AMD Brings FSR 4.1 Upscaling to Xbox Series X and S

AMD has announced that its FSR 4.1 machine learning upscaling technology will launch on Xbox Series X and Series S consoles, bringing neural upscaling to Microsoft hardware for the first time. The feature was previously limited to AMD Radeon 7000 and 9000 series desktop graphics cards, alongside a recent driver update for Radeon RX 6000 GPUs. The move positions Xbox to compete directly against Sony, which deployed machine learning upscaling on the PlayStation 5 Pro with PSSR and the base PlayStation 5 with QSSR.

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AMD SVP of Gaming and Graphics Jack Huynh indicated that engineers trimmed down the FSR 4.1 machine learning model so it can run on hardware lacking RDNA 4 dedicated AI accelerators. Technical work behind the lighter model stemmed from Project Amethyst, an ongoing engineering collaboration between AMD and Sony.

Xbox vice president Jason Ronald confirmed the rollout schedule for developers. "We are excited to share that AMD FSR 4.1 will be available to developers on XBOX Series X/S very soon," Ronald said. "We have partnered closely with our friends @AMD to optimize and tune the models to deliver incredible performance and quality on both consoles and the ROG XBOX Ally and Ally X."

Machine Learning on Consoles and Handhelds

Beta drivers delivering FSR 4.1 have already reached handheld systems, including the Asus ROG Xbox Ally, Ally X, and Ally X20. AMD and Microsoft have not published a public release date for Xbox Series X and S consoles beyond stating that tools will reach developers soon.

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Patch Requirements and Future Hardware

Microsoft has not clarified whether Xbox Series consoles will require studio developers to manually patch existing titles to enable FSR 4.1, or whether the system will offer an override for games running earlier FSR iterations. Initial software adoption also remains unconfirmed, leaving it uncertain which upcoming releases will integrate the tech.

Reports indicate that AMD and Microsoft are also collaborating on another upscaling solution, internally named FSR Diamond, planned for the next-generation Xbox initiative codenamed Project Helix.