Whether you’re a casual pubs player or someone who enjoys the more serious environment of ranked queues, there’s nothing better than beaming an enemy using the very best controller settings in Apex Legends.
Depending on whether you are playing controller on computer, old generation devices, or even on the latest console, your aim assist strength will vary. Since season 22, those playing controller on PC and in crossplay lobbies now play on a 0.3 aim assist strength, while PlayStation 4 and Xbox One users continue to use 0.6 in console lobbies.
If you’re a casual player, the aim assist nerf may have impacted your battle royale gameplay. But, it’s nothing practice can’t fix. Here are our recommendations for the best controller settings on Apex Legends in 2024.
Apex Legends: Top controller settings
While settings are down to preference and comfortability (with some utilising the claw grip), there are better options than others (regardless of how you hold the controller). If you don’t want to use the claw grip, you can rearrange the button layout to suit your needs.
Button layout settings
We recommend either Bumper Jumper or Button Puncher presets for beginners. These either swap Jump with Tactical Ability, or Melee with Crouch. If you want to experiment further, we highly recommend combining these presets under the Customized preset option.
You should also swapping the triggers and bumpers if you’re playing on PlayStation 5. This change is recommended exclusively for PS5 users due to the stiffness of the bumpers. Swapping these round should feel more seamless and remove that frustrating stuttering effect bumpers can cause mid-spray.
Having Crouch on the right analog stick lets you easily bunny hop, while moving your Jump to left trigger means you can execute wall bounces and become a difficult target while reloading.
Be mindful a Customized preset will take time to get used to. If anything feels uncomfortable after multiple sittings, rearrange the preset settings to suit your playstyle and match priorities. For example, if you use explosives as much as your abilities, then moving the Grenade slot to a bumper (similar to CoD settings) may feel more natural.
Controller settings
You can refer to our images for the best settings, but here is a rundown to why each setting has been picked:
General
| Setting | Choice | Reasoning |
|---|---|---|
| Stick Layout | Default | There’s no need to change this as it will only confuse your gameplay. |
| Interact/ Reload button | Tap to use and reload | As reviving is the same button as interact and reload, it’s better to tap to use, and hold to revive to limit team reset mistakes. |
| Crouch button | Hold | Hold removes any extra steps you’d need to adjust your movement. |
| Aim button | Hold | Same reason as Crouch. |
| Survival Slot | On | Leave on for beginners, turn off if you’ve mastered your settings. |
| L2/R2 Button Deadzones | Default | Set this to None if you’re aiming and shooting with triggers. |
| Menu Cursor Speed | Over halfway | This setting is only relevant to armor swap speed. |
Movement and Aiming
| Setting | Choice | Reasoning |
|---|---|---|
| Look sensitivity | Four | You want this higher than ADS speed to track enemies while using hip-fire. |
| ADS | Three | This should be lower than your overall sensitivity so you can track enemy movements in mid- to long-range fights. |
| Response Curve | Linear | Linear gives more freedom in control and tracking. It doesn’t feel as stiff and slow as Classic. |
| Movement Deadzone | Small | Unless you have uncontrollable stick drift (I’m looking at you, Genburten), you should leave this on Small. |
| Inverted Look | Off | No explanation needed. |
| Vibration | Off | Turn off vibration so your aim isn’t affected by enemy explosives and abilities. |
Another preference pick, we recommend Linear over Classic to track and adjust your aim quicker while ADSing. Through experimentation, we’ve determined Classic is better for long-range battles (marksman, rifle, and burst weapons), and Linear is stronger on close- to mid-range fights (shotgun and SMGs).
Gameplay and Video
Turn off Taking Damage Closes Deathbox, leave Always Sprint on, turn off FOV Ability Scaling (primarily affects Octane players), and switch Sprint View Shake to Minimal.
Having full control of your deathbox will let you execute armor swaps. Leaving sprint on lets you slide easier and you can easily swap to walk by reducing how much you pull the analog stick. FOV Ability Scaling and shake can cause visual distortion and increase clutter so turning these off is essential for a clutter-free game.
Custom ADS control recommendations
Due to the aim assist nerf that reduces the strength from 0.4 to 0.3 (25 percent reduction) in crossplay lobbies, you will either want to increase or reduce your optic sensitivity. We recommend starting off on Default and adjusting to improve your tracking.
- 1x Optic/Iron Sights – Default Three
- 2x Optic – High (Four)
- 3x Optic – Very High (Five)
- 4x Optic – Very High (Five)
- 6x Optic – Very High (Five)
- 8x Optic – High (Four)
- 10x Optic – High (Four)
- Seer Passive – High (Four)
Advanced Look Controls in Apex Legends
- Deadzone – 15 percent
- Outer Threshold – Five percent
- Yaw Speed – 320
- Pitch Speed – 260
- ADS Yaw Speed – 25 percent
- ADS Pitch Speed – 25 to 28 percent
- ADS Turning Extra Yaw – Zero percent
- ADS Turning Extra Pitch – Zero percent
- ADS Turning Ramp-up Time – Zero percent
- ADS Turning Ramp-up Delay – Zero percent
- Target Compensation – On
- Melee Target Compensation – On
If classic sensitivity settings aren’t for you, you may find better luck with ALC. These are used to set each individual aspect of your movement, strafe, and ADS to a percentage that fits your playstyle. Reduce deadzone as much as you can, but expect stick-drift with ALC enabled.
You will want to mess around with your Yaw Speed (horizontal sensitivity) and Pitch Speed (vertical sensitivity). This will determine how fast you react to danger and how much tracking control you have in a hip-fire spray.
The Reticle is the final change you should make to your tailored settings. I currently use light blue, but you should experiment with reticle colors, and select based on the map you’re playing on. Finally, avoid colors that blend in with enemies (like using a red laser and reticle while playing Recon).
