How to Evade Missiles [Updated]

Constantly getting shot down by enemy missiles? This guide will help you survive with a few tips and tricks!

The Basics

First, let's go over how the missiles work. There are generally three types of missiles used: semi-active radar homing (abbreviated as SARH), infrared guided (IR), and active radar homing (ARH).

SARH missiles operate on the principle of using the plane's radar to "paint" a target for the missile to follow. The missile itself does not have any radar, so the plane must maintain a lock in order for the missile to have a chance at hitting.

IR missiles have built-in sensors that will lock onto individual heat signatures and try to intercept them. However, they can (depending on the model) get easily confused if there are multiple heat sources in a small space.

ARH missiles are similar to SARH missiles, except they do have an onboard radar. When fired, they work the same, as they require a hard lock to know where to go. But once they get close enough to the target, they will turn on the radar in the head and use that to lock on to the target. What this means is that the plane that fired it no longer has to maintain that radar lock and is able to target a different plane or leave the combat zone entirely.

Missiles only have a limited amount of energy to hit their target. All types of guided missiles will try to anticipate where their target is headed and move to intercept them instead of just chasing them, which helps conserve their fuel. However, even chasing an aircraft directly can prove successful, as their solid propellant systems let them achieve upwards of mach 3 or even 4.

Next, let's talk about the tools, techniques, and components that are relevant to dodging missiles.

Countermeasures - You have two countermeasures installed on your plane to help shake off missiles: chaff and flares.
Chaff is basically strips of reflective tin foil that are dumped out of the back of the plane. The idea is that these strips reflect radar beams very effectively, and there is a chance that a radar might accidentally confuse the chaff for you and lock onto the chaff instead, making any radar-guided missile miss. Use chaff against radar.
Flares are very hot heat sources (kind of like handheld flares you might use) that are used to fool IR missiles. They don't distinguish between where the heat comes from, so if you are able to fool the missile into chasing a flare instead of your engine, you'll defeat it. Use flares against heatseekers.

Afterburners - They come standard on just about every fighter jet. Fuel is injected into the exhaust pipes of the main engines to re-ignite it, providing some extra thrust at the cost of drastically increased fuel consumption and substantially increased heat generation.

The Surroundings - Being able to use the terrain around you (if there is any) is one of the best ways to counter missiles. Keep this in mind when I explain it further later.

What Missile Is Chasing Me?

If you are going to be successful at defeating a missile, being able to distinguish what type it is is crucial. This is where understanding your RWR as well as enemy unit types comes in handy.

RWR

The RWR is the circular display in the top left of your plane (or its own program in the F-45A). It displays any radar contacts as well as certain indicators of an incoming missile.

If it detects a radar beam, it can determine the unit's type (such as if it's a search radar, a MAD-4 radar, a ship-based radar, etc.) as well as the "signal strength". You may have noticed that there are no units, yet there are several rings on the RWR. Since it only receives incoming signals, the RWR on all vehicles except the F-45A cannot tell the distance the radar is from you, but it can tell the approximate signal strength. Generally speaking, enemies further away have a lower signal strength and will be further from the center, while enemies closer to you will be in the inner rings.
Note that although signal strength and distance are somewhat related, there are some exceptions. An AWACS' radar is a lot more high-powered than a plane's, so even if it is very far away it could actually appear closer than an enemy fighter that is right next to you.

A brief lesson on the symbology that the RWR uses:

• A caret (^) on a contact means that it is airborne.
  
• A half-circle on a contact means that it is the most recently-detected target. (Note that a target can be undetected and re-detected if they go behind cover.)
  
• A diamond around the contact means that your RWR believes this contact is a priority threat. This is based on a number of varying criteria and is not always accurate; generally, airborne and long-range radars are considered more dangerous.
  
• A green circle around the contact means that it has acquired a hard lock on you (meaning it has for sure seen you and is preparing to fire a missile). You will hear a constant, medium-pitched tone when this occurs.
  
• A red circle around the contact means that it is guiding a SARH missile toward you. In other words, the missile is on the way and you need to evade! A special tone will play when this happens.
  
• A red circle around an "M" means that this contact is in ARH missile using its onboard radar to track you! It is very close and you need to take immediate evasive maneuvers if you aren't doing so already. A higher-pitched tone (compared to the normal lock) will replace the old one when this occurs.

