How to sprint in Atomic Heart (or as close as you can get)

Atomic Heart starting village
(Image credit: Focus Entertainment)

If you're looking for an Atomic Heart sprint button… it doesn't exist. Despite P-3's training, he can't sprint through Atomic Heart, although certain upgrades can increase his movement speed. You'd think with the labyrinthine bunkers and open world being infested with killer robots, sprinting would be a given, but no - there is no sprint option as you'd normally think of it in Atomic Heart. P-3 does naturally move faster when walking directly forwards however, and some upgrade options can boost this speed too. Here's what you need to know about sprinting in Atomic Heart and how you can speed up your movement.

How to run faster in Atomic Heart

(Image: © Focus Entertainment)

To move faster in Atomic Heart and get close to a sprint, head to a NORA upgrade station and the upgrade tree for "Character" (aka, yourself). You want to buy the Morning Exercise upgrade in the middle of the top row of upgrades which costs 80 Neuropolymer. It doesn't unlock a proper sprint function, it just increases your base movement speed, so your standard run is now a bit faster. It's important to note that P-3 does naturally move faster when moving directly forward instead of strafing, so bear this in mind when navigating Facility 3826.

Atomic Heart animal tank puzzle

Atomic heart animal tank puzzle

(Image credit: Focus Entertainment)

Solve the (rather gruesome) Atomic Heart animal tank puzzle here!

That being said, it does increase it fairly significantly - maybe 30 percent or so. Making it one of our top Atomic Heart tips and one of the better upgrades overall. Aside from the obvious advantages of being able to escape rampaging red robots, when it comes to stealth, faster movement speed can work pretty well with the X-Ray vision of the Atomic Heart scanner and the distraction abilities associated with telekinesis in Atomic Heart.

For combat however, without a sprint function the best you can get is the dodge (mapped to Circle/B, depending on your controller), which gives a quick boost for evasive purposes but also helps with extending a jump if you use it midair, or getting around a smidge quicker. Otherwise, sorry to say that P-3 is something of a slow poke in Atomic Heart - something to keep in mind in every encounter.

Keep in mind that there aren't any options to adjust the Atomic Heart FOV, unless you use a particular mod, and you can't adjust the Atomic Heart text size either if subtitles are proving difficult to read.

Joel Franey
Guides Writer

Joel Franey is a writer, journalist, podcaster and raconteur with a Masters from Sussex University, none of which has actually equipped him for anything in real life. As a result he chooses to spend most of his time playing video games, reading old books and ingesting chemically-risky levels of caffeine. He is a firm believer that the vast majority of games would be improved by adding a grappling hook, and if they already have one, they should probably add another just to be safe. You can find old work of his at USgamer, Gfinity, Eurogamer and more besides.