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handling.meta field · Grip

fTractionCurveMax

Peak grip

fTractionCurveMax is the peak grip the tyres deliver before they let go, roughly in g. It caps how hard a vehicle can launch, brake and corner; vanilla cars run about twice the grip of a real road tyre.

Unit
~ g
1.0 is about a real road tyre
Vanilla median
2.23
80 % of cars between 1.6 and 2.65
Lap time
−5 s per 1.0
strongest lever after 0-100
Applies
live
SetVehicleHandlingFloat

Try it on a real car

Grip changes three things at once: the launch cap, the cornering speed, and through both the lap estimate. The arcs show how fast the car can hold a corner of a given radius.

Super
Grip, peakfTractionCurveMax
0.54
stock 2.65

Peak cornering grip before the tyres let go. Vanilla cars sit between 1.6 and 2.65, which is arcade grip on purpose.

Open this in the editor
0-100
3.58s
AWD launch, grip-capped
Lap estimate
1:01.577
Broughy GP track model
Corner, 50 m radius
130km/h
v = √(grip · g · r)

Cornering speed by radius

92km/h
25 m radius
130km/h
50 m radius
184km/h
100 m radius

Vanilla grip is arcade grip: a real road tyre manages about 1.0 g, most GTA cars run 2.0 and up. The lap model was fitted on 482 measured laps and moves about 5 s per 1.0 of grip.

Three fields, one curve

The tyre model is a curve over slip angle. fTractionCurveMax is its peak, fTractionCurveMin is the grip once the slide has started, and fTractionCurveLateral is the width of the curve in degrees, with the peak at half that angle.

Stored
max, 1 ÷ max, and 1 ÷ (max − min)
Rule
min about 10 % under max; min above max breaks the curve
Peak slip angle
fTractionCurveLateral ÷ 2, vanilla 11.25°
Launch cap
max × g × (1.0 all-wheel, 0.55 two-wheel drive)
Cornering speed
about √(max × g × radius), before downforce

Keep the gap between max and min. A big gap makes the car snap when it lets go, a tiny gap makes slides lazy and easy to hold. Drift setups use exactly that trick with a lower max and a min close to it.

Values in the game

Supers sit at 2.25 to 2.8, sedans and SUVs around 2.1. The Dozer at 1.1 is the only vehicle near real-world tyre grip.

Computed from the 608 vanilla cars that have a public measurement, one entry per handling name. Motorcycles (49) are kept out of the chart; they run 1.6 to 2.9.

608 vanilla cars
median 2.228 ~g · 80 % sit between 1.6 and 2.65
1.352.072.78

Bars cover the 1st to 99th percentile. Extremes: 1.1 (Dozer) to 2.95 (RC Bandito).

By vehicle class
  1. Utility · 211.15 1.53 2.05
  2. Service · 101.15 1.55 2.55
  3. Industrial · 111.1 1.6 2
  4. Commercial · 151.5 1.65 2.05
  5. Vans · 221.4 1.913 2.175
  6. Military · 121.3 1.95 2.55
  7. Compacts · 141.76 1.983 2.3
  8. Off-Road · 571.53 2.05 2.95
  9. SUVs · 451.6 2.1 2.365
  10. Emergency · 311.35 2.15 2.6
  11. Sedans · 441.53 2.168 2.63
  12. Sports Classics · 491.53 2.25 2.7
  13. Muscle · 811.53 2.25 2.625
  14. Coupes · 191.53 2.3 2.6
  15. Sports · 1171.53 2.55 2.925
  16. Super · 602.25 2.68 2.782

Five cars from the bottom to the top

  1. Lowest
    1.1~g
    Dozer
    Industrial
  2. 25th percentile
    1.98~g
    Peyote Custom
    Sports Classics
  3. Median
    2.23~g
    Blade
    Muscle
  4. 75th percentile
    2.535~g
    Astrale
    Sports Classics
  5. Highest
    2.95~g
    RC Bandito
    Off-Road

What it does to lap times

Our lap estimate is a regression on 482 laps that Broughy1322 measured on his GP track with fully upgraded cars. Peak grip carries a coefficient of about −5 s per 1.0, second only to the 0-100 time. Sliding grip adds another −3.9 s per 1.0.

That is why a small change here feels bigger than any engine change. Going from 2.2 to 2.5 on a Sultan is worth more than a full engine upgrade around a lap.

Downforce stacks on top. fDownforceModifier adds grip that grows with speed, and a spoiler mod adds a further step. Neither shows in this field, both show on the track.

Applying it

client.lua, this vehicle only
SetVehicleHandlingFloat(veh, 'CHandlingData', 'fTractionCurveMax', 2.45)
SetVehicleHandlingFloat(veh, 'CHandlingData', 'fTractionCurveMin', 2.25)

Set both together. Raising max on its own widens the gap to min and the car starts to snap.

Related fields

Numbers on this page come from the vanilla handling files of GTA V (one entry per handling name, 55 fields catalogued) and from a speed model checked against 617 measured top speeds. Published 2026-09-08. Not affiliated with Rockstar Games or Cfx.re.