HOI 4 Console Commands – The Best Hearts of Iron 4 Cheats

Paradox Interactive’s logistics-heavy 4X (explore, expand, exploit, and exterminate) grand strategy title, Hearts of Iron IV (HOI 4), takes us to the prelude and mayhem of the Second World War. Take control of a nation, manage resources and supply, the home front and navigate the murky waters of foreign diplomacy in one of history’s toughest times. When all hell is let loose, you’ll command your armies’ attacks into enemy lines until victory or death. However, with an option to use the HOI console and employ cheats in your grand strategy, armies are not the only thing you’ll command. If you want to know more about HOI 4 console commands and cheats, hunker down while we lay down some covering fire.

If you want to use HOI 4 console commands then you’ll need to open the console in-game. Note that the only game mode you can enter HOI 4 console commands for is the regular game mode. Ironman is designed for earning achievements and being difficult with its anti-reload mechanic, so cheats are hardcoded out for that reason. Also, be aware that multiplayer doesn’t allow HOI 4 cheats or console commands, as it would obviously create an unfair advantage or introduce game-breaking bugs. Therefore, single-player,non-Ironman saves are the only place you can use HOI 4 cheats.

Many of the cheats in HOI 4 require a country tag to work. Most of the time, you can work it out easily enough (Germany is GER, Britain is ENG, etc). However, if you want to ensure you have the right nation tag, just type “tdebug” into the console and mouse over each nation to learn its tag.

Opening up the console can be a little tricky, as every keyboard has different keys. The usual method is to press the key below your escape key and to the left of the “1” key. If that isn’t working for you, then try SHIFT+2, ALT+2+1, or SHIFT+3 combinations.

For the eagle-eyed out there, you may notice that the console operates the same way for HOI4 as it does for Stellaris, as both games use Paradox’s Clauswitz engine. Therefore, you may recognize that similar cheats work for both games.

There are plenty of HOI 4 console commands available, all handily found on the HOI 4 wiki. However, many cater to more advanced players, modders, and debuggers. Therefore, we’ll keep it simple, making it easy to access the cheats you’ll need for your WW2 escapades.

Name	Effect	Example
Add Command Power	Adds Command Power to the currently selected nation, up to a maximum of 100 CP.	cp [<amount>] cp 25
Add Manpower	Adds more Manpower to the selected nation	manpower [<Amount>] manpower 7000
Add Stability	Adds Stability to the selected nation. (Max 100).	st [<amount>] st 50
Add Party Popularity	Adds more Popularity to the chosen political party. Party modifiers are: F – Fascist Party D – Democratic Party C – Communist Party N – Neutral Party	add_party_popularity <ideology group> <value> Add_party_popularity D 100 Adds 100 popularity to the nation’s democratic party.
Add Warscore	Adds warscore to the current war you are fighting (max100). Note: 100 warscore allows you to enforce all your demands and more, bringing the war to an end. This is one of the only HOI 4 console commands we advise not using, as it really strips away the fun from a game designed around fighting wars.	ws [<amount>] ws 50
Allow Traits	Allows the player to freely assign traits to generals, admirals and other leaders.	allowtraits
Annex Nation	Annexes the target nation, assigning all of its lands to you.	annex [<Target Country Tag>] or annex all to conquer the world. annex GER
Change Nation Opinion	Changes the selected nation’s opinion of the nation you are currently playing.	add_opinion [<Country tag>] add_opinion ENG 30
Experience	Assign experience to the selected leader, general, or admiral.	gain_xp 5000 Grant said leader 5000 XP
Instantly construct	Toggles the instant construction cheat for the player and the AI. Use in pause mode if you only want it applied to yourself. Don’t forget to turn it off before unpausing.	instantconstruction
Instantly Prepare Invasion	Instantly prepares naval invasions. Only works in debug mode.	instant_prepare
Instantly Train Units	Instantly trains divisions and ships.	instanttraining (it) It also affects AI by default, so use it in paused mode.
National Unity	Adds the specified amount of National Unity.	nu 5 Adds 5 national unity
Nukes	Adds nukes to your nation.	Nuke 100 Adds 100 nukes
Research 1	Researches the first technology in your research slot (or all of them) depending on the modifier.	research [<slot id> or “all”]
Research 2	Research technology you click on.	research_on_icon_click
Spawn Unit	Spawns a unit in a province.	spawn [<SubUnit Type>] [<Province ID>] [<Amount>]
Switch Country	Switch tag to another country. If you somehow are losing the game even with cheats, this HOI 4 console command has your back.	tag [<Country tag>]
Teleport Units	Activates the Teleportation tool for moving your armies, fleets, and squadrons.	teleport(tp)
White Peace	Ends war between two countries with neither party gaining or losing territory, income or other war goals.	wp [<country tags>] wp ENG GER

 

This concludes our quick guide to HOI 4 Console Commands. If you think we are missing any other handy cheats, let us know in the comments below.