Stick Drift Test
Let go of your sticks and read the resting values. A graded severity meter tells you whether your controller has no drift, minor wear, or a stick that needs repair.
Connect your controller, let go of both sticks, and read the drift severity above. A healthy stick rests at 0.000.
| Resting magnitude | Severity | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| < 0.01 | None | Healthy — within normal noise |
| 0.01 – 0.05 | Minor | Slight wear; usually masked by in-game deadzone |
| 0.05 – 0.15 | Moderate | Noticeable drift; can affect aiming and menus |
| > 0.15 | Severe | Faulty potentiometer or Hall sensor; needs repair |
Stick drift is when an analog stick reports movement while nobody is touching it. In conventional potentiometer sticks it is caused by physical wear on the resistive track the sensor rides against: the contact becomes electrically noisy and the resting position stops reading as true centre, so your character or camera moves on its own.
How to test for stick drift
- Connect your controller and press a button so the browser detects it.
- Place the controller on a flat surface and take your hands off both sticks.
- Read the resting magnitude and severity for each stick. A healthy stick sits at 0.000.
- Give each stick a full rotation and let go again — drift often shows up worse right after movement, once the stick fails to re-centre.
Reading the severity levels
The meter grades the largest resting movement on each stick:
- None (< 0.01) — normal sensor noise. Nothing to worry about.
- Minor (0.01–0.05) — early wear. Most games apply an inner deadzone that hides this, so you may not feel it yet.
- Moderate (0.05–0.15) — you will notice slow camera creep and cursor movement in menus.
- Severe (> 0.15) — the stick moves your character on its own. The potentiometer or Hall sensor needs replacing.
Why deadzones matter
Every platform ignores a small amount of stick movement near centre — the deadzone. Xbox and PlayStation controllers ship with an inner deadzone of roughly 0.05–0.08, which is exactly why a controller that reads 0.03 here can still feel fine in most games. Once resting drift climbs past that deadzone, the input leaks into the game and you get uncommanded movement. Some games (and Steam's controller settings) let you widen the deadzone to mask minor drift as a stop-gap.
What causes stick drift
The classic cause is the carbon potentiometer wearing down and feeding a non-zero voltage at rest. Dust under the stick module and a worn centring spring make it worse. Newer Hall-effect sticks use magnets instead of contacts and are far more drift-resistant, which is why replacement Hall modules have become a popular fix.
Potentiometer and Hall effect sticks compared
| Potentiometer | Hall effect | |
|---|---|---|
| How position is sensed | A wiper physically contacts a resistive track | A sensor measures the magnetic field of a nearby magnet |
| Physical contact in the sensor | Yes — the wiper drags across the track | No — nothing touches |
| Main wear mechanism | The track wears and the contact becomes electrically noisy | The sensing element itself does not wear |
| Drift over time | Common; this is the usual end-of-life failure | Largely designed out, though not impossible |
| What can still fail | Springs, housing, stick cap, click switch | Springs, housing, stick cap, click switch — and calibration can still drift |
Sources: MDN — Gamepad API · MDN — Gamepad.axes · W3C — Gamepad specification
Found an error on this page, or a result that does not match your hardware? Tell us and we will correct it.
Frequently Asked Questions
What counts as stick drift?
Any stick movement the game registers while you are not touching the stick. On this test, a resting magnitude above about 0.01 is measurable drift; above your platform's deadzone (roughly 0.05–0.08) it starts affecting gameplay.
My stick reads 0.03 at rest — is that bad?
That is minor wear. It sits inside the deadzone on Xbox and PlayStation controllers, so most games will not react to it. Keep an eye on it; if it climbs past 0.08 you will start to feel it.
Why does drift look worse after I move the stick?
A failing stick struggles to spring back exactly to centre. Rotating it and letting go exposes that — the resting value settles higher than it does from a cold start.
Can I fix stick drift myself?
Sometimes. Blowing compressed air under the stick or applying electrical-contact cleaner can clear dust-related drift. Persistent drift usually means replacing the stick module — Hall-effect replacements resist drift far better than the stock parts.
Does widening the deadzone fix drift?
It hides minor drift rather than fixing it. Steam and many games let you increase the inner deadzone so small resting movement is ignored, but severe drift will still break through.
Is this accurate for Switch Joy-Cons?
Yes, once the Joy-Con is paired to your computer over Bluetooth. For Switch-specific pairing steps and Nintendo's repair programme, use the Joy-Con drift test.