What is ADS in CoD?

If you’re only just starting to watch competitive shooter players online, you may be wondering what ADS is in CoD (Call of Duty), but we guarantee you’ve encountered it before — largely because the first-person shooter game is impossible to play without it. 

ADS stands for ‘aim down sights’, and is often also used to refer to the animation time between pressing the button and the targeting reticule adjusting for the player on the screen, usually so it can line up with a gun’s iron sights or some sort of optic scope. It is also sometimes referred to as Zoom or ZDS in other modern multiplayer shooter game series like Halo. 

Why should I ADS in CoD?

After you ADS, you’ll have increased accuracy but will trade off for lower look speed, movement speed and a smaller field-of-view. In many shooter series, ADS and ‘Hip Fire’ will have different accuracy rates and deal different amounts of damage. Largely, you’ll want to ADS with most weapons, but with a less accurate gun like a shotgun you may just want to be faster and use the option to Hip Fire (HIP).

If you’d like to lower your ADS in CoD, you can find attachments in many of the Call of Duty games that will do just that. Most of them will also change how the guns will perform in one way or another, so you’ll want to experiment until you’re absolutely sure the changes you have made are working out.   

Did you know what ADS meant already? Do you refer to hip fire? Do you have a preferred weapon attachment loadout to minimise your ADS time? What’s your strategy when playing Call of Duty? Let us know in the comments section below.