Counter-Strike 2

Smoke Grenade

Utility, both sides.

Smoke Grenade
Utility · both sides

When did you last play?

Full history

Until you pick a month the page shows every change. Pick the month you last played to keep only what is new to you. The date is shared by every weapon page.

Since you last played

Changed in 12 updates

16 balance changes across 12 updates, condensed below to what still matters.

2 buffs and 11 nerfs in total: trending weaker.

Biggest balance changes

  • ▼
    Accuracy Smokes that visibly fade off the ground now allow fire to spread under them without getting extinguished.adjusted 3 times across 3 updates, net nerf
  • ▲
    Increased minimum distance from the center of a smoke grenade volume in which a player’s view will be completely obscured by smoked.
  • ▼
    Damage Fire grenades that had been only partially extinguished by smoke will no longer deal damage from the flames under smoke grenade (fix for a bug discovered by jasonRRR)
  • ▼
    Lowered volume of smoke grenade tail.
  • ▼
    Molotovs are no longer extinguished by smokes that are significantly below them, so now it is possible to smoke inside hut on Nuke and throw a molotov on top of hut, or smoke under palace balcony on Mirage and throw a molotov on balcony floor.
  • ▼
    Molotovs are no longer extinguished by smokes that are above the fire height.

Most recent change 30 March 2023

  • ▼
    HE grenades no longer affect smokes through walls.

Using the Smoke Grenade now

Take one on a full buy, and learn the usual lineups for your map.

Alternatives

Every Smoke Grenade change, update by update

All 86 lines Valve listed for the Smoke Grenade since Apr 2012, newest first, fixes and visual changes included. Last changed 30 September 2026.

  • ◆
    Enabled grenade crosshairs in freeze time for insta-smokes (just hold any grenade attack button)

  • ◆
    The bomb explosion now interacts with smoke grenade clouds and molotov/incendiary fire.

  • ▲
    Improved smoke lighting consistency. visual

  • ◆
    Incendiary and smoke grenades now play the correct sounds. visual

  • ◆
    Added support for grenade types other than Smoke

  • ◆
    Fixed a regression with smoke rendering from old demo files. fix

  • ◆
    Range HE grenade explosions within smoke now clear the accumulated smoke screen effect on players inside that smoke within range of the HE grenade explosion. visual

  • ◆
    Fixed a bug where smoke grenades would sometimes appear lit as if a flashbang detonated inside them. fix

  • ◆
    Fixed smoke shadow rendering issues and improvements to perf fix

  • ◆
    Fixed ring artifacts that could appear on smoke particles. fix

  • ◆
    Various bug fixes and tweaks

  • ◆
    Smokes now cast shadows visual
  • ▲
    Rendering and animation have been improved visual

  • ▼
    Smoke particles no longer stick to dead ragdolls visual

  • ◆
    Decoy grenades interact aesthetically with smoke clouds
  • ◆
    Smoke grenades now have a minimum fuse duration to prevent smokes from prematurely detonating if stuck in crevices
  • ◆
    Smoke grenade canister changed to chrome material

  • ◆
    Fixed a bug in Windows 11 Auto HDR that led to smokes intermittently disappearing fix

  • ◆
    Fixed smokes not rendering correctly on AMD GPUs on Linux fix

  • ◆
    Updated water in Nuke to fix an issue with smoke

  • ◆
    Various fixes for smoke grenades

  • ◆
    Continued iterating on smoke shape
  • ◆
    Desert Eagle third-person muzzle flash smoke now dissipates faster visual

  • ◆
    Minor adjustments to smoke cloud shape

  • ◆
    Fixed smoke expansion algorithm when detonating very close to a wall. fix

  • ◆
    Shotguns now create larger holes in smoke volumes.
  • ▲
    Improved lighting/rendering when smoke overlaps multiple distinctly lit regions. visual
  • ▼
    HE grenade effect times on smoke has been reduced. visual

  • ▼
    HE grenades no longer affect smokes through walls.
  • ◆
    Adjustments to smoke grenade sound timing at a distance. visual

  • ◆
    Smoke bullet holes are now fixed relative to the firstperson camera.
  • ▼
    Smoke grenades dropped in small crevices no longer detonate on the incorrect side of thin walls.
  • ◆
    Fixed smoke cloud volume lighting. fix

  • ◆
    Fixed a recently reported smoke bug. fix

  • ◆
    Smoke grenades will ignore players when detonating over burning fires and tracing to ground.

  • ◆
    Fixed some rendering artifacts related to boosted player contrast on players inside or near smoke grenade volumes. fix

  • ◆
    Scope Added kill feed icons for blind shooter, kills through smoke, and no scope sniper kills; all kill feed icons feature the bullet on the same line. visual

  • ◆
    Draw time cl_sim_grenade_trajectory : Freeze the trajectory of the currently equipped grenade for the specified number of seconds. Useful for studying the path of long range smokes that go out of view.

  • ◆
    Smoke, HE Grenade explosions, and fire are now always displayed consistently between all players.

  • ◆
    Accuracy Smokes that visibly fade off the ground now allow fire to spread under them without getting extinguished.

  • ◆
    Fixed the ‘radar spotting enemies through smoke’ mechanic to behave the same regardless of the game server tickrate, and to not reveal enemies on the opposite side of the smoke until the smoke effect dissipates. fix

  • ◆
    Fixed graphics regression that caused smoke and molotov particle effects to appear fully transparent. fix

  • ◆
    Smoke grenades now have 10 unit radius when deciding if they are close enough to a fire to extinguish it. This helps reduce the number of ‘gaps’ between flames which could cause a smoke grenade to not detonate.
  • ◆
    Additional changes to smoke grenade detonation to make smoke/fire collision more predictable in areas with rough terrain / ledges / stairs.

