How To Change FOV In CS:GO/CS2

FOV, or field of view, is a video setting you will see in almost every first-person shooter game, so Counter-Strike 2 is not an exception. It essentially determines how far away or close your weapon hand is, affecting how much of the game world you can see at a time.

Having a high FOV value means your weapon hand will be placed further away from your screen, appearing smaller, hence allowing you to see more of your screen. Meanwhile, a lower FOV value means your weapon hand is closer to your screen, which will take up a large portion of what you can see.

Therefore, it is widely considered by players and professionals that a higher FOV value is more effective, since it is less distracting and covers up the least amount of space on your screen at any given time.

In CSGO and CS2, Valve decided to set the default FOV value for all players to 60. However, players have room to adjust between 54 to 68.

A FOV value of 60 essentially places it around the middle of the two extremes, but we still do not recommend keeping the default FOV value. Your weapon hand will appear way too large, especially when you are holding a large weapon like the AWP. With that out of the way, let’s talk about how you can change your FOV value in CS2.

Fortunately, changing your FOV value in Counter-Strike 2 is extremely simple. It follows a two-step process:

• Enabling the developer console
• Using the CS2 FOV command

Let’s thoroughly go through these steps one by one!

Enabling the Developer Console

We are going to use the CS2 FOV command later, but it is only possible if we have our developer console enabled. If you already have it turned on, you can skip this step. If not, follow the steps below:

1. Launch Counter-Strike 2 and go to your Settings page.
2. Next, navigate to the “Game” section.
3. The first option you see should be “Enable Developer Console”.
4. Change the setting from “No” to “Yes”.

Now that the console is enabled, you can press your tilde (~) key to open and close it. 

CS2 FOV Command

Once your console is up and running, you can start using the CSG FOV command to change your field of view. As mentioned earlier, you can select a value between 54 to 68, with the former being the lowest FOV and the latter being the highest FOV.

The viewmodel command is: “viewmodel_fov <value>”.

For example, you would like to use the maximum FOV value. In that case, you would open your developer console and type in the command “viewmodel_fov 68”.

With everything in mind, it is important to understand that FOV is just one component of your viewmodel. If you are not satisfied with the changes the FOV has left on your weapon hand, there are further customization options you can use.

Changing Viewmodel Offset

The first set of viewmodel options we’ll cover is the viewmodel offset. The viewmodel offset commands are used to help adjust your FOV to a specific degree.

There are three components to the viewmodel offset, which are X, Y, and Z. Each of these components will adjust various metrics to your FOV and viewmodel’s position. Let’s go over what each of them changes.

X Viewmodel Offset

The X viewmodel offset is responsible for adjusting the left and right placement of your weapon FOV. You can move your weapon hand closer to the center of your screen, or push it all the way to the right.

The X viewmodel offset command is:

viewmodel_offset_x <-2.5 to 2.5>

Y Viewmodel Offset

The Y viewmodel offset is used to move your weapon hand front and back, which further helps with determining your FOV. However, playing on maximum FOV and maximum Y offset might make your screen look awkward, so we recommend a value of 0.

The Y viewmodel offset command is:

viewmodel_offset _y <-2 to 2>

Z Viewmodel Offset

The Z viewmodel offset will determine the up and down placement of your weapon hand. You can lift up your weapon hand, or drop it down by tweaking the Z offset values. Preferably, you would want your Z value to be on the negative side.

The Y viewmodel offset command is:

viewmodel_offset _z <-2 to 2>

Changing Viewmodel Preset Pos

The third aspect of your viewmodel is the “preset pos,” or preset position. Valve has already added in three preset positions for your viewmodel in case you don’t know what offsets and FOVs to use.

If this is the case, you can just use one of the three preset positions and go on with your day. Here is what each preset position does.

• viewmodel_presetpos 1: This viewmodel preset uses the Desktop preset, which sets your FOV value to 60, and your offsets to X: 1, Y: 1, and Z: -1.
• viewmodel_presetpos 2: This viewmodel preset uses the Couch preset. We recommend against this preset as it makes your viewmodel look extremely awkward.
• viewmodel_presetpos 3: This viewmodel preset uses the Classic preset, which sets your FOV value to 68, and your offsets to X: 2.5, Y: 0, Z: -1.5. This is the viewmodel used by most players in the early days of Counter-Strike, hence why it is called the “Classic” preset.

Overall, the most effective preset position has to be the third one, as it is used by most players in Counter-Strike since it offers a FOV value of 68.

Cheat FOV Commands

There is one final FOV command that allows you to go past the FOV limit, but it is a cheat command that can only be used on a private server where cheats are enabled. This command is extremely handy when you are recording highlights for your frag movie, as increasing the FOV past the limit can make your weapon hand look more zoomed out and aesthetically pleasing. 

The command is: “fov_cs_debug”

Instead of the default 54 to 68 FOV values, you can select any FOV you desire as there are no limits. You can choose a value of 120 to make your FOV extremely zoomed out, or you can also use a value of 40 to see what it looks like.

Remember that you must activate cheats on the server by using the “sv_cheats 1” command, and it cannot be used on Valve’s official matchmaking servers since you don’t have admin permissions.

Almost every professional player has identical viewmodel settings, as they can widely agree that these are the best possible settings.

The most common viewmodel used by pros includes the following:

• Viewmodel FOV: 68
• Viewmodel Offset X: 2.5
• Viewmodel Offset Y: 0
• Viewmodel Offset Z: -1.5

If you were paying close attention throughout the whole article, you would notice that these are settings that come from the “Classic” preset. These settings are best because they use an FOV value of 68, which is the maximum. Though we spent a section of the article discussing about the offsets, the changes aren’t too significant so most professionals did not tweak them as much, and chose to stick to what was offered.