Driving in BeamNG for the first time can be overwhelming, especially with the fact that the game doesn’t have a clear tutorial. But don’t worry, because this guide is here to help. This guide will look at which cars are best for beginners, the basic controls, and some advanced controls for other cars.
Guide to Drive with Keyboard
your car
Choosing a vehicle to start driving may not be the first thing a BeamNG driver thinks about, but it’s very important. I recommend a basic front-wheel-drive car that you’ll see driving on the road every day in real life. Performance cars are not recommended!
Here are some specific cars and car configurations I recommend:
Cherrier FCV
- Vivace 110
- Tograk 110
- Vivace 160
Hirochi Sunburst
Ibishu Covet
Student driver
Ibishu Pessima (First Generation)
Ibishu Pessima (2nd gen)
The basics
You need the bare minimum controls to drive in Beam NG.
Basic movement
- Up Arrow: Throttle (go forward).
- Down arrow: Brake (also reverse in arcade gearbox, default).
- Left and Right Arrows: Drives left and right respectively.
- Right click and drag: look around
Manual transmissions
- Question: Switches the gearbox mode (down to arcade auto shift and reverse).
- X: Shifts up.
- Z: Shifts down.
- Up arrow (in reverse): Go in reverse.
- Left shift: Clutch.
Cameras
This will go to every camera option in the game. Some vehicles or props may not have all camera options.
- A: Switch between the first three camera options.
- 1: Orbital camera (default)
- 2: Driver POV
- 3: Hood camera
- 4: External camera (cinematic camera, basically)
- 5: Relative (WASD to move camera)
- 6: Follow the camera (always follows you)
- 7: Top down (not recommended in tunnels)
Advanced controls
These are some additional controls you may need and use to play BeamNG.
Reset Formats:
- R: Reset the car to the spin point.
- Enter: Recover Car (reset your car to where you are)
- Hold Insert: Rewind Car (Release for Recovery)
Hand brakes:
- Location: Handbrake (Temporary)
- P: Parking brake (permanent, at least until you press it again)
Other controls:
- V Turn the ignition on/off.
- Koma: Left turn signal
- Duration: Right turn signal
- H: Hank
- N: Toggle headlights.
Vehicle Specific:
- B: Toggle nitrous oxide.
- T: Toggle JATO rockets.
- Ctrl+Q: Switches drive mode (only available on newer cars)