  • ▼
    Reduced the height at which smoke grenades that bounce off of walls can extinguish flames.

  • ▲
    Improved reliability of smoke grenades popping to extinguish fire when bouncing smoke grenade on displacement surfaces.

  • ▼
    Flying smoke grenades no longer have a half-second restriction after a bounce before subsequent bounce can extinguish a molotov.
  • ◆
    Smoke grenades bouncing off a surface not directly on fire will not extinguish a molotov.
  • ▼
    Smoke grenades can no longer stick under a hot surface to extinguish a molotov.
  • ◆
    Smoke can still extinguish fires in a smoke volume even if the emitting smoke grenade rests behind an obstacle.

  • ▼
    Molotovs are no longer extinguished by smokes that are significantly below them, so now it is possible to smoke inside hut on Nuke and throw a molotov on top of hut, or smoke under palace balcony on Mirage and throw a molotov on balcony floor.
  • ▼
    Molotovs are no longer extinguished by smokes that are above the fire height.
  • ▼
    Ammo Smoke grenades no longer get stuck in player clips when they extinguish flames upon bouncing off a wall.

  • ▼
    Lowered volume of smoke grenade tail.

  • ◆
    New smoke sound to reduce interference with bomb defuse sound. visual

  • ◆
    Smoke clouds from smoke grenades detonated by burning fire will now correctly cover the ground instead of floating above that area.
  • ▼
    Damage Fire grenades that had been only partially extinguished by smoke will no longer deal damage from the flames under smoke grenade (fix for a bug discovered by jasonRRR)
  • ▼
    Accuracy Flames from fire grenades that are still spreading will no longer spread into the smoke cloud and will instead spread along the edge of the smoke cloud.

  • ◆
    Fixed a disappearing smoke exploit. fix

  • ◆
    Fixed smoke rendering exploits that were possible when running certain video capture applications. fix

  • ◆
    If a player spawns with a smoke grenade in classic competitive, it counts toward their maximum smoke grenade purchases for that round (i.e., they cannot purchase a second smoke grenade).
  • ◆
    Draw time Fixed HE grenade particle system drawing improperly sometimes with other particle systems (like smokes volumes). fix

  • ◆
    Smoke grenades are now more reliably kept track of on the client to prevent mismatches between smoke particle visuals and screen overlay visuals. visual
  • ◆
    Fixed players being able to double stack inside a smoke to peek out of the top (and be really hard to see from outside the smoke). fix
  • ◆
    Updated expiration of the smoke screen overlay to match more closely to the visuals of when the third person particles expire and vice versa. visual
  • ◆
    Updated the vertical position slightly of the smoke particles to reduce seeing though edges of the smoke (particularly at the bottom). visual
  • ◆
    Fixed spectator sometimes not getting the smoke overlay for the player they are spectating when that alive player is inside smoke. fix

  • ◆
    Smoke screen overlay fades faster now when exiting smokes quickly.
  • ◆
    Adjusted boundaries of smoke screen overlay slightly.

  • ◆
    Adjusted the radius at which incendiary and smoke grenades interact.

  • ◆
    Fixed M4A1-S muzzle flash showing through smoke. fix

  • ◆
    Draw time Fixed masks drawing through smoke. fix

  • ◆
    Flagged smoke grenade particles to face player camera position instead of camera direction. visual

  • ◆
    Fixed a crash for render state corruption related to smoke grenades. fix

  • ▲
    Increased minimum distance from the center of a smoke grenade volume in which a player’s view will be completely obscured by smoked.
  • ◆
    Fixed smoke grenades popping again when thrown into more than one molotov fire in a row. fix
  • ▼
    Smoke volumes are now more consistently shaped with the particles more evenly distributed. The overall shape is now round and no longer square. visual

  • ◆
    Fixed some grenades allowing radar visibility when they shouldn’t and vice versa – this fixes bugs like players showing up on radar through smoke volumes when they shouldn’t. fix

  • ◆
    Accuracy Release Notes for 7/10/2013[ GAMEPLAY ]- Adjusted the function that mapped movement speed to weapon inaccuracy. The linear portion of this function is now exponential.[ MAPS ]- de_dust2: Fixed collision bug in Bombsite B, tweaked fog, fixed navmesh naming.[ MISC ]- Added support for more Unicode characters in player names.- Fixed a rare incorrect name truncation in the death notice feed, scoreboard and main menu.- Fixed truncation of the competitive maps selection when all maps were selected.- Smoke volume is now cheaper to render.- Players that spawn and don't move for longer than sv_spawn_afk_bomb_drop_time (default 15 seconds) will automatically drop the bomb. Thanks GreenTea!

  • ▼
    Reduced the opacity core radius for player standing inside a smoke grenade.Animations: visual
  • ▲
    Draw time Smoke grenade effect now has reduced draw order issues. visual
  • ▼
    Smoke grenade effect no longer has a great disparity between the screen fog effect and the world fog sprites. visual
  • ▼
    Reduced the length of time the particle smoke/dust lasts after an HE grenade explodes. visual
  • ▼
    Fix for a scenario where stepping into molotov fire sometimes turns the screen black. Reduced opacity of screen-space smoke effect at the molotov's core from 1.0 to 0.75. -- Also removed some extraneous tings from the molotov explosion and reduced the lifetime on the molotov inferno's embers, which were artificially enlarging the effect's bounding box. visual
  • ◆
    Fix for a bug that made it possible to throw smoke grenades in such a way that teammates can enter the smoke radius without seeing or hearing the smoke, completely immune to its effect. visual

  • ◆
    Dust - Added some back faces to the geometry where players could see out of the map. - Fix for an environment light effect that could be seen through a building as well as smoke grenade effect. - Added a cubemap and updated a floor material for a noticeably dark door. visual