# Phaser: Physics

> Learn how to use Phaser physics with the Arcade engine, enabling it in your config and creating sprites and static or dynamic groups for your game.

Author: [Flavio Copes](https://flaviocopes.com/about/) | Published: 2021-04-25 | Topics: [Phaser](https://flaviocopes.com/tags/phaser/) | Canonical: https://flaviocopes.com/phaser-physics/

> This post is part of a Phaser series. [Click here](https://flaviocopes.com/phaser-setup/) to see the first post of the series.

Phaser provides 3 different kinds of built-in physics engines:

- Arcade
- [Matter.js](https://brm.io/matter-js/)
- Impact (Impact.js compatible)

Arcade is the simplest one, and the one I'll describe right now.

Enable it by adding a `physics` property to the `Phaser.Game` initialization config object:

```js
const config = {
  //...
  physics: {
    default: 'arcade',
    arcade: {
      debug: false
    }
  }
}
```

You can add physics to a single GameObject, like this:

```js
const dog = this.physics.add.sprite(20, 20, 'dog')
```

or you can create a physics group.

Groups are handy, because we can setup common rules for all the items in a group.

We have 2 kinds of groups: static groups, and dynamic groups. A static group include static bodies, and a dynamic group includes dynamic bodies.

Static bodies are element that never move. Like the ground in a platform game:

```js
//in preload()
this.load.image('ground', 'assets/platform.png')

//in create()
const platforms = this.physics.add.staticGroup()
const ground = this.add.sprite(200, 200, 'ground')
platforms.add(ground)
```

> Note: you can download the asset from <https://github.com/photonstorm/phaser3-examples/tree/master/public/assets>

A dynamic group includes elements that can move, and have a velocity and speed:

```js
const dogs = this.physics.add.group()
```

You can add items to a group using `items.add()`.

```js
const dogs = this.physics.add.group()
const dog = this.add.sprite(20, 20, 'dog')
dogs.add(dog)
```

Groups also provide a handy `create()` method which we can use to create GameObjects automatically:

```js
platforms.create(200, 200, 'ground')

//instead of
const ground = this.add.sprite(200, 200, 'ground')
platforms.add(ground)
```

Once you have a physics object set up, you can start working on collisions.