Civilization VI is $5.99 on Steam: can your PC run it?

2K’s Autumn Sale is live on Steam with offers running through October 8, and Sid Meier’s Civilization VI is $5.99 today, 90% off. That matches the 90% it got during the series’ 35th anniversary sale, which ran from September 3 to September 17. If you missed that one, here’s another chance. The game came out in 2016, holds an 88 on Metacritic and is still very much alive: 28,761 people are playing it on Steam right now. The good news for PC players is that it asks for very little.

Civilization VI PC requirements

These are the Windows requirements listed on the Steam store page:

	Minimum	Recommended
GPU	AMD 5570, Nvidia 450 or Intel Integrated Graphics 530 (1 GB)	AMD 7970 or Nvidia 770 (2 GB)
CPU	Intel Core i3 2.5 GHz or AMD Phenom II 2.6 GHz	Fourth Generation Intel Core i5 2.5 GHz or AMD FX8350 4.0 GHz
RAM	4 GB	8 GB
Storage	17 GB	23 GB
OS	Windows 7, 8.1 or 10, 64-bit	Windows 7, 8.1 or 10, 64-bit

Both tiers require DirectX 11. The first install needs a one-time internet connection to authenticate the game on Steam.

Which graphics cards run it

At canirun we checked these requirements against the most common GPUs. Every card on our list clears both the minimum and the recommended. Grades are measured against the recommended requirement:

GeForce GTX 1650 and Radeon RX 580: grade A, Smooth. These are the most modest cards on the list, and they still sit well above the recommended.
GTX 1060 6GB, RTX 3050 or Arc B580: grade S, Overkill.

Grades assume 16 GB of RAM. The game asks for less, 4 GB minimum and 8 GB recommended, so memory is rarely the bottleneck. If you’re on an older machine or a laptop, the minimum lists an Intel integrated GPU. For more options, browse our games for low-end PCs.

Steam Deck, Mac and Linux

On Steam Deck, Valve rates it Playable, and canirun gives it a B, which means the Deck meets the recommended requirement. Details are on the Civilization VI Steam Deck page.

The Mac and Linux versions come from Aspyr, and both ask for 6 GB of RAM at minimum:

Mac: macOS 10.14.6 (Mojave), Intel Core i5 2.7 GHz, a 1 GB GPU (GeForce 775M, Radeon HD 6970 or Intel Iris Pro) and 17 GB of space. One catch: Mac and PC versions can fall out of sync during patches. While that lasts, Mac players can only play with other Mac players.
Linux: Ubuntu 16.04 64-bit, Intel Core i3 530 or AMD A8-3870, NVIDIA GeForce 650 with 1 GB of VRAM and 17 GB of space. Aspyr notes that ATI and Intel chipsets are not supported on the Linux version. It also says some Intel i3 processors may need an additional 2 GB swap partition.

Find more games for those platforms on our Mac and Linux pages.

Can your PC run Civilization VI?

Here’s how your PC grades against Civilization VI and against the entries before and after it. Civilization VII asks for a lot more, including 16 GB of RAM recommended:

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