Guide · Updated August 2026
DPI, Polling Rate and Sensitivity: What Mouse Specs Mean
Mouse boxes advertise numbers that sound like performance: 26,000 DPI, 8000 Hz, some acceleration figure in Gs. Two of those matter a little, one of them matters not at all beyond a point, and none of them is the number that decides whether your aim feels right. Here is what each one actually does.
DPI is a unit of distance, not of quality
DPI, or CPI as the more careful manufacturers call it, is how many counts the sensor reports per inch of physical movement. At 800 DPI, moving the mouse one inch sends 800 counts; the operating system turns those into cursor movement. Higher DPI means the cursor travels further for the same hand movement, and nothing else.
So a higher number is not a better sensor. It is a bigger multiplier, and past a certain point it is unusable: at 26,000 DPI, a twitch of a millimetre throws the cursor across the screen. The people who advertise those numbers know this; the setting exists because the specification sheet sells mice.
What matters is that the sensor tracks accurately at the DPI you actually use. Most competitive players sit between 400 and 1600, and modern sensors are effectively flawless across that range, which is why sensor arguments have become quieter over the last few years.
Sensitivity multiplies DPI, and the total is what you feel
Your game applies its own sensitivity multiplier on top of DPI. 800 DPI at 2.0 sensitivity moves exactly as much as 1600 DPI at 1.0, which is why comparing sensitivity numbers between two players tells you nothing unless you also know their DPI.
The figure that does compare is centimetres per 360: how far you have to move the mouse to turn a full circle in game. Somewhere between 25 and 45 cm is common for shooters, and lower is not automatically better; it trades fine aim for fast turns.
Windows adds a third multiplier in its pointer speed slider. Keep it at the middle notch, the sixth of eleven, because that is the only position where the system passes counts through unchanged. Every other position multiplies or, worse, drops counts.
Polling rate is about delay, and it saturates quickly
Polling rate is how often the mouse reports to the computer. At 125 Hz that is every 8 milliseconds; at 1000 Hz, every 1 millisecond. The step from 125 to 1000 removes about 7 milliseconds of average delay, which is genuinely noticeable when you drag a window slowly.
The step from 1000 Hz to 8000 Hz removes another fraction of a millisecond and costs measurable processor time, because the computer now handles eight times as many reports. On a mid-range machine it can lower frame rates in exactly the games it was bought for.
Browsers hide this number by default, which is why most online polling tests report your screen refresh rate instead of your mouse. A test that asks for the raw coalesced samples gets the real figure, and expect to land a little under the rated number: a 1000 Hz mouse usually measures in the high hundreds.
The specs that are mostly marketing
Maximum acceleration in Gs and maximum speed in inches per second describe when the sensor loses track. Modern sensors exceed anything a human arm produces, so unless you play at 400 DPI and swing like a metronome, these numbers are decoration.
Angle snapping, sometimes called prediction, straightens near-horizontal movement. It flatters line drawing and ruins aim, so it should be off; most mice ship with it off and it is worth checking rather than assuming.
Weight is the spec that people underrate. The difference between 90 and 60 grams changes how a mouse feels far more than any sensor figure, and unlike DPI it cannot be changed in software.