PS5 DualSense stick drift and Hall effect fix: interactive 3D teardown

All 8 steps

1. 1Unclip the black trim, horns first trap

   With the controller face up, slide the spudger’s thin end (or an opening pick) under the black trim’s bottom right corner, the horn that runs down the inside of the right grip, and lift it just enough to free its clip; then run it along the trim’s lower edge towards the middle. Do the same at the left horn. Only then lift the bottom edge with your fingers and slide the trim up, over both sticks and off. Avoid this trap: The black trim’s two bottom horns, which run down the inside of the grips, are its thinnest part, and each is held down by a clip at its tip. Lever the trim up in the middle of its bottom edge, or pull it up over the sticks, while the horns are still clipped, and the whole trim bends against them: a horn cracks across its neck and its tip stays clipped in the grip. The trim never sits flat there again, so it needs replacing. Free each horn at its tip first, run along the lower edges, and only then lift the trim.

2. 2Pop off L1 and R1

   With your thumb on the L2 trigger, slide the spudger’s flat end into the gap between L1 and L2 and lever L1 up: it unclips from its pivots. Keep a finger over it so it does not fly off. Do the same for R1. Under each bumper is one of the two hidden upper shell screws.

3. 3Undo the four shell screws

   Turn the controller face down. With the Phillips #00 driver, undo the four 6.4 mm screws that hold the rear shell: one at the tip of each grip, and one in each pocket where L1 and R1 were. Lay each in its own numbered tray well.

4. 4Unclip and lift off the rear shell

   Push the point of the spudger into the seam either side of the headphone jack to release the two front clips, which are delicate. Run it along the left and right edges to free the side clips, then lift the rear shell straight off and set it down, inside up.

5. 5Unplug and lift out the battery trap

   Grip the white plug of the battery’s three-wire lead by its short sides with the tweezers, close to the socket, never by its wires, and pull it straight out of its socket along the board, rocking it gently from side to side if it is tight. Then lift the 1,560 mAh battery pack straight up out of its grey plastic cradle and set it down. Avoid this trap: The white plug sits tight in its socket, and the battery’s three wires are thin. Pull on them, worse still upwards at an angle, and the force goes into the tiny crimped contacts that hold each wire in the plug, not into the plug itself: a wire pulls out of the back of the plug while the plug stays put. The battery is then cut off, and the loose end of its red wire is live: let it touch the board and it can short. Grip the plug’s short sides with tweezers, close to the socket, and pull it straight out along the board.

6. 6Remove the cradle and unplug the ribbons trap

   Pull the orange lower-microphone flex out by its tab. Undo the one 6.4 mm screw in the middle of the battery cradle and lift the cradle off. Then pull the four ribbon cables out of their sockets by their blue pull tabs: the touchpad, the upper microphone, and the left and right adaptive-trigger ribbons. Avoid this trap: The two adaptive-trigger ribbons are thin, short and hide beside the trigger modules. Lift the board, or pull the shell halves apart, before both are out of their sockets, and the taut flex pulls its connector straight off the board, tearing the solder pads with it. A torn pad cannot just be plugged back in: the trigger stops working until the connector is soldered back. Check that all five flex cables are out before the board moves.

7. 7Lift the board and pull the stick caps

   Release the board from its two clips by the trigger modules and lift it straight up, guiding both sticks out through the front shell. Four soldered wires still tie it to the haptic motors in the grips, so fold it forward onto the mat, stick side up, and pull both dome caps straight up off the stick shafts.

8. 8Clean the potentiometer or fit a Hall-effect stick

   Each stick reads its position with two green potentiometers, one per axis. To clean the drifting one, snap open its green cover with the spudger, lift out the wiper disc with the tweezers, and wipe the disc and the carbon track inside the cover with isopropyl alcohol on a swab; then refit them and snap the cover shut. A worn track needs a new module, and a Hall-effect or TMR module, which reads a magnet instead of rubbing a track, goes in the same way: the old module’s 14 solder joints under the board are desoldered and the new one soldered into the same holes.

What you need

• Plastic spudger · nylon: for the trim, the bumpers and the clips
• Phillips #00 screwdriver · five 6.4 mm screws
• ESD-safe tweezers · for the plug and the pull tabs
• Isopropyl alcohol, 90% or stronger, and cotton swabs · to clean the potentiometer
• A magnetic screw tray · a well for each screw
• To replace a stick: soldering iron, flux, desoldering pump, solder wick · and a new Hall-effect, TMR or standard module

Questions

Safety

Switch the controller off and unplug its cable first, and unplug the battery before touching anything else inside, by its plug, never its wires. Never pry near the battery or with metal: use a plastic spudger. Isopropyl alcohol is flammable: let it dry completely before the battery goes back in.

