Zwift goes off-road, uses your smartphone to add in-game steering trial

It was only a matter of time. You can now actually steer your avatar in Zwift. Well, sort of. As part of their FutureWorks live testing and development program, Zwift is allowing you to try out the steering option in a new singletrack section of the Titan Grove expansion.

Not only is this the first time for real steering input, but it’s also the first time for mountain bikes within Zwift.

In order to try it out, you’ll need to be using the Zwift Companion app on your smartphone, with the phone attached to your handlebars. Then, when you ride by the singletrack section in the Watopia Titan Grove expansion, you’ll get an on-screen prompt asking if you want to try it out. Select yes, and you’ll have to center your bars to calibrate the steering. The app is designed to use the accelerometers in your phone to sense movement, which is then relayed to the game in as steering input.

The singletrack section is about 2 miles in length, and there’s scoring for how well you corner. As a bonus, if you finish under 12:30 with a 100% score, you’ll unlock the Zwift Mountain Bike and Zwift Mountain Wheels to use elsewhere in the game.

While steering is currently limited to your smartphone, Zwift says that the option will be integrated into the new smart bikes like the Wahoo KICKR bike and StagesBike – which is good news if you plan on buying a multi-thousand dollar smart bike.

The feature is currently in development, but Zwift is looking for your opinion on whether or not you’d like to see more of this in the future!

Update: Zwift just sent out an official invitation to try FutureWorks: Steering on Oct 1. More info on where to find it for now & how to play along here.

zwift.com