Applied to missile identification, the last three are the most important. If a radar is hard-locking you but not guiding a SARH missile, there is a chance that it is guiding an ARH missile toward you instead (as these use a datalink connection to the radar rather than the radar beam itself). Look for a smoke trail in the direction of the radar to see if a missile is inbound and prepare accordingly.

IR missiles, however, are a curveball, as they do not use radar at all. Instead, you will need to use a combination of visually seeing them and the RWR's special features listed below:

MWS

In addition to your RWR suite's radar detection, it also has an MWS suite capable of detecting launched and inbound missiles. It does this by looking for a burst of heat coming from the missile's booster. If it suddenly sees a big plume of heat, this is a missile launching and you will hear a tone as well as the aircraft say "Missile launch." It can also detect using similar means if a missile is headed for you. If so, an orange line will appear in the direction of the missile as well as a very high-pitched tone.

There are a few limitations to the MWS, however:

• The launch detection only works at close range, and even if it has direct line of sight to a launched missile far away it may not pick up on it. It also does not differentiate between friendly and hostile missiles, so any wingmen firing a missile might trigger it (this is why it's always a good idea to call out missile shots in multiplayer!).
  
• The incoming missile detection only works if the missile's booster is still firing. If the booster runs out and the missile starts gliding, there is no longer any heat for it to pick up on and once the missile cools down you will not get the warning anymore.
  
• The incoming missile detection also cannot tell if a missile is actually heading for you or simply in your general direction (e.g. at something near you).
  
  In summary, if there is a radar lock from a source, it is probably a SARH or an ARH missile. If there is no radar lock, it is probably an IR missile.

Infrared Missiles

Infrared missiles' ability to track heat signatures is, ironically, their downfall.

When you first identify an incoming IR missile, try and look for where it is relative to you. If it is behind you or in front of you, the technique varies compared to if it is to your side. If you cannot locate it, these techniques still work and you'll just get a very sudden explosion in case you do it wrong.

On your throttle is a button (the B button on most two-button controllers and the menu button on the Vive controller) that is used to deploy countermeasures. For IR missiles, you want flares to be active (you can disable chaff if you like, though you have enough of both that this usually isn't something to worry about). Hit that button a few times, or press and hold it if you configured your countermeasures system in the CMS program to auto-deploy them. You will hear an audible thud as the flares deploy behind you!

Once you've deployed your countermeasures, you want to reduce your throttle so that your plane no longer looks as attractive to the missile compared to the flares. At the very least, turn off the afterburner (the orange "AB" light should be off), but ideally you want to cut the throttle as much as possible. If in a dogfight, be cautious as this will make you lose a lot of speed.

When you've done both of these things, try and look for the missile. If it is in front of you or behind you, you want to make a turn to the left or right so that the missile can more easily see the flares (and once it flies through them it won't see you anymore). If it's to the side, you can skip this step. Either way, you should see the missile visibly adjust course behind you to hit one of the flares, at which point it is safely defeated and you can re-engage your afterburners. Even if the missile does see you at this point, it has wasted a lot of energy from changing course and will not catch up to you.

Alternatively, if you are flying in a hilly or urban area, you can break line of sight with the missile. It can't chase what it can't see, and it will go dumb (give up and fly in a straight line) almost immediately.

Radar Missiles

Radar-guided missiles are, unfortunately, more difficult to shake. They are significantly smarter than their IR counterparts and you need a new set of techniques to deal with them.

Unlike IR missiles, knowing where a radar missile is coming from is necessary as the tactics to evade them rely heavily on abusing this. Generally, they will be fired from either in front or to the side of you as you fly into hostile territory, though occasionally one might be fired from behind you. If so, you can usually just outrun it by flying as far, fast, and as low as possible.

But that usually isn't an option if you have an objective to complete, and you will need to employ one of two commonly-used tactics to defeat a radar missile: beaming or masking. (This guide will not cover notching since it is a relatively advanced and inconsistent tactic.)

As you read through both of these techniques, keep in mind the idea of using chaff. It is most effective when you dump it while making a turn, so whenever you would turn using one of these techniques, try and think about dumping chaff a couple times in case it fools the radar.

Beaming

Remember that missiles will try and intercept you by going toward where they think you will go. While this is smart from a physics perspective, it is also the key to defeating them! If you are mathematically-inclined, you can think of it as a game of energy; your jet engines have a lot of fuel but they can only burn so much at a time, whereas the missile has a ton of energy that it releases very quickly and then must glide to its target.