• Lithium-ion batteries: never bend, puncture or pry a battery with metal. A damaged cell can go into thermal runaway: it smokes, catches fire and can explode. Discharge it below 25% first; if it swells, hisses, smokes or gets hot, stop and move it somewhere safe.
• Static (ESD): work on an anti-static mat with a grounded wrist strap; a spark you cannot feel can kill a chip.
• Power off: switch the device off and unplug its charger before you open it, and disconnect the battery before touching anything else inside.

About this teardown

3D Spatial Reconstruction: Models are engineered from factual hardware measurements to visualize internal layouts, screw lengths, and hidden cable traps before you open your device. Always verify cable routing on your specific hardware revision.

The controller is Sony’s DualSense wireless controller for the PS5 in its first version, modelled at its published size of about 160 × 66 × 106 mm. The order of the steps, the screws, the clips and the connectors follow iFixit’s DualSense guides: the black middle trim unclipped from its bottom corners first, then along its lower edges, then lifted over the sticks; four 6.4 mm Phillips shell screws (two hidden under L1 and R1, two at the grip tips) and one 6.4 mm screw in the battery cradle, all for a #00 driver; two delicate clips either side of the headphone jack; the 1,560 mAh battery on a three-wire plug, gripped by the plug, not the wires; and 14 solder joints on each stick module (4 frame anchors, 6 potentiometer pins and 4 push-switch pins). Later versions open the same way, but their battery has to be swung aside to reach its plug.

Where the owner’s brief for this guide differed from the controller, the controller decided. The trim’s “horns” are its two bottom corners, the tips that run down the inside of the grips, and the guides free them first; no guide reports one snapping, so that trap is our own warning of what levering the trim up too soon would do. The battery plug has no angle to find: it pulls straight out of its socket along the board, gripped by its sides and rocked gently if it is tight; it is the wires that must never take the pull. The potentiometer’s “wiper hood” is its green cover, which snaps open on the module with the board folded out and no soldering. A Hall-effect or TMR stick does not spare the soldering iron in this controller: it replaces the whole module in the same 14 holes, and only the DualSense Edge has stick modules made to be swapped by hand. And as before: the board has five flex connections, not four (the orange lower-microphone flex comes out before the cradle), each a friction socket with a pull tab, not a flip-latch (ZIF) socket, and four soldered wires tie the board to the haptic motors, so here it is folded out on them (iFixit desolders them to take it right out).

The places of the inner parts, the sockets and the clips, the pick depth at the horns and the sizes of the battery, the cradle and the stick modules are our estimates from photos; the button faces are left plain. The 3D runs faster than real hands do.

Sources: iFixit: DualSense Joystick Replacement, iFixit: Sony DualSense Controller Middle Trim Replacement, iFixit: Sony DualSense Controller Battery Replacement, iFixit: DualSense Controller V5 Battery Replacement (the plug rocked out of its socket), iFixit: DualSense Controller v2 Battery Replacement (later versions), iFixit: Sony DualSense Controller Touchpad Replacement, iFixit: How to Fix Stick Drift for a PlayStation DualSense Controller V1 (the green covers and wiper discs), iFixit News: Here’s Why PS5 Joysticks Drift, PCMasterX: opening a DualSense, the battery plug pulled straight out of its socket, Tech4Gamers: GuliKit TMR joysticks for the DualSense, a teardown review (December 2024), PlayStation Blog: the DualSense Edge and its replacement stick modules, MP1st: DualSense size and weight, from Sony’s specifications, Laptop Mag: the DualSense’s 1,560 mAh battery, TronicsFix forum: the stock battery’s three wires, Price: iFixit’s DualSense joystick, $14.99 (October 2026), Price: iFixit’s Gulikit TMR joystick for the DualSense, $29.99 (October 2026), Price: Gadget Medics, Boca Raton, stick drift repair, $35–$60 a stick (October 2026), Price: Gizmo Pros, Florida, PS5 controller stick drift repair, $39 (October 2026).

The 3D models, drawings and text are our own. PlayStation, PS5 and DualSense are trademarks of their owners, named only to say which device this teardown is for; iTakeApart is not affiliated with them.