SteelSeries Sets Sights on “Boring Office Peripherals” With New Mouse, Keyboards

Considering the crushing burden of student debt, not everyone can afford a $150 gaming mouse or a $250 gaming keyboard. Or, appraising the deliciousness of well-prepared restaurant-style Ramen, one might prefer to spend their money elsewhere. Luckily, SteelSeries has released three new gaming peripherals set on providing gamers with quality on the cheap. 

Enter the Rival 3 gaming mouse and the Apex 3 and Apex 5 gaming keyboards. The goal with each peripheral is to replace “boring office peripherals” that many gamers use on a day to day basis. Ehtisham Rabbani, SteelSeries CEO, said of the new peripheral line: 

There are so many gamers out there that are stuck using boring, traditional office peripherals for gaming. With these new products, we set office products in our sights and sought to retool our cutting-edge technologies and put them into products that are accessible for every gamer. No one should have to be stuck using run-of-the-mill office products for gaming.

The Rival 3 retails for $29.99 and employs SteelSeries’ TrueMove Core optical sensor. The sensor, made in collaboration with PixArt, is capable of reaching 8,500 CPI. Though that value isn’t as meteoric as the Rival 600‘s 12,000 CPI, it’s also $50 cheaper than the Rival 600. The Rival 3 is also 77g and has switches rated for 60 million clicks. 

Retailing for $49.99, the Apex 3 is a full gaming keyboard, complete with num-pad. It features proprietary SteelSeries switches said to surpasses 20 million keypresses. The keyboard is also IP32 water-resistant, similar to the Corsair K68. The Apex 3 also features nifty cable re-routing underneath the chassis, magnetic wrist rest, dedicated media keys, customizable lighting, and “gaming-grade” anti-ghosting. 

At $99.99, the Apex 5 gaming keyboard is the most “expensive” product in the new SteelSeries line. However, it has a few tricks up its sleeves, such as featuring switches that bridge the gap between membrane and mechanical. According to SteelSeries, the Apex 5 also has a magnetic wrist rest, dedicated media controls, and customizable lighting. It also has an OLED Smart Display for viewing information from Discord, TIDAL, and more. 

Of course, we haven’t tried any of these products ourselves, so we can’t specifically speak to their quality. But SteelSeries has been steadily upping its quality over the past several years, as seen in its other products, such as the Arctis Pro+ gaming headset, Stratus Duo controller, and Sensei Ten ambidextrous gaming mouse. 

All three peripherals are available now globally. You can learn more about them by visiting the SteelSeries website. Be sure to stay tuned for more on these products as we’re able to go hands-on with them in the coming weeks.