How a Tick Works
Each tick, the server performs a complete simulation cycle:
- Receives all player input packets that arrived since the last tick.
- Simulates the game world forward by one tick interval (applies movement, projectiles, physics).
- Runs hit detection — checks whether any projectiles or hitboxes overlapped during this tick.
- Sends updated game state (positions, health, events) to all connected clients.
All events within a tick are treated as simultaneous from the server's perspective. If you fire your shot 1ms into a 15.6ms tick interval, the server processes it at the end of the tick — your action effectively gets "quantized" to the nearest tick boundary. This is why higher tickrates improve hit registration accuracy: smaller tick intervals mean less potential timing error per event.
Common Tickrates by Game
| Game | Standard Tickrate | Competitive/Premium |
|---|---|---|
| CS2 | 64 tick (subtick system) | Subtick (equivalent to ~128+) |
| CS:GO (legacy) | 64 tick (matchmaking) | 128 tick (FACEIT, ESEA) |
| Valorant | 128 tick | 128 tick |
| Overwatch 2 | 63 tick | 63 tick |
| Apex Legends | 20 tick | 20 tick |
| Fortnite | 30 tick | 30 tick |
| Call of Duty (MW series) | 60–120 tick | Varies by mode |
Tickrate vs Client Framerate
Tickrate is a server property — it controls how often the server sends state. Your client framerate (FPS) is separate — it controls how often your GPU renders a frame. These are independent:
- Running at 300 FPS on a 64-tick server: your client renders 300 frames per second but receives server updates only 64 times per second. The frames between server updates are extrapolated/interpolated locally.
- Running at 60 FPS on a 128-tick server: your client receives updates 128 times per second but only displays 60 of them. Server accuracy is high but your screen is the bottleneck.
For competitive play, you want both: high client FPS to reduce input lag and display updates responsively, and high server tickrate to ensure those inputs are registered accurately.
Tickrate and Bandwidth
Higher tickrate increases packet frequency but the total bandwidth impact is minimal. A 128-tick server sends roughly 100–150 kbps per player — doubling from 64-tick adds perhaps 30 kbps. This is negligible on any modern internet connection. Tickrate is a server CPU cost problem, not a bandwidth problem.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does higher tickrate require more internet speed?
No — competitive FPS games use 40–150 kbps total regardless of tickrate. The difference between 64 and 128 tick adds ~20–30 kbps. Internet speed is never the constraint. The cost of higher tickrate is server-side CPU, which is why operators use 64-tick for mass matchmaking and 128-tick for premium tiers.
Why do some games use subtick systems instead of fixed tickrates?
Fixed tickrate quantizes events to tick boundaries, introducing up to one full tick of timing error. CS2's subtick system timestamps events at their exact moment of occurrence within the tick, then interpolates them during simulation — providing hit registration accuracy approaching an infinite tickrate without the server CPU cost of actually running at that rate.