Standard Xbox One Wireless Controller gets button remapping feature

Up until now the new Xbox One Elite Wireless Controller was the only kind of controller that offered buttons remapping. On November 16th, Microsoft is announcing that the standard Xbox One controllers will also get button remapping through the Xbox Accessories app as part of the New Xbox One Experience (NXOE).

Being able to customize the standard Xbox One controller was a highly requested feature on the community, but the “ultimate degree of personalization” will continue to be using the Elite controller, Microsoft says.

Here’s the difference between the Elite and standard Xbox controller:

	Elite	Standard
Button mapping
Remap controller buttons	Yes Completely customizable	Yes Only swap button pairs
Remap same button multiple times	Yes	No
Map paddles to buttons	Yes	No
Swap thumbsticks	Yes	Yes
Swap triggers	Yes	Yes
Invert Y axis on thumbsticks	Yes	Yes
Button mapping supported on Windows 10 PCs	All features	No
Hardware settings
Adjust thumbstick sensitivity	Yes	No
Adjust trigger sensitivity	Yes	No
Adjust vibration motors	Yes	No
Adjust Xbox button brightness	Yes	No
Configuration management
Max number of configurations per user	256	1 Per user, per console
Configurations stored on controller	2	No N/A stored on console.
Configuration sync to cloud	Yes	No N/A stored on console.
Custom names for configurations	Yes	No
Preset configurations from first-party publishers	Yes	No

As you can see from the above table, the standard controller can swap buttons in pairs. For example, if you choose to map LT to X, then X will automatically map to LT. Of course, you can always remap buttons in sequence to move a particular button to the position you like.

Another thing to keep in mind is the remaps are not transferable to other consoles. As such, if you move the controller to another console, you’ll have to go through the remapping process all over again. The new feature is available for both first-party wireless and third-party wired controllers.

Microsoft says that the new feature is only available for standard controllers on Xbox One consoles, and PC support is in the pipeline, but there is not a specific release date.

On the other hand, the Elite controller, the only required buttons that need to be mapped in the controller are A and B. Furthermore, the Elite controller includes the ability to map multiple buttons to the same function (e.g., multiple physical buttons or paddles can be mapped to X).

Another unique feature is that the Elite controller can store the remaps into the controller itself, as such you can bring your customization settings to another console or PC.

How to remap buttons on your standard Xbox One Wireless Controller

On Xbox One, you can access the Xbox Accessory app in three different ways:

Settings > Kinect & Devices > Devices & Accessories
Settings > Ease of access > Button mapping
Launch the Xbox Accessories app directly

While the Xbox Elite Wireless Controller packs the best remapping features, it’s still good to see that Microsoft is bringing some customization to the standard controller.

Will you be taking advantage of the new feature? Let us know in the comments below.

Source Major Nelson