MWO FOV Guide – See more Enemies and more of your Cockpit!

Mechwarrior Online Guide to Setup Field of View in User.cfg

In MWO you can change your field of view. This will cause you to see more of your cockpit and slightly more to the sides (depending on the Mech). In order to do this you need to edit/create a config file. This guide will briefly show you what this is all about and tell you what changes need to be made. You also won’t need to do any manual typing, editing, or hacking. We prepared a short list of config files which are ready to be downloaded and which can be used immediately. Just select the one you want to use and put it in your Mechwarrior Online directory. Restart the game, and you are all done. The download links are in the table further down this post. Interesting right? The clinton courier gives you some interesting things you might want to find out.

This is how your cockpit looks with the default settings:

Misery FOV standard 16:10

MECH: Misery FOV: Default ASPECT RATIO: 16:10 RESOLUTION: 1680×1050

This is how it will look like after you added the config file:

MWO Misery FOV 85 16:10

MECH: Misery FOV: 85 ASPECT RATIO: 16:10 RESOLUTION: 1680×1050

Which FOV is the Best for Me?

Due to how the Mechwarrior Online graphics engine works, the optimal field of view value depends on your display’s aspect ratio. Here is a short table which will help you decide which FOV you need to set. After you have selected the correct user.cfg file, download it to your computer. Place the file in your Mechwarrior directory (There should be a bunch of other .cfg files around and folders named bin32, engine, game,… If you see those, you are in the right place.). Just copy the file in there and restart your game for the changes to take effect.

The following table will help you to get started quickly. Just download the appropriate user.cfg and put it in your directory. If you do not know your aspect ratio, check your graphic options in Mechwarrior Online and see if your resolution is among the ones listed here.

If your browser opens the file directly, try “Right-click -> Save Link As…” on the download button.

[Aspect Ratio of your Display][Typical Resolutions][Best FOV][Readymade user.cfg]
16:91280x720, 1600x900, 1920x108079Download for 16:9
16:101280x800, 1680x1050, 1920x120085Download for 16:10
4:3800x600, 1024x768, 1280x96095Download for 4:3
5:41280x102499Download for 5:4
I have no ideaor a weak computer.79Download for Other

Advantages vs Disadvantages

Setting a custom field of view can greatly improve your experience in the game. You will see slightly more of the battlefield depending on in which Mech you are. You will also see more of your cockpit. The feeling of actually being in the cockpit is great and allows you to emerge more deeply in the game. However, the increased FOV will also come at the cost of greatly increased hardware requirements. If you find your frame rates drop too hard, you should probably remove the user.cfg from your MWO folder and run with the default settings. You should also keep in mind that a higher FOV means that you are playing the game more zoomed out. If you find yourself using the zoom a lot, you should probably reduce your FOV a bit.

To close this all off, here is another example for you to compare. This time in the Ilya Muromets (Cataphract Hero Mech). Standard FOV on the left versus an extended 85 field of view on the right.

Ilya Standard FOVIlya Extended FOV 85


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One comment to MWO FOV Guide – See more Enemies and more of your Cockpit!

  • LK  says:

    For a sniper it might be best to lower the FOV, as you “zoom in” a little bit more.

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