What is DPI? Does it affect gaming?

What is DPI? Well, it’s a good question as you’ll hear many different answers from across the web for this, ranging from dogmatic to downright disingenuous. To help set the record straight, we’re going to give you a brief rundown of what DPI means, and how it relates to your mouse and your PC gaming experience.

Obviously, we’ll be using the examples from our range of CORSAIR gaming mice to help explain, but the core concepts are applicable regardless of what brand you’re using. It’s probably Corsair though, right?

DPI stands for “Dots Per-Inch”, or, you might have heard the phrase PPI too, which stands for “Pixels Per-Inch”. You don’t need to worry about PPI as that’s an antiquated term related to printing on actual paper, like a caveman.

The DPI number is effectively tied to the resolution that your mouse's sensor detects. Think of each dot, as a pixel on your monitor, if your mouse sensor was calibrated at 1 DPI, if you moved it linearly one inch to the right, your cursor would move 1 pixel across to the right. So, the higher the DPI, the greater the distance the cursor moves on screen over that one inch of physical movement, this makes mice, set to higher DPIs, much faster as a result. High DPI and low DPI each have benefits and drawbacks when it comes to general computer use, however, it comes into play the most when it comes to PC gaming. Here’s why:

Yes. We’ll take an FPS game like Valorant or Counter Strike 2 as an example, as these games require pixel-perfect accuracy, meaning that your DPI setting will affect gameplay the most, compared to, say, a racing game.

If you set your SABRE RGB PRO WIRELESS CHAMPION SERIES to a high DPI, for example, 3000. You’ll be able to move the crosshair far more quickly than you would at a DPI of 800. The benefit here is that you can change what you’re aiming at super quickly, however, it also makes it far more likely that you’ll overshoot your target. Additionally, as tiny movements of your hand result in large movements in-game, you’ll probably find yourself over-correcting and missing a lot of shots. Tracking moving targets will also become more difficult for the same reasons.

This is why Pro esports FPS players rarely exceed 1200 DPI. Accuracy, precision, and consistency just aren’t there. Fun fact: In addition to ergonomic preference, this is one of the reasons pro FPS players often have their keyboard at such a funny angle. It creates more room for the mouse.

That last bit is one of the downsides of a low DPI. As you need to move the mouse a lot more for any given movement. Effectively you need a lot of space, and will probably end up having to lift your mouse and reset for the largest movements. Unsurprisingly, people with smaller rooms and therefore smaller desks can find it inconvenient.

It’s certainly tempting, isn’t it? The idea that changing a small setting could increase your performance overnight, however, it won’t work like that. For casual players, it’s probably not worth the hassle, however, those committed to improving their rankings should read on.

It’s true that lowering your DPI will help increase your accuracy, but the adjustment period will be very frustrating as the muscle-memory built-up over the years will have to change.

For this reason, we recommend slowly lowering your DPI by smaller increments (100-200) every couple of days, so the difference isn’t so sudden and drastic. After a couple of weeks, you might start to see some performance gains. Good luck.