Red Dead Redemption 2 cheat codes guide

Red Dead Redemption 2 cheat codes are difficult to discover, but they change the game by allowing you to make Arthur more powerful or summon items into your world. In this guide, we’ll teach you all about them.

How to enter Red Dead Redemption 2 cheat codes

In the Red Dead Redemption 2 Settings menu, hit Triangle/Y to bring up the Cheats menu. Here, you can hit X/A to enter cheat code text. If you’ve entered it correctly (capitalization doesn’t seem to count), you’ll receive a message that says “Alert: You have successfully unlocked a cheat.” It’s that simple. The cheat then appears on a list. Highlight it and press X/A to activate it.

Using cheats brings up the following warning message:

By activating a cheat you relinquish the ability to save single player game progress, and collect single player [Achievements/Trophies]. Are you sure you want to activate this cheat?

In other words, you can’t use a cheat to get ahead in Red Dead Redemption 2. But you can use them to be silly, have fun or get yourself out of a bind.

How to find Red Dead Redemption 2 cheat codes

Finding Red Dead Redemption 2 cheat codes is more complicated than activating them. You’re looking for phrases, not individual words. And you’ll find them throughout the world in multiple ways.

Some Red Dead Redemption 2 cheat codes have requirements. For example, you’ll need to purchase a newspaper from a Newspaper Seller to find the “Abundance is the dullest desire” cheat code. You’ll find Newspaper Sellers in towns. They’re marked with an icon that looks like, well, a newspaper.

Rockstar Games via Polygon

Once you have a newspaper, hold right on the D pad to open your Satchel. Use the bumpers to navigate to the Documents tab, and find Newspapers. Click on an issue to read it, and look for a pull quote within the text. For this one, you’ll need to flip the newspaper and look the bottom right, where the cheat code is written. Based on our testing, you can find the same cheat code phrase in multiple newspapers. In the screenshot below, we found it in the Saint Denis times No. 43, but we also saw it it in the Blackwater Ledger No. 62.

Rockstar Games via Polygon

Other cheat codes are written within the game world, like “Keep your dreams simple,” which we found while wandering the world. (You can see it above in the header image of this guide.)

Red Dead Redemption 2 cheat code list

Below is a list of the cheat codes we’ve discovered and verified, as well as what cheats they offer. We’ll continue adding to the list and updating this guide as we find more.