Settings

Input customization, button mappings, audio, and controller compatibility.

General

The General tab contains permission and audio settings. All settings are applied in real-time and persist across app restarts. A Reset to Defaults button at the bottom restores factory values for this tab.

Run in Background

When enabled, the Remote Play connection stays alive when you switch to another app or turn off the screen. A persistent notification is shown while connected. This is useful for keeping macro playback and audio running while using other apps.

While running in background:

• The connection, active macros, microphone, and game audio remain active.
• Controller inputs and recordings are disabled — the phone cannot receive controller events while the app is not in the foreground.

Microphone

When enabled, the microphone captures audio from your phone and sends it to the console as voice chat during Remote Play.

The first time you enable the microphone, Android will prompt for microphone permission. If permission is denied, you can grant it later from your phone's app settings.

When the microphone is enabled, two additional settings appear:

• Input Device — Select which microphone to use. The dropdown lists all available audio input devices, "Auto" defaults to internal phone mic.
• Mute Trigger — Assign a controller trigger to toggle the microphone mute on and off from any screen while connected. This is a global trigger — it works regardless of which screen you are on, unlike record/macro triggers which are screen-specific. The trigger does not work when the app is minimized. See Trigger Types for configuration options.

A microphone icon appears in the top toolbar on all screens while connected to the console. Tap it to quickly mute or unmute the microphone without navigating to Settings. The icon changes to reflect the current mute state.

Audio Output

Game audio from the console is played through your phone's speaker or connected audio device. The speaker is always enabled — use the toolbar icon to silence it.

Output Device — Select which audio output device to use. The dropdown lists all available audio input devices, "Auto" defaults to phone speaker.

Input

The Input tab controls how analog sticks and L2/R2 triggers are processed before being sent to the console. Input settings are applied before button mappings and trigger detection — recordings, triggers and console see the processed values. A Reset to Defaults button at the bottom restores factory values for this tab.

Deadzone

Sticks — Sets a circular center deadzone. Any stick movement with a magnitude below this threshold is ignored and sent as (0, 0) to the console. This prevents stick drift — small unintended movements when the stick is at rest. The deadzone is magnitude-based (circular), not per-axis, so diagonal movements are treated the same as cardinal directions.

• Range: 0–30% of full tilt
• Default: 10% (no deadzone)
• Configured independently for left and right sticks

To find the right value, open the Controller Test screen, release both sticks, and check the Tilt values. If a stick shows a small tilt percentage at rest, set the deadzone slightly above that value.

Triggers (L2/R2) — Sets the minimum raw value before the trigger activates. Values below the deadzone are sent as 0 to the console. Useful for triggers that register a small value at rest.

• Range: 0–110 (on a 0–255 raw scale)
• Default: 0 (no deadzone)
• Configured independently for L2 and R2

Clamp

Sticks — Sets a circular outer boundary that caps the maximum stick output. Any stick movement beyond this percentage is cut off — the output will never exceed the clamp value. For example, if clamp is set to 80%, the stick output ranges from 0–80% and can never reach 100%. The range is not rescaled.

• Range: 40–100% of full tilt
• Default: 100% (full range)
• Configured independently for left and right sticks

Triggers (L2/R2) — Caps the maximum raw trigger output. Any press beyond this value is cut off. For example, if clamp is set to 200, the trigger output ranges from 0–200 and can never reach 255. The range is not rescaled.

• Range: 120–255 (on a 0–255 raw scale)
• Default: 255 (full range)
• Configured independently for L2 and R2

Since values above the clamp are cut off before trigger detection, any trigger configured to fire above the clamp range will never activate.

Invert

Inverts a stick axis so that the output direction is reversed. Each stick has independent toggles for the X-axis (horizontal) and Y-axis (vertical).

• Invert X-Axis — Left becomes right and vice versa.
• Invert Y-Axis — Up becomes down and vice versa. Common for flight controls or inverted aim preference.

Swap

Swap L/R Sticks swaps the output of the left and right sticks. When enabled, left stick input is sent as right stick data and vice versa. Useful for southpaw or legacy stick layouts where movement and camera controls are on opposite sticks from the default.

Swap L2/R2 Triggers swaps the output of the left and right analog triggers. When enabled, L2 input is sent as R2 and vice versa.

Enable Axes

Each stick has independent Enable X-Axis and Enable Y-Axis toggles. When an axis is disabled, its value is always sent as 0 regardless of stick position. This lets you lock a stick to horizontal-only or vertical-only movement.

Disabled axes are zeroed out before trigger detection and recording — stick triggers that rely on a disabled axis will not fire, and recordings will not capture movement on that axis.

Mappings

The Mappings tab lets you remap controller buttons so that pressing one physical button sends a different button to the console. For example, you can map Cross to Circle if a game uses a different button layout.

Tap the + button to add a new mapping. Select an Input Button (what you press) and an Output Button (what gets sent). Tap an existing mapping to edit it, or press X to delete.

