pro subscription service). If you want to stream Xbox Game Streaming games, you’ll need to pay for an Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscription, and you can only stream approximately 200 games as selected by the service – unlike additional Xbox games that you purchase individually. And Amazon Luna offers different “channels”, each with individual costs and unique content, that you can choose from and arrange in the same way as with video streaming subscription services.

The cost of GeForce Now, on the other hand, has nothing to do with the games you can buy or borrow, everything to do with the Nvidia hardware you rent in the cloud. In some ways, GeForce Now is just a cloud computer that you can use as you see fit. When you use GeForce Now, you log into other storefronts on your server farm, load and play games you have already purchased using their profiles, and save files. Nvidia’s cloud gaming service doesn’t care where or how you buy your games. He just wants to power them.

The big catch, however, is that some game publishers do not allow Nvidia to stream their games. (Remember: when you buy a game from an online store, you only pay for access to the license. This means, among other things, that publishers can take your access this way.) After launching the service in 2019, Nvidia was forced to remove the games it originally hosted after some publishers hailed profanity – in particular, games from Activision Blizzard’s Battle.net service. We have some good news, many more games have been added to the service over time from the following storefronts, for a total of just over 1,100 games:

• Steam
• Epic Games Store
• Ubisoft Connect
• Origin of EA

Until this week, GeForce Now only had two tiers: $ 98 / year or Free. The latter involves performance degradation and the required wait in server queues, so if too many people are using the service you have to wait for paying clients. This free option is a decent way to basically confirm that your ideal streaming device – smartphone, set-top box, or weak netbook – can connect to the service and translate gamepad taps or keyboard and mouse madness into a cloud of streaming video games. But it’s not good for image quality or processing power.

RTX 3080 tier wins, even at a higher resolution

Meanwhile, the paid version includes basic “Nvidia RTX” support. Its server instances feature Nvidia’s proprietary GPU cores that are designed for ray tracing and Deep Learning Super-Sampling (DLSS), but only a few per instance, thanks to the enhanced RTX variant of the server-grade Nvidia Tesla T10 GPU. The results are generally strong enough to get average modern PC games at a constant 1080p, 60fps refresh rate, usually with a few graphical bells and whistles turned on.

As I already attested, if you are within the proper geographic range of Nvidia’s servers and you have a wired Ethernet connection with low ping, you can expect near unwavering performance when playing with your mouse and keyboard at various shooters on the site. But 1080p resolution at 60fps and medium settings is basically what the rest of the streaming fight offers. How much more juice can the same Nvidia application ecosystem gather, especially if Nvidia itself, producer of so many high-end GPUs, is applying its own hardware upgrade?

The best way to answer this question is to let a few compatible games talk. After all, these are the exact same versions of PC games you can install on your own PC, and some have benchmark sequences built in. So I did some testing of an existing $ 98 / year service called the “founder” tier before Nvidia invited me to pre-launch the “3080” tier for $ 198 / yr so I could compare the power of the two server options on their own.

Assassin’s Creed Valhalla benchmark scores on the GeForce Now 3080 service tier. “Ultra” graphics settings, 1440p resolution.

Assassin’s Creed Valhalla benchmark scores at the GeForce Now founders service level. “Ultra” graphics settings, 1080p resolution.

Watch Dogs Legion intense ray tracing test results on GeForce Now 3080 service layer. Graphics settings “Ultra”, RT at almost maximum, 1440p resolution, DLSS enabled in “quality mode.

Watch Dogs Legion, GeForce Now founders’ service tier of intense ray tracing test results. Graphics settings “Ultra”, RT at almost maximum, 1080p resolution, with DLSS enabled in “quality mode.

The above benchmarks for computationally brutal Assassin’s Creed Valhalla (no ray tracing) and Watch Dogs Legion (significant ray tracing) are explained in their captions. Bottom line: all testing from the newer 3080 service tier is done at the higher 1440p resolution, but still clearly ahead of the same testing at the lower 1080p resolution at the founding tier of the service. Unfortunately, we couldn’t run these tests with the FPS graph attached, so we were left with vague, wavy line graphs. Even so, all of these tests have the key “bottom 1 percent”, and when they are higher (which is, by a large margin, at layer 3080), you can expect fewer frame stuttering and refresh rate drops.

GeForce Now is compatible with PC, Mac and Android. On PC and Mac, your device will have to meet certain basic requirements, or you can guarantee compatibility with the NVIDIA Shield TV box. If you’re not sure if your device can handle this, check out our full list of GeForce Now compatible devices.

What games are available on GeForce NOW?

This is a very comprehensive list, so not all of them will be listed here. The short answer is most games.

GeForce NOW supports a wide variety of games via Steam, Uplay, and other PC launchers. This is how he gains access to the games. Downloads from games you already have in your existing library.

Moreover, this should also answer any questions you may have regarding costs. You don’t pay NVIDIA directly for game titles. But it won’t let you access games you didn’t buy. So if you want to play this, you have to purchase through Steam or elsewhere.

