What Is a Controller Dead Zone, and Should You Change It?
When browsing through your controller settings, you may have seen a setting where you can adjust the “dead zone” of the controller. Dead zone adjustment can be crucial to getting the best experience using a controller if you know what it does.
The dead zone (or sometimes “deadzone”) of a controller is the distance the stick can move from the neutral position before it starts registering as an input in games and applications. A controller with a large dead zone takes longer to register inputs than one with a small dead zone. However, if the dead zone is too small, the controller may become too sensitive. It may even exhibit false inputs when the stick is untouched.
Every controller has an inherent dead zone out of the box, but it can be tweaked to a certain extent. Why would you? There are two main reasons to adjust your controller’s dead zone: eliminating drift or getting a more responsive controller.
Most mainstream controllers use a sensor design susceptible to wear and tear over the course of the controller’s life. Eventually, this wear can exhibit as “drift”, which is when the controller detects inputs when none are present. For example, your character might keep walking even with your thumbs off the stick, or the camera could keep spinning.
Often drift is quite subtle, and by enlarging the dead zone slightly, you can cancel out the effect of drift. This is a great way to extend the life of a controller that’s started to show signs of drift and if you’re lucky, it won’t degrade any further. In the worst-case scenario, you’ll buy some time until the drift worsens to the point where a usable dead zone isn’t possible anymore.
The other main reason to adjust your dead zone is to improve the responsiveness of your controller
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