How to “Ghost Peek” in Fortnite Battle Royale

What is peeking?

Peeking is simply when you come out of cover to take a shot at an enemy.

Peekers have an advantage because of the latency involved in online gaming.

You see, there is a delay between your action and when it gets sent to the server. This is known as your ping and it’s measured in milliseconds.

Imagine you have a ghost version of your character that follows everything you do. But it’s slightly behind you based on your ping.

That ghost is where other players see you. So when you peek an enemy, you’ll see them before they can see your ghost.

This GIF from dolmakalem is a perfect example of peekers advantage in CSGO and the same thing applies in Fortnite.

This is why ping is so important in gaming. You can see your ping in Fortnite by enabling net debug stats and here are 10 things you can do to lower your ping.

Moreover, peekers have an advantage because players need to be able to react to you. But the average reaction time is roughly 250 milliseconds.

So ping and reaction time together are the reasons why you should play aggressive when peeking.

How NOT to ghost peek

As you know, there is building in Fortnite.

So most of the peeking you do is from the top of your stairs and that is what we are going to focus on here.

The thing you have to be aware of, though, is that you first need to be in the correct spot of your ramp.

• If you’re too low then you’re going to end up shooting your own ramp
• If you’re too high then you’re going to expose a lot of your character when you stand up to shoot

So you have to find the sweet spot where you can stand up to shoot freely. And then crouch again to be fully covered.

Also, when most Fortnite players peek, they use the crouch key both for standing up and crouching back down again.

The problem with using the same key for 2 actions is that it’s too slow. And if the enemy is pre-aiming your ramp, they could get some damage on you.

What should you do instead?

Use your jump key to stand

When you use 2 different keys for standing and crouching, you can do it a lot faster.

This is the very essence of ghost peeking.

By default, your jump key is bound to the space bar on PC.

So you use your space bar to stand up from a crouching position. And then use your crouch key to crouch again.

By default, crouch is bound to left-ctrl. Some players can find this hard to press with their pinky finger because they lack the coordination needed.

If you find left-ctrl hard to press, here are some alternate crouch keybinds you could try:

1. Left-shift is a good option because it’s closer to where your pinky finger naturally rests. This is the key Tfue uses for crouching. But you will need to enable “Sprint By Default” in the Fortnite settings.
2. C is another good option because it’s close to the D key so you can press it with your index finger. This is the key Ninja uses for crouching.

Go and jump into a Fortnite creative map right now to practice crouching and standing like this to see how fast you can do it. Chances are it’s a lot faster than standing and crouching with just the crouch key.

The next thing you need to learn is to time your shot as soon as you stand up. You need to get this timing perfect to ghost peek properly.

Alternative ghost peeking keys

You can also set up some secondary keybinds to better automate ghost peeking.

One thing you can try is using F1 to jump, F2 to fire and F3 to fire.

Then you just need to press those keys in a sequence to ghost peek easily.

But the problem with this is that you have to move where your hand usually is on your keyboard. You see, 3 of your fingers will need to move up to press the F keys.

So you won’t have good access to the WASD movement keys in Fortnite. In other words, you might not have as good mobility when you ghost peek using your F keys.

I have small hands and I don’t like to use the F keys because they are too far away. Instead, I prefer to ghost peek the normal way by using my space bar and crouch key.

Still, the F keys can be useful because it makes ghost peeking much easier and more consistent. So it’s worth trying to see if it works for you.

By the way, you won’t get banned for using this as you’re only using the secondary keybinds options in Fortnite. In other words, it’s not cheating.

Conclusion

Having the ability to peek properly in Fortnite is very useful because it can let you get free damage on an enemy.

But it can be tricky to pull off as you need to be in the right position of your ramp. And have good coordination with your fingers and perfect timing for your shot.

With enough practice, ghost peeking can feel fluid and natural. So you can start using and taking advantage of it in every game you play.

Looking to learn more? Here are more than 50 Fortnite tips and tricks that you can start using today.

The more you know and learn, the more you are able to take your gameplay to the next level. Yes, it’s going to take a lot of time before you can become the best player you can be.

But when you start now and make a commitment to continue learning and practising, you will be surprised at how good you can get at Fortnite.

What’s something you’re struggling with in Fortnite? Comment down below and I’ll try to help.