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Gaming

Play games on a remote gaming PC or Mac with low latency and smooth motion. Games need a fast encoder, a frame rate that matches your screen, and mouse movement that doesn't stop at the edge of the window.

Applies to

  • Jump Desktop on Windows and macOS. On iPad, you can lock the cursor with a connected mouse.
  • Fluid connections to a remote computer with Jump Desktop Connect.

Set up the session

In Jump Desktop for Windows or Mac, during a Fluid session:

  1. Network: use Ethernet on both the remote computer and the device you connect from. See Set up the network.
  2. Displays: choose Display > Presets > Single Virtual Display, then turn off Use Retina Resolution in the Display menu. On Windows, presets need Jump Desktop for Teams Pro or Enterprise. See Keep the pixel load in check.
  3. Codec: choose Remote > Codec > Hardware. On a Mac with an M-series Pro, Max, or Ultra chip, or a remote computer without a supported GPU, choose Fluid 2.0. See Which codec to use.
  4. Color: choose Remote > Color > Good.
  5. Framerate and Maximum Bandwidth: leave both on Auto. Auto framerate follows your screen's refresh rate, so a 120 Hz or 144 Hz screen gets up to that many frames per second.

Lock the mouse cursor

Lock the cursor so mouse movement goes to the game: press Ctrl+Alt+Shift+L (Windows) or Ctrl+Cmd+Esc (macOS) to lock, and hold Esc to unlock. See Lock the mouse cursor.

More for games

  • Lower latency on a Mac: in Jump Desktop settings, under General, select Disable VSync. The screen may show tearing.
  • System shortcuts: to send Alt+Tab, the Windows key, or Cmd+Tab to the game, see Send system shortcuts to the remote computer.
  • Game controllers: share a controller, or on iPhone, iPad, and Android use the on-screen controller. USB redirection must be on for the remote computer. See Use game controllers.

Check that it worked

In connection statistics, Encoder shows Hardware followed by the GPU vendor, such as Hardware NVIDIA (or Fluid 2.0 if you chose it, or if the hardware encoder failed and the session switched to it), and Frames stays close to Max Frames while the game moves. If Frames drops, see Slow or laggy sessions.