Microsoft has officially launched Automatic Super Resolution (Auto SR) – an image-scaling technology functioning at the operating system level and independent of the game’s integration. At the same time, the company released a list of games that will automatically enable Auto SR, as well as those requiring manual activation.
Auto SR resembles Nvidia Image Scaling (NIS) and AMD Radeon Super Resolution (RSR), but it is not tied to a specific graphics card manufacturer and operates at the OS level. The integration complexity level for Auto SR, which game developers don’t need to handle, is similar to these technologies.
The function of scaling images at the OS level offers an excellent alternative to integrating proprietary scaling technologies. Also, unlike other upscaling technologies, Auto SR scales the entire image frames, including the user interface.
Auto SR is designed to improve game performance. However, the final image quality will be lower than proprietary upscaling technologies, although it doesn’t require driver-level integration. Auto SR uses AI algorithms to compensate for quality loss, unlike NIS and RSR that use spatial scaling methods.
Auto SR relies on a specialized AI model trained on gaming content. It does not depend on GPU or CPU cores, instead relying on the hardware AI Neural Processing Unit (NPU) that offloads scaling tasks from the graphics card and CPU. Auto SR will not function without the NPU.
Auto SR is intended for released games and will be automatically applied to some games (the list is provided below). DirectSR, however, is designed for new games requiring API integration. Despite both solutions aiming to improve scaling and performance, they offer different qualities and are not competitors. Auto SR will work automatically with the following games: BeamNG.drive, Borderlands 3, Control (DX11), Dark Souls III, God of War, Kingdom Come: Deliverance, Resident Evil 2, Resident Evil 3, Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, Sniper Ghost Warrior Contracts 2, and The Witcher 3.
At the moment, Auto SR is only supported by Copilot Plus PC computers, translating to systems with Qualcomm Snapdragon X processors. Future updates may likely involve support for laptops with AMD Ryzen AI 300 and Intel Core Ultra 200V (Lunar Lake) processors. Microsoft also aims to add HDR support and compatibility with multi-monitor systems for Auto SR in the future.