Beaming is the technique of flying perpendicular to the missile (at either 90 or 270 degrees relative to it) in order to maximize how far it has to go out of the way to intercept you. Flying farther means it has to burn more energy, and the sooner you do this the better. If the missile is extremely long range, you can even swerve back and forth left and right to force the missile to change directions frequently, though this technique is not recommended in short-range encounters.

In addition to this, the supersonic nature of missiles means that they have a lot of drag from cutting through the air. So if you dive down as low as possible (ideally about a 45 degree dive to still make it fly out to the side), you are forcing the missile to fly into denser air where the drag will slow it down considerably. Maneuvering upwards is not recommended unless you are already at ground level as the thinner air usually counteracts the effect of gravity on the missile, though by forcing it to turn you are still bleeding some of its energy.

As you do this, maintain visual contact with the missile. As it gets closer to you, it will switch to its onboard radar (if it is an ARH missile), but don't panic; now that it has been flying for a while, it should be running out of fuel very soon! Once its booster runs out, the smoke trail will stop and you can move on to "stage two". Now that it is losing energy, you can pull back up to make the missile turn more. As it loses energy, it becomes harder for the missile to turn, so by the time it gets close to you, you can make a high-G turn to make it fly past you, defeating it.

Terrain Masking

While beaming is effective at longer ranges and over flat terrains and water, sometimes the missile is too close for it to work properly; this is where the concept of terrain masking comes into play.

Terrain masking is the official term for simply breaking line of sight by putting something like a hill or even a building between you and the radar. By doing this, the radar will lose its lock on you and any missiles that it is guiding (or the missile itself) will be unable to chase you and will go dumb. This is why it's actually preferred in most cases to fly low and along the contours of the ground when going into enemy territory.

The key to successful masking is not only being aware of what is around you but also where the radar is, especially if it is an ARH missile. Depending on this, you will have to occlude yourself from a specific location, which could even be behind you!

If you are confident in reaction times and joystick control, and are inside a city, you can weave between buildings, where you are sure to eventually mask yourself from every direction except above you. This is especially good if an ARH missile is chasing you, as it likely has enough energy to follow you if you just fly behind a hill. Once you successfully mask yourself, the radar lock should immediately disappear and the tones should stop, meaning you can fly back to re-engage the enemy.

If you are still at a long range from the enemy and the terrain allows for it, you can instead use hills as large cover for hit-and-run tactics. By flying above them and firing a missile, then turning back to fly behind it for a few moments, enemy radars will be unable to get a bead on you! Mastering terrain masking in this way is crucial to staying alive in the air when under heavy pressure.

Closing Remarks

These skills will take a lot of practice to hone in, and in some cases might not even be fully consistent. The key is to slowly gain confidence and muscle memory for avoiding missiles so that you can eventually do it in your sleep. Don't be discouraged if you don't get it right on your first few tries, simply think about what went wrong and what you could do to prevent that from happening again. The in-game air force picked you to be their pilot, and you can prove to them that they made the right choice.

[SMRTGUY]

how do u deploy chaff and flares

[Shuudan]

the tried and true method is turning off G-lock and pulling up on your stick and dumping chaff and flares when the missile is extremely close.

[Shadow]

@Hotnet Notching works but it can be difficult to do it precise enough to have a major effect. You need background clutter (like terrain or a city) behind you, and you need to be very close to that terrain. The further you are from it, the less of an effect notching will have, etc.
I didn't explain it here because it's relatively advanced and I wanted this guide to help newer people learn the basics.

[Hornet]

Does radar notching actually work in this game?
I've attempted couple times to no avail. Perhaps im not doing it so well as I am new
I thought you can just dive 45 d and fly perpendicular to the aggressor.

[CrayonEater]

Great info. Read once, got confused. Got finger stuck in engine fan blades. Replaced finger. Read again. Dodged a missile. Killed by another behind it. Progress.

[Shadow]

@Pathfinder there's no such thing as a fox 1 heat seeker. Fox one is an SARH missile, and a heatseeker is fox two. The first one will give an rwr warning, because the enemy radar has to lock onto you to fire the missile, while the second one will not. You might get an MWS warning, but that's it

[Pathfinder]

does Fox 1 heat seekers give RWR warning? NO, correct?

[Filthy Feats for Feasible Fees]

@stu idk if you're gonna see this but if you have them GPS guided cruise missiles might be worth a shot, it's at least help you stay out of SAM range

[CartoonLad]

This is an excellent breakdown! take my points.

[Tango Juliet]

Thanks, I've read this well and it will come in usefull!