Overview

The in-game console is used for:

chatting with other players
running commands / scripts / cheats
occasional status updates

There are three types of command:

Multiplayer - message filtering, banning users, etc.
Information - display various information about the game
Scripting/Cheating - run small Lua scripts (but they disable achievements for the save game)

Using the console

The console display can be toggled with the / (slash) or ~ (tilde) keys.

You can customise the keys via Options Menu -> Keyboard -> Toggle Lua console.

When the console is open, you'll see a blinking cursor at the bottom of the screen; type your message or command and hit Return to send it (this will also close the console). Documentation about message and command prefixes can be found further down this page.

When console is closed, only the most recent messages/commands will be displayed, but they will gradually fade away (opening the console will immediately redisplay all recent messages).

You can set the fade out time via Options Menu -> Other Settings -> Message Delay.

If you want to immediately hide the console, open the console and then press Escape key (or press Return without entering any message/command). This not only closes the console, but it also hides all the recent messages/commands.

In Factorio 0.14.5 and later, you can clear the console with the /clear command.

Console history

The console has an inbuilt history; it's a bit like a text editor where only one line of text is displayed at a time.

Use the up arrow and down arrow keys to scroll through the console history.

Use the left arrow and right arrow keys to cursor through the currently displayed message or command, which you can edit (delete, insert, etc.) and resend (by pressing Return).

In Factorio 0.14.5 and later, the Tab key will autocomplete commands and player ids.

Multiplayer Chat

Send private message to specific player with /whisper (or /w):

/whisper <playerId> <message>

Reply to the most recently received private message with /reply (or /r):

/reply <message>

In Factorio 0.14.4 and later, group chat works like this:

hello my team!

/s hello all players!
/shout same as /s

In Factorio 0.14.3 and earlier, group chat worked like this:

hello all players!

/team hello my team!

These are just the main chat features - there are also options for banning, ignoring and muting players; see the console /help for a full list.

Commands

To see a list of all available commands, enter /help (or /h) in to the console. The available commands will depend on Factorio version and game setup.

/help

In Factorio 0.14.4 and later, the /help command will just display a list of commands - to get full details for a command add the command name (without slash) after /help (or /h), for example if you want help on the /evolution command, you'd type:

/h evolution

Scripting and cheat commands

You can run Lua script commands via the console. It works similarly to any command line interface or the JavaScript console for your browser.

This is a very powerful feature, which also allows cheating, and as such achievements will be permanently disabled for the save as soon as you use a script command.

To run a script, prefix it with /command (or /c), for example:

/c game.player.print 'hello me!'

If you're in a multiplayer game, the command will be echoed to all other players (so they can see if you're cheating).

In Factorio 0.14.5 and later, multiplayer server admins can use /silent-command (only via RCON/server console) instead of /c to avoid the command being echoed to all players.

/silent-command game.player.print 'only admins can use (and see) silent commands'

Mod developers can also take advantage of the special /measured-command which is like /c but will time how long the command takes to run. This is very useful for performance tuning your scripts.

/measured-command game.player.print 'how much time does this take to run?'

The game ignores newlines when pasting "scriptlets" in the console. This means they can be written in a human readable form in an editor and copy/pasted into the console, making understanding and editing a bit easier.

You can essentially fire any Lua command here, just as you would from a Lua program - Factorio Mods are merely Lua commands. Therefore you don't necessarily need "cheats" active per-se, as the console allows you full access to the game's internals. You only need a familiarity with the commands and types, as shown in the below examples and the Modding section.

Basic Command Examples

Use it as calculator

/c game.player.print(1234 * 5678)

Mine faster

/c game.player.force.manual_mining_speed_modifier=1000

Craft faster

/c game.player.force.manual_crafting_speed_modifier=1000

Unlock and Research all Technology

/c game.player.force.research_all_technologies()

Undo this with:

for _, tech in pairs(game.player.force.technologies) do tech.researched=false end

Reset any modifiers to default

This includes Tech and speed alterations.

/c game.player.force.reset()

Zoom beyond normal bounds

Note that zooming too far out can cause performance hits. Be careful.

/c game.player.zoom = 0.1

Inventory Manipulation

Refill resources (refill oil, iron etc.)

While holding the cursor over a resource tile in-game

/c game.player.selected.amount=7500

Add items to the player's inventory

Replace iron-plate with the internal name of the item desired.

/c game.player.insert{name="iron-plate", count=100}

Cheat mode

Allows for infinite free crafting. Disable by replacing true with false.

/c game.player.cheat_mode=true

World Manipulation

Turn off night

Enables eternal day.

/c game.surfaces[1].always_day=true

Change Game Speed

0.5 is half speed, 1 is default, 2 is double speed, etc. This can be used for a lot of things like when you know you will have to wait for long periods of time for something to complete. Increasing will decrease performance, be careful.

/c game.speed = X

Freeze Time Passage

Stops the advancement of the time if true is passed, or unfreezes it if false is passed.

/c game.player.surface.freeze_daytime(BOOL)

Add new resource patch

This creates a new 5x5 patch of resources, centered on the player character. For resources other than stone, just change "stone" to "iron-ore", "copper-ore", or "coal"

/c local surface = game.player.surface;
for y=-2,2 do
 for x=-2,2 do
  surface.create_entity({name="stone", amount=5000, position={game.player.position.x+x, game.player.position.y+y}})
 end
end

Count Entities

Counts all entities whose name includes the string in local entity.

