Short answer: Apex is a tracking-heavy game. Because enemies move, strafe, slide and tank a lot of damage (high time-to-kill), the player who keeps their crosshair glued to a moving target over a full burst — while controlling recoil — wins, not the player with the fastest flick. So your training priorities are smooth horizontal tracking and recoil smoothing first, with sensitivity tuned for it (Apex uses a 0.022 yaw like Source; a common range is 800 DPI × 1.0–2.0, about 20–40 cm/360). Push FOV up to its 110 cap so you can keep up with strafers. This guide breaks down each piece.
Three things make Apex a tracking game. First, high time-to-kill: most weapons need a sustained burst plus armour cracks, so the fight lasts long enough that holding the target matters more than landing the first pixel. Second, movement: tap-strafing, sliding, bunny-hopping and lurching mean targets rarely stand still, so a flick onto where they were is useless. Third, recoil: you are managing a climbing spray for the whole burst, which is a tracking motion in disguise — you track sideways and pull down at the same time.
The practical takeaway: spend the bulk of your aim practice on smooth horizontal tracking against a strafing target, not on isolated flick reps. Flicking still matters for the opening shot and for snapping to a surprise peek, but in Apex it is the supporting skill, not the main event. For the broader trade-off, read tracking vs flicking aim.
Apex shares the Source-lineage 0.022 yaw, so its sensitivity numbers map cleanly to CS-style cm/360 math. Tracking benefits from a touch more speed than tap-aiming CS, because you need to keep pace with a strafer who can reverse direction instantly. A widely comfortable band:
| Band | 800 DPI sens | Approx cm/360 | Feel & who it suits |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lower | 0.8–1.1 | ~40–28 cm | Smoother long-range tracking and recoil; needs more pad to turn |
| Medium | 1.1–1.6 | ~28–20 cm | The popular all-round band; keeps up with close strafes |
| Higher | 1.6–2.0+ | ~20–16 cm | Fast close-range duels and quick turns; harder to keep tracking calm |
Remember eDPI = DPI × sens and that cm/360 is the cross-game truth. If you also play CS2 or Valorant, match cm/360 between them so one muscle memory carries over — line them up with our cm/360 calculator and sensitivity converter. Generic pro tendency: many high-level Apex players sit in the medium band above, but exact values are personal — pick one and commit.
Apex allows a field of view up to 110, and most serious players push it high. A wider FOV shows more of the screen, which helps in two tracking-specific ways: you keep a fast strafer inside your view instead of losing them off the edge, and you spot flanks and third-parties sooner. The trade-off is that distant targets render slightly smaller, so very long-range poke shots take marginally more precision — a fair exchange in a game decided mostly at close and mid range.
Many players settle between 100 and 110. Whatever you choose, keep it constant and match your aim trainer to the same FOV so your tracking calibration transfers. Use our FOV calculator to convert Apex's horizontal value into your trainer's unit on your monitor's aspect ratio.
▶ Open the Apex aim trainerTracking is a trainable, isolatable skill. Drill it deliberately rather than hoping it improves from ranked alone:
| Drill | Time | How to do it | Builds |
|---|---|---|---|
| Smooth strafe-track | 5 min | Keep crosshair centred on a bot strafing left/right at steady speed | Speed-matching, not chasing |
| Direction-change track | 5 min | Bot reverses direction randomly; absorb the change without overshoot | Reaction + micro-correction |
| Track-while-recoil | 5 min | Track a strafer while firing a full mag, pulling down through recoil | The real Apex motion |
| Close-range hipfire track | 5 min | Short-range, fast strafes, keep crosshair on chest | The close-range meta |
The key mental cue for tracking is match the target's speed, do not chase its position. Chasers oscillate behind and ahead of the target; trackers move with it and only make small corrections. Build a daily block of this with our tracking aim drills and a structured warm-up from the best aim training routine.
Every Apex weapon has a fixed recoil pattern, and because you fire long bursts you must counter it for the whole magazine. Recoil smoothing means blending the downward pull that fights vertical climb into your horizontal tracking so it reads as one fluid motion, not a jerky two-step. Practise per weapon: spray a full mag at a wall to memorise the climb shape, then spray while tracking a strafing bot so the pull-down and the side-track happen together.
Because Apex spreads damage across a long burst, a player who keeps 80% of bullets on target through good recoil smoothing out-damages a player who lands a flashy first shot and then sprays off. This is the single biggest mechanical gap between average and strong Apex players, and it is pure practice — the pattern is the same every time, so it rewards reps.
Most Apex fights collapse to close range as zones shrink and teams push. Up close, targets strafe fastest in screen-space, recoil matters most, and there is no time to reposition your hand — which is exactly why a slightly higher sens and a high FOV pay off. Your job is to glue the crosshair to a chest or head while the enemy strafes and slides, win the damage race, and reset for the next fight. Tracking, recoil smoothing, FOV awareness and a committed sensitivity are the four pillars; get them consistent and your aim becomes a weapon you can rely on every match. As ever, the deliberate-practice research (Ericsson, Krampe & Tesch-Römer, 1993) is clear that consistent conditions — fixed sens, fixed FOV — are what let the skill consolidate, so lock your settings and train.
Apex has fast movement, strafing and high time-to-kill, so most damage comes from keeping your crosshair on a moving target over a sustained burst rather than one flick. Smooth horizontal tracking plus recoil control wins close and mid-range fights, which is why Apex aim is trained differently from a tap game like CS2.
Apex uses a 0.022 yaw like Source games. A common, comfortable range is 800 DPI with about 1.0–2.0 sens, roughly 20–40 cm/360. A slightly higher sens than CS helps you keep up with strafers up close while leaving enough control for recoil.
Apex lets you raise FOV up to 110. Higher FOV widens your view and helps you track fast strafers and spot flanks, at the cost of making distant targets slightly smaller. Many players use 100–110; pick a value, keep it constant, and match your trainer to it.
Train smooth horizontal tracking on a strafing target: keep the crosshair centred and match the bot's speed rather than chasing it. Combine that with recoil-smoothing practice so you can pull down through a magazine while tracking sideways. Short, daily, focused reps beat long unfocused sessions.
They are inseparable because you fire long bursts — you track horizontally while pulling down to counter recoil, so it is one combined motion. Learning each weapon's pattern and smoothing it into your tracking is what turns hits into knocks at Apex's high time-to-kill.