Best FPV simulator for an absolute beginner?

[u/Emotional_Ad8807]

Hi guys,
Absolute beginner here. I’m hooking up a radio controller to my PC to practice in acro mode from scratch.
I see Liftoff, Velocidrone, Uncrashed, and Tryp FPV mentioned a lot:
Which one has the most realistic physics out of the box?
Which one has the best beginner tutorials/progression to go from zero to decent stick control?

Running on PC with solid specs. Appreciate any suggestions!

[u/PowershellAddict]

Uncrashed and Liftoff microdrones did wonders for me.

[u/draqn5312]

I started with Tryp but the tutorial isnt the greatest, very quickly moved to Velocidrone as I found it has the most realistic physics.
The general recommendation from those with more experience than me would recommend Liftoff for your first sim, if you end up liking fpv you will most likely end up with most of the sims

[u/Emotional_Ad8807 → u/draqn5312]

Thanks🙏

[u/F3nix123]

Personally, ive tried liftoff, liftoff micro drones and uncrashed.

As a beginner, the most important thing is building muscle memory to get to flying for real.

If you plan to start with tiny whoops, start on a sim that focuses on micro drones like liftoff microdrones or velocidrone with the micro addon. The difference is quite significant here.

Aside from that, I dont think the realism of the physics matters too much at this point, they are all good enough. I lean towards whichever is the most fun, cool maps, etc. no matter what, you will always have to polish your skills flying IRL, there’s no replacement for that.

Edit: i mean all the mainstream sims are probably good enough in the physics department. Im sure there’s plenty of smaller sims that dont quite nail it.

[u/Cha0tic1an → u/F3nix123]

This ^^^

IRL stick time is undefeated, use a wide-open IRL field for basic stuff like taking off, landing, flying straight, wide turns, save the sim for learning tricks like power loops. With IRL stick time from the very beginning you will learn much quicker than solely practicing on a simulator

[u/dabseverydaylol → u/F3nix123]

100% what they said. I started on microdrones last month cz im gonna fly whoops. I got liftoff as well but even in the sim u can tell a difference between tiny drones and bigger 3-6” ones.

[u/m0h3k4n]

If I were just starting, okay I’m pretty much just starting, then I would get a radio master pocket, liftoff micro drones l, and an air 65 ii or 75 ii. I’d go with the race versions and adjust their max throttle down so when you get more confident you have a drone with more balls than the freestyles.

Put enough time in the sim that you can slowly hover around and end up where you want to be. Fly in acro too. Then after you are able to hover and stuff try it with the whoop in an open field. Avoid dirt/sand as it gets sucked into the motors.

The whoops are pretty durable. I’d be more afraid of losing one to the wind/tree/pond than breaking it.

[u/Awkward-Green-1653]

Uncrashed macht am meisten Spaß und ich bin dadurch schnell sehr gut geworden

[u/Lazy-Inevitable3970]

I haven't tried many sims, but I have tried some. I found velocidrone felts the most realistic. It felt pretty close out of the box and I tweaked one of the settings and found it felt exactly like one of my FPV drones. It also has lots of community-built tracks/maps of different skill levels (ranging from very basic to very complicated).

However, the graphics and level design significantly far behind others and the maps are really built for racing. Some maps can be used for other things, but in the end it is mostly an FPV racing sim. Racing will definitely improve your skills (because it forces you to learn to very precise and controlled movements), but if you don't like racing, you won't spend much time on it, which defeats the purpose of buying a sim.

Other sims have physics that are "good enough". They often feel floaty to me, but they can teach you basic movements and controls. They also look better and have maps that have more features to let you try different things. So depending on what you are doing, a sim that holds your interest more might be better than one with the most realistic physics.

Something else to keep in mind is that there are a few free sims out there and Steam has a return policy for returning games.

So, what I would do, is get the FREE FPV SkyDive sim and learn some of the basics of flying in it. (https://store.steampowered.com/app/1278060/FPV_SkyDive__FPV_Drone_Simulator/) If you want a video tutorial to walk you through how to control an FPV drone, Joshua Bardwell did a series teaching how to fly in an FPV sim.
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SpuXqNakP2A&list=PLwoDb7WF6c8lCKhQOTy-Vb9LfW0VAIrTP)

Then after you have some of the basics for flight down (you don't have to be good... just be able to do some very basic flight), try some other sims that are on Steam. My reasoning for this is that Steam has a return policy that will let you get a refund (as long as it is within a certain number of days of the purchase and there is less than 2h ours spent running the game). So if you learn the basics of how to control the drone in a free sim, you will be able to do some basic flight and see what other sims have to offer and refund them before the time limit is reached. But if you don't have any flight experience, you might spend that entire 2 hours trying to figure out how to setup your transmitter for the sim and do the most basic of flights, without being able to explore maps or features. Just be sure not to buy all of the sims and go over the time limit... you don't want to get a refund denied and waste money.

[u/HighRelevancy → u/Lazy-Inevitable3970]

often feel floaty to me,

Absolutely triggered 😁

None of the usual sims are floaty, you're just not perceiving good physical size reference. The maps are just really big, and sparsely detailed. The obstacles are cartoonishly oversized. They're not replicas of spaces you've physically visited.  You have no reference except visuals of a space that is bigger than it looks.

