Switch Joy-Con & Pro Controller Tester

Pair over Bluetooth, press any button, and every input appears below. Joy-Con drift is the most common fault this page gets used for — the drift test gives you a number, not a feeling.

Stick drift test

Vibration test

Pairing Switch controllers with a computer

With the controller off, hold the small round Sync button (on the side rail of a Joy-Con, on the top edge of a Pro Controller) until the player lights sweep back and forth, then pair from your OS Bluetooth menu. Each Joy-Con pairs as its own controller — you'll see two separate entries with one stick each, which is exactly what you want for isolating a drifting side. Pro Controllers also work over USB-C in Chrome and Edge.

Testing for Joy-Con drift properly

Lay the Joy-Con flat, touch nothing, and run the drift test. Because each Joy-Con has a single stick, test left and right separately. Readings: under 0.05 = healthy; 0.05–0.10 = wear beginning (games mask it with dead zones); above 0.10 = the drift you're seeing in-game is real and hardware-level. Joy-Con sticks are miniaturized potentiometer designs and wear faster than full-size sticks — drift here is wear, not something you caused.

If a stick is drifting

In order of cost: 1) recalibrate on the console (System Settings → Controllers and Sensors → Calibrate Control Sticks) — fixes offset, not true drift; 2) lift the rubber skirt and give a short burst of electronics contact cleaner, work the stick in circles, let it dry — resolves a surprising share of mild cases; 3) Nintendo has offered free Joy-Con drift repairs in several regions regardless of warranty status — check Nintendo support for your country before paying anyone; 4) replacement stick modules cost a few dollars and need only a small Phillips/tri-wing driver — drift-immune Hall-effect modules are available for both Joy-Con and Pro Controllers.

Switch quirks in this tester — expected, not faults

ZL/ZR show 0 or 1 with no in-between: Switch triggers are digital switches with no analog travel — a value that snaps straight to 1.00 is correct behavior. The vibration test usually reports no actuator: browsers don't expose the Switch's HD Rumble, so silence here says nothing about your hardware — test rumble on the console. Button labels: Nintendo's A/B and X/Y positions are swapped relative to Xbox naming, so the highlight position matters more than the letter. Motion controls and the Joy-Con IR camera aren't part of the Gamepad API and can't be tested here.

Testing a different pad? Generic gamepad tester · PS5 DualSense · Xbox Series X|S