How to drift: five steps from first slide to first chain
To drift in Slipline Garage, build speed past 50 km/h, steer into the corner and tap the handbrake to break the rear tires loose, then steer into the slide and use part throttle to hold the angle. Drive straight for 1.2 seconds afterwards and the points you built are banked.
That is the whole loop. The rest of this guide slows it down.
Why the car slides at all
Slipline Garage does not play a sideways animation when you press a drift button. There is no drift button. Each axle has a limited amount of grip, and that grip is shared between going forwards and going sideways. Ask the rear tires for more than they have — by locking them with the handbrake, or by pouring on power mid-corner — and they let go. The rear swings wide. That is a drift.
Because the slide comes from grip running out, everything you do with the throttle and steering changes it. That is good news: it means the car is always telling you something, and it means the slide is yours to control.
Step 1: Build speed
Hold W or ↑. You need at least 29 km/h for any slide to score, and around 50–70 km/h for the first one to feel right. Slower than that and the car simply turns. Much faster and things happen quicker than you can react while you are learning.
Lesson 1 in the Drift Academy is only about this: reach 70 km/h, then stop in a marked box. It teaches you how much road the car needs.
Step 2: Turn in and start the slide
Steer toward the corner with A/D or the arrow keys. A moment after the nose starts to turn, tap Space — the handbrake — for about a quarter of a second. The rear wheels lock, lose most of their sideways grip, and the tail steps out.
Two mistakes are common here:
- Holding the handbrake too long. A tap starts a slide. A hold kills your speed and spins the car.
- Pulling it before you steer. With no steering input the car just slows down in a straight line.
There are other ways to start a slide — a burst of power, or lifting off sharply mid-corner. They are covered in three ways to start a slide.
Step 3: Countersteer
This is the part that feels backwards. The moment the rear steps out, the car is rotating into the corner faster than you want. To stop it going all the way round, the front wheels need to point into the slide — the opposite way to the corner.
The easy way: let go of the steering. In this game the front wheels self-align toward the direction the car is actually travelling, the way a real car’s steering does when you loosen your grip. Release the key and the wheels start countersteering for you. Then add a little steering either way to fine-tune.
The full explanation, with practice drills, is in countersteering explained.
Step 4: Hold it with the throttle
Once the car is sideways, the throttle is your steering wheel.
| Throttle | What the car does |
|---|---|
| Flat out | Rear stays very loose, angle grows, likely spin |
| About half | Angle holds steady |
| Lifted | Rear grips up, car straightens |
On a keyboard the throttle is on or off, so “half” means tapping it — short presses with gaps. It feels clumsy for the first ten minutes and natural after that. Lesson 5 asks you to hold one scoring drift for four seconds, which is exactly this skill.
Step 5: Exit clean and bank
Points build up in a chain while you slide. They are not yours yet. Ease off, let the car straighten, and after 1.2 seconds of calm driving the chain is banked into your score. Hit a wall or spin before then and the chain is gone.
That one rule shapes how you drive: a tidy medium slide you finish is worth more than a huge one you bin. See how drift scoring works for every number.
A ten-minute practice plan
- Open Free Drive on Academy Yard. No timer, no walls nearby.
- Do five handbrake starts in a row. Do not try to hold them. Just start, release the steering, let the car straighten.
- Now try to hold each one for two seconds using throttle taps.
- Circle the painted ring in the middle of the yard without straightening.
- Go and run the Oval Warm-Up challenge. Your first bronze is 1,700 points.
When that works, the rest of the game — the other three tracks, the other five cars — is the same five steps at different speeds. For a broader overview, start from the Slipline Garage drifting games guide.