The sequence below follows Oscar Liang's slider method for a 5-inch freestyle quad and the Betaflight documentation. It needs nothing more than your eyes, ears and fingertips. A Blackbox log gives a more precise result (see the Blackbox logging article on this site), but Oscar's own comparison found that tuning by feel still beats the defaults.
Before you move anything
- Save a
diff allfirst. If a change goes badly, it is the quickest way back (see the backup article on this site). - Start from the defaults or a suitable preset, with RPM filtering working.
- Fit new props. Oscar Liang tunes on fresh props because damaged ones add noise and throw the tune off. If you normally fly with an action camera, mount it.
- Change one thing at a time, in small steps. Fly about 30 seconds of flips, rolls and punch-outs, then land and feel the motors.
- Turn on Expert Mode. In basic view the 4.3 notes say you only see the three main sliders (PI, D and feedforward).
Keep to sliders once you start. The 4.3 notes warn that if you type PID numbers by hand while the sliders are active and then save from a screen where the sliders are on, your typed values are overwritten by the slider values. If you want to enter numbers, set the slider mode to OFF first. The mode has three settings: OFF, RP (sliders control roll and pitch, yaw is entered by hand) and RPY (all three axes).
What each slider changes
| Slider | Gains | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Damping | D | Resists fast movement and damps P oscillation. Higher helps propwash and wind, but softens stick response and heats motors |
| Tracking | P and I | How firmly the quad follows the sticks and holds its line. Too high gives oscillation, fast bounceback and hot motors |
| Stick Response | Feedforward | Reaction to fast stick moves. Too much causes overshoot at the end of flips and rolls |
| Dynamic Damping | D Max | How far D can rise during fast moves, while base D stays lower in cruise |
| Drift - Wobble | I | Fine adjustment of I. Higher holds orbits and spiral turns; too much gives wobbles on throttle chops |
| Pitch Damping, Pitch Tracking | pitch relative to roll | Fine-tune pitch once roll flies well |
| Master Multiplier | all PID gains | Scales everything in the same proportion |
In the CLI each slider is a simplified_... variable (for example simplified_d_gain or simplified_master_multiplier). The default is 100 and the range is 0-200, which is 1.0 and 0-2.0 on the slider.
Step 1: take I, feedforward and D Max out of the way
To hear what P and D are doing, Oscar Liang first removes everything else:
- Stick Response to 0 (no feedforward),
- Dynamic Damping to 0 (D stays constant),
- Drift - Wobble to 0 (no I),
- I Term Relax off,
- Anti Gravity off.
The quad will feel loose and drift around like this. That is expected for these test flights.
Step 2: find the P/D balance
Move the Damping slider down step by step, test-flying in between, until flips and rolls start to overshoot. Then move it back up one or two notches. That position sets the ratio of P to D, and Oscar keeps it from then on: if one gain goes up, the other goes up in proportion.
Overshoot happens fast and is easy to miss in the goggles. Oscar listens for it instead: a clean flip makes one "whoof", a flip with bounceback makes two. If only pitch overshoots, raise the Pitch Damping slider.
Step 3: raise P and D together
Both Oscar Liang and the Betaflight 4.3 notes say a quad generally tracks best with the highest P and D it can tolerate. There are two ways to raise them without breaking the balance from step 2:
- Move Tracking and Damping to the right together. The 4.3 notes call this the simplest method: go until something bad happens, then back off a little.
- Raise the Master Multiplier one click at a time. Oscar uses this because it keeps every ratio exact.
Betaflight's documentation for the PID Tuning tab is more cautious about the Master Multiplier. It says to leave it alone unless the other sliders run out of range, which typically happens only on low-authority or high-inertia quads such as X-class and cinelifters. Either way, the limits are the same. Back off when you notice any of these:
- motors that are too hot to keep your fingers on for more than a few seconds (Oscar's rule of thumb),
- grinding or humming on arming, or a high-pitched trill in flight,
- a fluttering sound in hard turns at mid to high throttle.
D is the term that burns motors, because it amplifies noise from the gyro. Oscar warns that with too much D the quad can shoot up as soon as you arm it, so stand well back while you push it. If you do not always fly fresh props, leave some headroom in D.
Step 4: bring I back
Set Drift - Wobble back to 1. Oscar notes that the default I usually sits inside a wide working window and rarely needs changing. If I is too low, the quad feels drifty, gets pushed by the wind and needs constant correction. Too much I causes overshoot that is slower than P overshoot, and wobbles when you cut the throttle after a punch-out and descend. Racers often prefer a bit more I for tighter control, freestylers a bit less.
Some bounceback will probably come back with I. The next step deals with it.
Step 5: I Term Relax and Anti Gravity
Turn I Term Relax back on. It stops I from building up during fast moves, which is the usual cause of slow bounceback after flips. If bounceback is reduced but not gone, lower the cutoff: a lower value suppresses I more strongly. Oscar's starting values are 30-40 for racing, 15 for freestyle and 10 or less for big, heavy quads.
Turn Anti Gravity back on. It boosts P and I during fast throttle changes and fixes the nose dipping when you pump the throttle. The default gain is 3.5. Oscar runs 4-6 on his quads, but the Betaflight 4.3 notes advise against raising it without careful testing and say that values of 5 or more may not add much. Go up in small steps, if at all.
Step 6: Stick Response
Raise Stick Response until the quad feels as sharp as you like, and stop if flips start to overshoot. Feedforward cannot make the quad oscillate the way P can, so this slider is more about feel than safety. Oscar ends up around 1.0-1.5. Above that the quad starts to feel jittery to him.
Step 7: Dynamic Damping
Set Dynamic Damping back to 1. With it active, D stays at the base value in calm flight and rises towards D Max in fast moves and propwash, which keeps the motors cooler while cruising. Oscar's way to use it:
- Note the current D Max. With the slider at 0, it equals the base D.
- Move Dynamic Damping to 1.
- Lower the Damping slider until D Max is back at the value you noted. A point or two off makes no noticeable difference.
The result is the same peak damping as before with lower D in cruise. Fly, then check the motor temperature and listen. If they are hotter or sound worse, move the slider down. Oscar often leaves Dynamic Damping at 0, because the boost sometimes arrives too late in a sharp move. On a freestyle quad that runs hot it is worth trying.
The filter sliders
The same tab has two filter sliders. Moving Gyro Filter Multiplier to the right means less filtering and lower delay. Oscar does it one step at a time, checking the motors after each short flight. He stops at the first grinding noise on hover or arming, or when the quad flies worse. Betaflight's documentation calls moving the D Term Filter slider to the right not recommended, because it can cause motor grinding on arming, sudden resonances and serious overheating. Without a Blackbox log, leave it at the default.
When the tune is not the problem
Shakes and jello are not always PID or filter problems. Before you chase a shake with sliders, Oscar Liang suggests checking the camera mount, the props, the flight controller mounting and the motor bearings, and making sure the ESC has a low-ESR capacitor. The post-crash inspection and soft-mounting articles on this site cover those checks.
When the quad flies the way you want, save a fresh diff all. That backup also holds the slider positions.