When it comes to accessing games from Steam, some games will not appear or appear in the GeForce NOW Android app. However, after logging into your Steam account via the GeForce NOW app, you can select one of the displayed titles, then simply go back to your Steam library and select any game you want.

This is because NVIDIA simply accesses your Steam account using Steam’s remote play feature. As for games from other launchers, you can play titles like The Division 2, Fortnite, Kingdom Come: Deliverance, and more.

Some of the newest games were added on July 8, including Ys IX: Monstrum Nox, Black Skylands, Swords Of Legends Online, Call To Arms, Crowfall, GRAVEN, Ironcast, Mutant Year Zero: Road To Eden, Rayman: Raving Rabids, and Kroniki Wushu.

Recent Games:

As of October 7, some of NVIDIA’s newest games on this platform include Far Cry 6, which launched on October 7, as well as Aragami 2, which launched in mid-September, King’s Bounty II, and a few more.

More Recent Games:

Some of the newer games that joined GeForce NOW came in late October and include New World, Disciples: Liberation, ELYON, Riders Republic, Rise of The Tomb Raider 20 Year Celebration, Sword And Fairy 7, The Forgotten City, Legend of Keepers and Urbaniec.

Newer games added on November 18, including Combat Mission Cold War and The Last Stand: Aftermath, are both new on November 16. In November, Bright Memory: Infinite, Jurassic World Evolution 2, Epic Chef, Age Of Darkness: Final Stand, and Recipe for Disaster were also added, just to name a few.

Newest Games:

The latest games to appear on the site are a few from this month and last month. Games like Chorus, Icarus, The Crackpet Show, Inscryption, SCARF, EVE Online, Ready Or Not, Fly Corp, and Rainbow Six Extraction.

Is there first-party content?

No. You won’t find any content of your own on GeForce NOW, as it is not a platform by itself. Not in the way Stadia is technically a new platform. GeForce NOW is just a ship that allows you to access games you already own from other stores.

If author content is available on this store, it may be available through GeForce NOW. Borderlands 3 is a good example of this. Currently only available on the Epic Games Store. You can play GeForce NOW.

So, approximately there are first-party exclusive products. But not like PlayStation 4 or Epic Games Store they are exclusive.

What are the requirements to use the service?

When it comes to requirements, there isn’t an extensive list, but you’ll still have to get down to the basics.

Of course, you need an internet connection for this to work. The connection speed must be at least 15Mbps for 720p and 30fps for the frame rate. If you want 1080p resolution at 60fps, you need a connection speed of at least 25Mbps.

You also need to connect the device physically with an Ethernet cable, or you can play wirelessly if you are connected to a 5 GHz wireless router. This means you may not be able to play GeForce games right now on some public Wi-Fi hotspots if your router doesn’t have a 5 GHz frequency. At least the experience may not be that good.

That’s pretty much it. If you are playing on Windows, there really aren’t any software or hardware requirements. This means you don’t need to use a specific type of display, and you don’t need at least 16 GB of RAM.

Android does have some requirements, however, as mentioned above. You need a device with at least 2 GB of RAM, which must run on Android 5.0 or later and support OpenGL ES 3.2 or later.

Pre-orders will be active in November for North America and December for Western Europe. Implementation in other regions will start in 2022.

Is GeForce Now free?

There is a free GeForce Now tier that allows you to play in one-hour sessions. The paid tier is $ 5 per month and includes higher priority access to start playing as well as extended sessions that are not limited to one hour. These options are known as the Free and Founder’s versions respectively.

Free	Founder Membership
Access	Standard	Priority
Playtime	One hour	Extended length
RTX	❌	✔️
Free trial version	No	Free for 90 days
Price	Free	$ 4.99 / month for a year

Is GeForce Now still in beta?

No. Although it has been in beta testing for several years, the streaming service has been released from beta testing on February 4, 2020. Since then, over a million gamers have tried GeForce Now, according to NVIDIA.

The exact number of games available to gamers on GeForce Now is too large to list as there are so many of them. NVIDIA says over 1,000 titles are compatible with the service and maintains an updated game list on its website so fans can make sure what they want to play will work on their streaming service.

In addition to maintaining its own curatorial list, NVIDIA also unveils new games that appear on the site every Thursday. Some of the biggest and best available on GeForce Now today include:

• Outriders
• Dead by Daylight
• world of Tanks
• Fearless
• Fortnite
• Warframe
• Control
• Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla

Start streaming

GeForce Now

NVIDIA’s cloud game streaming service is one of the best available today, delivering lag-free gameplay at 1080p / 60 FPS. The best part about this service is that you don’t need a high-end machine to run it, so there’s a good chance you’re already set up. The $ 5 monthly plan makes it an instantly tempting option for seasoned gamers.

PC Game Streaming

NVIDIA Shield Android TV Pro

4K HDR via streaming

The latest version of the NVIDIA SHIELD TV gaming edition is the perfect hub for PC game streaming – with 4K HDR RTX quality untouched.

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