How to Counter Strafe in Valorant: Guide with Training

Controlling the spray pattern and shot accuracy of your weapon can be learned and mastered. But pros have uncovered a new kind of technique to peek and achieve kills in Valorant - counter strafing.

Strafing in video games such as Riot Games’ Valorant means to move sideways, while anti-strafing is moving in the opposite direction. But what is counter-strafing? Let’s go ahead and check out how to counter-strafe Valorant, and how to practice it!

What is Counter Strafing in Valorant?

Counter-strafing refers to instantly stopping your side-ways movement in gameplay. So while you move in one direction sideways, if you want to start counter-strafing, you’ll just press the movement key for the opposite direction to make a successful counter-strafe.

So you’ve picked the Vandal or Phantom and entered a match. You’re trying counter-strafing, but you have no clue how to accurately do it, nor why counter-strafing means moving in the opposite direction. So let’s go ahead and check out a guide on how you can counter-strafe in Valorant!

How Can I Counter Strafe in Valorant?

First, enter a custom game or the Practice Range to start getting the feel of counter-strafing. Now here’s a complete guide on how to counter-strafe in Valorant:

1. Start going sideways by pressing your movement keys A or D

2. Quickly press the opposite key: if you’re pressing A, quickly press D. If you’re pressing D, quickly press A and don’t move

3. Shoot with your weapon

4. Optional: retreat behind the initial cover from the same direction where you were counter-strafing

While you’re trying counter-strafing, try to see where your first bullet lands once you instantly press D or A and make your first shot. This leads us to why counter-strafing is important in Valorant: the first shot accuracy of the bullet is as if you’re standing still.

Valorant’s first-shot accuracy may not be important in lower ranks, but as you start to climb to higher ranks like Radiant you start to notice something. The moment the enemy peeks at you, you’ll die. That’s because of the shot accuracy of their weapon. Their pre-aim to the head combined with the counter-strafe accurate shot makes for an instant kill.

How to Train Counter-Strafing in Valorant

As you could’ve guessed by now, counter-strafing isn’t just something you can do out of the blues. You’ll have to practice counter-strafing, implement it in your gameplay style, and slowly but surely you’ll start mastering counter-strafing. So next we’ll check out how you can train and practice counter-strafe in Valorant:

1. Enter the Shooting Test of the Practice Range

2. Choose Sage

3. Shoot the Practice buttonon the board

4. Place a Sage Wall

5. Move Left and Right of the wall, counter-strafe by pressing the opposite keys, and practice and shoot the bots

With this method of training, see where your first shot lands. If the first shot is inaccurate, then practice pressing the key heading in the opposing direction much faster. You want your first shot of the counter-strafe in Valorant to be accurate, especially with the Vandal.

Another thing with the counter-strafe in Valorant is moving enemies. Your movement error can be fixed, but if the enemy is moving and you’re not aiming, then he’ll defeat you first. To practice this, press F3 at the Range, and set the bots to Strafing. This way, the bots will move and you’ll be able to practice counter-strafing more efficiently.

Once you get the hang of the first accurate shot of counter-strafing, you must implement the practice into gameplay. Lots of players forget to counter-strafe in-game even though they got the hang of it with their smiley crosshair!

To do counter-strafing in gameplay, a simple way is to always remember and say to yourself in your mind to counter-strafe. Once you fully commit your mind to counter-strafing, you’ll slowly start to do it by instinct.

Valorant Counter-Strafe Tips and Tricks

Riot Games made this mechanic with intent, and we should use it. But some tricks up our sleeves with counter-strafing wouldn’t hurt. So below you can check out some counter-strafing tips and tricks.

• Don’t crouch: when you’re counter-strafing in Valorant, most of the time you’ll want to defeat the enemy at the first bullets. So don’t instantly crouch. Crouch only if you’re not dead and are spraying your weapon
• Practice peeking: most of the time you’ll use counter-strafe for peeking. So practice wide-angle peeking, as well as normal peeks
• Pre-aim: if you know where the enemies are behind a wall, pre-aim them. Then counter-strafe and shoot for better accuracy

That’s everything you need to know about counter-strafing in Valorant. Always try to remember the counter strafe’s first bullet, be quick with the opposite A-D key movement, and aim accurately. If this guide helped you out, then you should definitely visit our Youtube channel for more Valorant guides and other Riot Games content!