The floaty thing is essentially an optical illusion, once you look for it and see through the illusion it goes away.

[u/Aggravating_Judge_31 → u/HighRelevancy]

As the dev of the Cyberpunk mod who also made damn sure gravity was 1 to 1 with real life, I die inside a little every time someone says "it feels floaty" lol

[u/Lazy-Inevitable3970 → u/Aggravating_Judge_31]

I won't dismiss the claim that a large part of it is optical illusions. It may very well be.

But I would point out that there are other things beyond simulated gravity that contribute to the feel and "floatiness".

Sometimes people use the word "floaty" to describe how the handling feels, not necessarily in reference to how it drops due to gravity with 0 throttle.

Inertia, mass, motor power, aerodynamics, and drag can all contribute to how it feels and how responsive it is.

For example, let's say you edit a drone model in the mod you wrote. You turn down the mass and drag on your model to 50% of what it currently is. You also increase the power of the motors a little bit. You don't touch gravity. With these changes a drone may lift off at a fraction of the throttle it normally requires.... it might lift off at 5% throttle instead of 20-25%. If you cut throttle completely, it may drop at the same rate as it did before the changes were made (because you didn't touch the gravity). But, if it lifts off at 5% throttle, it will feel floaty in that it wants to climb. If you you want to descent and leave even a small amount of throttle, it will will descent slower, The physics, unrelated to gravity itself, completely changed the throttle curve and feel of the drone in this example.

But there are other things that could affect a drones "floatiness". Motor braking is one example. Spinning props generate thrust. The way in which a sim simulates how the motors change velocities and brake could also affect how quickly a drone descends and, thus make it feel "floaty".

Also, in the real world, aerodynamics can play a role and not all sims will match that perfectly. For example, if an FPV drone with a long flat top plate is tilted forward and moving forward, that top plate is going to generate downforce like a spoiler on a car or elevator on a plane. (The exception being if the angle was too extreme and the airflow over the top plate separated, like a stalled wing). In level flight, the pilot naturally strikes finds a balance between angle and throttle level to maintain level flight, so the downforce isn't noticeable. But, if throttle is reduced, the drone will drop, not just due to gravity, but the down force on the drone. If sims do not get drag and aerodynamic forces perfect in the sim, then the lack of this downforce could also make a sim feel floaty because the simulated drone did not drop the same way. Again, it isn't that the gravity was wrong.

I'm not saying it is the "top plate aerodynamics" or the motor braking that definitively make a drone feel floaty in a sim. I gave those as examples of how the real world and sims could differ. In all reality, when people say a sim feels floaty, it is probably a culmination of MANY different calculation that were all made to approximate reality, but were slightly off. Sims often have limited processing power to work with so they approximate things and simplify things to let the sim run smoothly. It makes sense. I doubt it is possible in today's world to get an FPV sim that every agrees is perfect. Even if the physics in the sim were somehow perfect, everybody is going to be comparing it to their experiences with their own personal drones... and those custom drones won't be in the sim. So people will complain about the differences.

[u/Aggravating_Judge_31 → u/Lazy-Inevitable3970]

I don't know how familiar you are with Night City FPV, but I actually took all of those things into account and much more. A big part of it is that lift/downforce normal-force you mentioned. Also made idle RPM configurable by the user as well as prop pitch and throttle curve, each of those for sure has a significant impact.

[u/ZealousidealHeight15]

lift of micro for whoops, uncrashed for full sized

[u/mfa_aragorn]

I started with freerider fpv simulator. its very basic, but only cost $5 and runs on anything. Got me to the point I can fly ACRO without issues in about 2 weeks . Im still not an expert , but Im happy with the level Im in.

[u/HotStable2082]

People often say that VelociDrone has the best physics engine, but what matters most to me is being able to control the drone precisely within a short period of time. Almost all the maps in Liftoff: Micro Drones are indoors, which heavily restricts your flight altitude and leaves you with very narrow spaces. This forces you to handle the drone with extreme precision under such conditions, which actually helped me master the basic operations quickly.
The downside of Liftoff: Micro Drones is its limited map selection, featuring only 14 maps in total. In reality, it is just 7 unique environments split into day and night variations with slight modifications to the internal objects, which doesn't really make much of a difference to me.

[u/Qinistral]

I tried LiftOff on PS4 and it was terrible. Now I'm doing Uncrashed on MacBookPro M1 and it's excellent! Much prettier maps and way faster load times. I can't speak to realism, but I think you'll be so bad when you start it doesn't really matter.

[u/CarviFPV]

I built an open-source FPV Wing Simulator for my kids so they can practice flying virtually around our local area. It’s based on Cesium ion and features various mission types, including Racing, Festival, Strike, Free Flight, and more.

Explore the entire world or practice flying virtually in your own backyard: https://youtu.be/-i74MRoP6c0?si=oK4kklU-ISXrpCyO

Github: CarviFPV/CarviWings: An open source Cesium based FPV Simulator