Questions
How to fix controller stick drift on a Mac
Drift is a stick that reports a small movement when you are not touching it, and it shows up as a camera that slowly turns or a pointer that creeps. The stick is not going to fix itself, but a deadzone hides it completely: ignore everything inside a small circle around centre. On a Mac you can set one in three places.
Measure it first
Let the stick rest and look at where it sits. The deadzone visualizer reads the controller in the browser and shows the resting position as a number; InputConfig's Live Visualizer does the same in the app. A stick resting at 8 percent needs a deadzone a little over 8 percent, not the 25 percent a lot of games default to, which makes the stick feel dead.
Set it in the game or in Steam
Many games have a deadzone slider; Steam Input has one per stick in its layout editor. Either works for that game only.
Set it system-wide
InputConfig sets an inner deadzone per stick, per preset, with a live plot so you can see the drift disappear as you raise it. The deadzone calibrator does the measurement and the setting in one screen. It also offers an outer deadzone, for a stick that no longer reaches full tilt, and a response curve, so the range that is left still feels right. The deadzones page explains each one.
When it is not drift
A pointer that creeps only with a mapper running is sometimes the mapper's own threshold rather than the stick; raise the deadzone a point or two. A stick that jumps rather than creeps is a worn potentiometer, and no deadzone fixes that; that is the one case for a new pad or a Hall-effect stick module.
Questions
Can stick drift be fixed in software on a Mac?
Hidden, yes: a deadzone ignores the resting offset. Measure the drift and set the deadzone just above it.
What deadzone should I use?
The smallest that stops the movement, usually 5 to 12 percent. A bigger deadzone makes fine aiming worse.
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