25 Essential Gaming Apps to Install on Every New PC

Optimize Your Gaming Experience

NVIDIA’s GeForce Experience is essential for gamers with NVIDIA graphics cards. It optimizes game settings, keeps your drivers up-to-date, and allows you to record and stream your gameplay with minimal hassle.

The Ultimate Gaming Library

Steam is the most popular digital distribution platform for PC games, offering a vast library of games, social networking, automatic updates, and community features. It’s a one-stop shop for purchasing, managing, and playing your games.

Monitor and Overclock Your Hardware

MSI Afterburner is the go-to app for monitoring your PC’s performance and overclocking your GPU. It provides detailed hardware statistics and allows you to tweak your settings for better performance.

Stay Connected with Friends

Discord is a must-have for gamers who want to stay connected with friends. It offers voice, video, and text communication, as well as community servers where you can join discussions, find teammates, and share your gaming experiences.

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Boost Your PC’s Performance

Razer Cortex is a game booster that frees up system resources and optimizes your PC’s performance. It also offers game deals, a rewards program, and the ability to manage and launch your games from a single interface.

Stream and Record Like a Pro

Open Broadcaster Software (OBS) Studio is a free and open-source software for video recording and live streaming. It’s highly customizable and supports various plugins, making it perfect for both beginners and advanced users.

Handle Compressed Files Easily

WinRAR is a powerful tool for handling compressed files. Whether you’re downloading mods, custom content, or game patches, WinRAR makes it easy to unpack and manage these files.

Reduce Eye Strain

f.lux adjusts your monitor’s color temperature according to the time of day, reducing blue light exposure and helping to minimize eye strain during long gaming sessions. It’s especially useful for late-night gamers.

Keep Your System Clean

CCleaner helps you maintain your PC’s performance by cleaning up unnecessary files, managing startup programs, and fixing registry issues. Regular maintenance with CCleaner can help keep your gaming rig running smoothly.

Simplify Modding Your Games

For gamers who love to mod their games, Nexus Mod Manager is an invaluable tool. It simplifies the process of installing, managing, and organizing mods for a wide variety of games, making it easy to customize your gaming experience.

No-Nonsense Antivirus

Antivirus software is essential for protecting your PC but often hogs resources. Malwarebytes is lightweight and doesn't slow down your PC, making it perfect for gamers who want to keep their system safe without sacrificing performance.

Lite-Modding That Anyone Can Do

ReShade is a post-processing tool that lets you tweak your games' appearance with filters and effects. It's perfect for modding enthusiasts who want to improve the visual quality of their games without extensive modding knowledge.

Alternative Voice Communication

TeamSpeak is another great option for voice communication, especially if you prefer a more traditional server-based system. It offers high-quality voice chat, low latency, and is widely used by professional gaming teams.

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Backup and Transfer Game Saves

GameSave Manager allows you to backup, restore, and transfer your game saves with ease. It supports a wide range of games and can be a lifesaver if you’re upgrading your hardware or reinstalling your OS.

Detailed GPU Information

GPU-Z provides detailed information about your graphics card, including specifications, performance data, and real-time monitoring. It’s a handy tool for gamers who want to keep an eye on their GPU’s health and performance.

Get a Detailed Overview of Your System

Speccy is a full system information tool that gives you detailed insights into your PC’s hardware. It’s useful for diagnosing issues, planning upgrades, and ensuring your system is running at its best.

Benchmark and Record Your Gameplay

FRAPS is a classic tool for benchmarking your PC’s performance, capturing screenshots, and recording gameplay footage. It’s simple to use and provides reliable performance metrics for gamers who want to optimize their setup.

Remote Play at Its Finest

PC Remote Receiver lets you remotely control your PC from your mobile device on the same network. You can launch games, get on-screen controller buttons, connect any Bluetooth controller, and stream games directly to your smartphone. It also lets you control your PC with features like shutting down with a single tap and using a customized on-screen mousepad.

The Browser for Gamers

Opera GX brings many features tailored specifically for gamers, including Discord and Twitch integration, resource control, and a gaming corner with news and deals. It ensures your browser doesn’t consume valuable resources you'd rather allocate to gaming.

Quick Audio Device Switching

This small utility lets you switch between different audio devices with a simple keyboard shortcut. It's perfect for gamers who frequently switch between headphones and speakers.

Powerful Audio Editing

Audacity is a powerful, free tool for audio recording and editing. It's great for creating high-quality game commentary or editing soundtracks. Audacity is highly versatile and user-friendly, making it a valuable addition to any gamer's toolkit.

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Remote Access and Support

This remote access software is invaluable for troubleshooting and managing your PC from afar. It’s particularly useful if you need to access your gaming PC while you’re away or if you want to assist friends and family with their tech issues.

Versatile Media Player

An alternative to VLC, this media player is lightweight and highly customizable. It's perfect for playing a wide range of media formats without the bloat of some other media players.

Detailed Hardware Information

CPU-Z provides detailed information about your system’s hardware, including the CPU, memory, and motherboard. It’s useful for monitoring your system’s performance and ensuring everything is running smoothly.

Voice Command Automation

VoiceAttack lets you control your PC and games with voice commands. It’s particularly popular among sim gamers for creating custom voice macros to control in-game actions.

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