All 16 controller buttons can be mapped:

• Cross, Circle, Square, Triangle
• L1, R1, L3, R3
• D-Pad Up, Down, Left, Right
• Options, Share, PS, Touchpad Button

Controller Test

A diagnostic screen accessible from the Settings navigation drawer. It displays the real-time state of all controller inputs — buttons, analog triggers, sticks, and touchpad — showing processed values after all settings (deadzone, clamp, invert, swap) and button mappings have been applied.

The screen shows:

• Controller info — Controller name, connection type (USB or Bluetooth), active input settings, and active button mappings.
• Touchpad — Press indicator and a visual canvas tracking up to two simultaneous touch points with X/Y coordinates.
• Triggers — L2 and R2 with analog values (0–255). Labels turn green when the trigger is pressed.
• Bumpers — L1 and R1 press indicators.
• Buttons — D-pad, face buttons, and center buttons (Share, Options, L3, R3, PS) with press indicators.
• Sticks — Visual position circles with X, Y, Angle, and Tilt values for each stick.

Use this screen to verify that your controller is detected, all inputs are mapped correctly, and your settings are behaving as expected. If a button press highlights the wrong label, check your button mappings or see the Controller Compatibility section.

Controller Compatibility

AdaptivePlay works with any USB or Bluetooth HID controller that Android recognizes. The following controllers have been tested.

DualSense (PS5)

Supported over both USB and Bluetooth. All buttons, analog triggers, sticks, and D-pad work on all phones.

• Touchpad press — Works on all phones.
• Touchpad touch and movement — Requires a phone with a newer Linux kernel (5.12+, typically Android 12 or later) that includes the DualSense-specific HID driver. On older phones, the generic HID driver does not expose touchpad touch events. Touchpad press still works.
• Not supported — Haptic feedback, adaptive triggers, and gyroscope/accelerometer are not supported.

Xbox Controllers

Xbox Wireless Controllers (Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S) are supported over Bluetooth and USB. All buttons, analog triggers, sticks, and D-pad work.

• Xbox button — Intercepted by Android at the system level (minimizes the app). This cannot be captured by any app.
• USB on older phones — Xbox USB may not work on phones with older Linux kernels (typically Android 11 or earlier). The generic driver recognizes the controller but does not deliver input events. Use Bluetooth instead.
• Not supported — Vibration is not supported.

DualShock 4 v1 (PS4)

Supported over Bluetooth. All buttons, analog triggers (full analog range), sticks, and D-pad work on all phones.

• Touchpad — Same as DualSense: press works on all phones, touch and movement require a newer Linux kernel (5.12+, typically Android 12 or later).
• Older phones over Bluetooth — All inputs work, but the DS4 v1 may become extremely laggy after extended use on phones with older Linux kernels. This is a system-level Bluetooth stack issue — only a phone reboot resolves it.
• DS4 v1 USB — The original DualShock 4 is charge-only over USB and does not transmit input data. Only the DS4 v2 supports USB data. Use Bluetooth for v1 controllers.
• Not supported — Vibration and gyroscope/accelerometer are not supported.

USB vs Bluetooth

Both USB and Bluetooth work well for controller input. USB provides the most consistent timing with lowest jitter, both are more than sufficient for 60fps gameplay, recording and consistent macro playback.

Older Phones

Phones with older Linux kernels (before 5.12, typically Android 11 or earlier) use a generic HID driver for controllers instead of controller-specific drivers. This affects different controllers in different ways:

On all older phones, touchpad touch and movement is non-functional for any controller — the generic HID driver does not expose touchpad events. Touchpad press still works on DualSense (remapped automatically). The Controller Test screen is the best way to diagnose what is and isn't working on your phone.

USB OTG Setting

Some phone manufacturers disable USB OTG (On-The-Go) by default and require you to enable it manually before a USB controller will be detected. This is a manufacturer-specific setting, Samsung and Google Pixel phones do not require this. Affected manufacturers may include Sony, Motorola, OnePlus, Xiaomi and Huawei.

If your USB controller is not detected, search your phone's settings for "OTG". The toggle is typically found under System, Additional Settings, Connected Devices, or Battery — the exact location varies by manufacturer and OS version.

Other Controllers

AdaptivePlay should work with any USB or Bluetooth controller that Android recognizes as a gamepad. The controllers listed above have been fully tested, but many other controllers use the same standard HID protocol and will work without any issues.

If your controller's inputs are not registering correctly — such as buttons being swapped, triggers not responding, or inputs activating the wrong actions — this is often a simple button mapping issue that can be resolved with an app update. Please email support@adaptiveplay.app with your controller model, phone manufacturer/model/android version and a description of the problem, and we will work on adding support for it.

If you have a controller not listed above that is working perfectly, we'd also like to hear from you — email us so we can add it to the list of verified compatible controllers.