Playdemo

In both Counter-Strike: Global Offensive and Counter-Strike 2, any player can toggle the in-game developer console and make use of commands to customize their gameplay for a variety of reasons. Say you want to practice smoke lineups and easily clip through walls to the location your utility should hit? There’s a command for that. Want the round to never end even after multiple hours? It’s definitely possible!

But what if you want to relive an unbelievable clutch you once had or even an entire highlight reel of your finest frags? That’s where the Playdemo Command comes in.

How Do You Use The Command?

To use any command in the game, you must first access the in-game developer console which is usually bound to the ~ key on your keyboard. In the event your keyboard doesn’t have this key, you can bind the console to open upon pressing any available button you have. Since playdemo is not considered a cheat command, there is no need to input “sv_cheats 1” on the console. After this, simply type or copy and paste the command “playdemo <Demo File Name>” to the console. 

Before hitting the enter key, however, you must indicate the exact file name of the demo you want to access through the game. The “<Amount>” portion of the command refers to the demo’s name, which can be found in your CSGO demo folder. The folder Steam\steamapps\common\Counter-Strike Global Offensive\csgo is where demos are located by default. You must put “replays/” before the demo name if you put them in your “replays” folder.

How Do You Record A Demo In The First Place?

To record a demo in CSGO/CS2, enter the command “record <Demo File Name>” into the console by typing it or copying and pasting it. You cannot leave the <Demo File Name> field empty because the game needs to know what to call the file that is produced at the end of the match. The game may be seen later when it has been automatically recorded as a demo after pasting the command and hitting enter. The recording will automatically cease if you type “stop” into the console.