/c 
local entity = "belt"
 
local surface = game.player.surface
local count = 0
for c in surface.get_chunks() do
  for key, entity in pairs(surface.find_entities_filtered({area={{c.x * 32, c.y * 32}, {c.x * 32 + 32, c.y * 32 + 32}}, force= game.player.force})) do
    if string.find(entity.name,entity) then
      count = count + 1
    end
  end
end
game.player.print(count)
end

Enemy/Evolution

Check how far the biters have evolved

Note that commands that do not start with "/c" do not disable achievements.

/evolution

Set evolution factor

Ranges from 0 (new game) to 1.

/c game.evolution_factor=X

Disable time-based evolution & increases pollution-based evolution

/c game.map_settings.enemy_evolution.time_factor = 0
/c game.map_settings.enemy_evolution.pollution_factor = game.map_settings.enemy_evolution.pollution_factor * 2

The "2" at the end of the last command will double the default pollution factor. You can substitute another number to increase (or decrease) the pollution factor further.

Kill all biters on the "enemy" force

Note that this will kill only mobile units and worms, spawners will not be killed.

/c game.forces["enemy"].kill_all_units()

Kill all enemies

This will kill all biters, bases and worms. Anything that is an enemy will be completely destroyed. This only affects enemies in the explored world, so any unexplored parts of the map which still need to be generated will still have enemies.

/c local surface = game.player.surface
for c in surface.get_chunks() do
   for key, entity in pairs(surface.find_entities_filtered({area={{c.x * 32, c.y * 32}, {c.x * 32 + 32, c.y * 32 + 32}}, force= "enemy"})) do
       entity.destroy()
   end
 end

Enable peaceful mode

Peaceful mode prevents biter attacks until provoked. Substitute false for true to disable.

/c game.player.surface.peaceful_mode = true

Disable biter expansion

This prevents biters from creating new spawners.

/c game.map_settings.enemy_expansion.enabled = false

Player Character

Commands concerning the player directly.

Get Player Position

Prints coordinates of your current position.

/c game.player.print({"", "(", game.player.position.x, ", ", game.player.position.y, ")"})

Teleport player

Moves the player to the specified location. You should be able to teleport to a specific player if you obtain their coordinates via them executing the previous command and giving them to you.

/c game.player.teleport({X, Y})

To teleport to the world's origin, use 0,0.

Spawn a player character

This is useful for escaping god mode. (see Console#Enable_god_mode.) This will spawn a new player at the spawn point of the world, and connect your controls to it.

/c game.player.character = game.player.surface.create_entity{name="player", position = {0,0}, force = game.forces.player}

Change Player color

Note that commands that do not start with "/c" do not disable achievements. Replace COLOR with the name of a color.

/color COLOR

Enable god mode

God mode removes your player character allowing you to fly over obstacles and take no damage.

Disassociate your controls from the player:

/c game.player.character = nil

Then, hover the mouse over the useless player and destroy it by typing:

/c game.player.selected.destroy()

To undo

/c game.player.create_character()

Research

Enable faster research

/c game.player.force.laboratory_speed_modifier = 1

1 is normal speed, 2 is double speed 3 is triple etc. I think it goes up to 100.

Enabling specific technologies

Enabling technologies (forums)

/c game.player.force.technologies['electric-energy-distribution-1'].researched=true
/c game.player.force.technologies['steel-processing'].researched=true

Finish research immediately

/c for name,technology in pairs(game.player.force.technologies) do technology.researched=technology.enabled end

Large Screenshots

This is how you would take a large HD screenshot. As usual, replace the X and Y with the values you wish.

The file is put into a folder called "script-output", which is located in the same location as the mods folder. These pictures can be quite large.

/c game.take_screenshot{resolution = {x = XPOS, y = YPOS}}

or

/c game.take_screenshot{showgui = true, resolution = {x = XPOS, y = YPOS}}

Command Line Parameters

As of Game Version 0.12.7

Command line parameters can be used to set settings in the command line before the game launches, this is useful mainly for advanced users or server hosts.

General options:

 -h [ --help ]                     display help
 --wait-to-close arg               Wait until the specified process finishes.
 --version                         show version information
 -c [ --config ] PATH              config file to use

Running options:

 -s [ --map2scenario ] arg         map to scenario conversion
 -v [ --convert ] SAVE[, SAVE...]  convert maps from previous versions to current version
 --apply-update arg                immediately apply update package
 --create SAVE                     create a new map
 --start-server SAVE               start a multiplayer server
 --mp-load-game SAVE               start factorio and load game for multiplayer
 --mp-connect ADDRESS              start factorio and connect to address
 --benchmark SAVE                  load save and run benchmark
 --benchmark-ticks N (=1,000)      number of ticks for benchmarking. Default is 1000

Server options:

 --latency N                       multiplayer server latency, in ticks
 --latency-ms N                    multiplayer server latency, in milliseconds
 --autosave-interval N (=2)        server autosave interval, in minutes
 --autosave-slots N (=3)           server autosave slots
 --disallow-commands               disallow use of the command console
 --peer-to-peer                    use peer-to-peer communication

Multiplayer

 --start-server SAVE

Will start a Headless (Dedicated) server, with no GUI.

 --mp-load-game SAVE

SAVE is the filename of the save file. For instance, for saves/MySave.zip: ./factorio --mp-load-game MySave.zip

 --mp-connect ADDRESS

ADDRESS is the ip:port of the remote host. Port is optional. Examples:

 ./factorio --mp-connect 192.168.1.101
 ./factorio --mp-connect 192.168.1.101:2345

As above, port can be specified by placing the port number after a colon in the address.

 --map2scenario SAVE

Converts a save game to a User Scenario, allows saved game state to be loaded into map editor. Assuming that save game name is "foo.zip", executing './factorio --map2scenario s1' will result in Factorio loading, opening the save file, and saving the scenario into the scenario folder.

Console