🏆 Review Score: 4.5/5 – ‘Awesome!‘

✅ Pros:

• 🪶 Super light without feeling cheap

• 💪 Packed with the best tech

• 👆 Excellent switches and side buttons

• 🛜 Multi-device compatibility

• 👏 The Keychron Launcher shames other brands

❌ Cons:

• ✋ Doesn’t work with every grip type

• 🤷‍♂️ Not the most exciting product

Amazon: Keychron G3

The Shortcut Review

Lightweight gaming mice have become increasingly popular, and the Keychron G3 shows how to design one that feels effortless to use without skimping on crucial features.

The Keychron G3 is armed with everything competitive gamers would expect from a high-end mouse: it has an 8K polling rate, a flagship PixArt 3950 sensor, DPI up to 30,000, and weighs just 44 grams. It feels robust in the hand, too, with no give or flex to the carbon fiber build.

Thankfully, you can make any adjustments to the Keychron G3 without downloading proprietary software. The Keychron Launcher web app lets you create custom profiles, change the lift-off distance, power management, and a variety of other settings straight from your browser.

The 500 mAh battery lets you use the Keychron G3 for days before it needs charging, even when using an 8K Hz polling rate. You can also connect the mouse via Bluetooth or wired, giving you complete flexibility.

Keychron G3 specs 🛠️

• Price: $109.99/$84.99

• Connection: 2.4GHz, Bluetooth, Wired

• Sensor: PixArt 3950 sensor

• Battery Life: Up to 160 hours

• Weight: 44 grams

• Colors: Black (Carbon Fiber), Frosted Gray (PCB)

While it may not have fancy haptic induction technology like the Logitech G Pro X2 Superstrike, the Huano Micro Switches offer a satisfying click that isn’t distracting like on the Razer Viper V4 Pro.

At just 120mm long, 38mm tall, and 63mm wide, the Keychron G3 gaming mouse is best suited to those who play with a claw-grip or a fingertip-grip. Palm-grip players will probably struggle with the Keychron G3, as it’s slightly too short for larger hands, despite the raised hump. Still, I found it incredibly comfortable to use, even as someone who tends to use a palm-grip than a claw-grip.

At $109.99 for the Carbon Fiber model and $84.99 for the Frosted Gray model, the Keychron G3 undercuts most of the competition and delivers equally impressive performance in titles where it matters most, like Counter-Strike 2. Read my full Keychron G3 review below for more.

A review unit was provided by Keychron.

What I loved about the Keychron G3 ❤️

🪶 Super light without feeling cheap. No matter how hard you squeeze the Keychron G3, its shell never flexes or creaks. There are also no rattling parts or cheap-feeling materials. It may weigh just over 40 grams, but it still feels like a premium product thanks to its excellent build quality.

💪 Packed with the best tech. With an 8K polling rate, Motion Sync, and a PixArt 3950 sensor, the Keychron G3 doesn’t skimp on premium technology to achieve its lightweight design. You won’t be held back by input latency or let down by the G3’s beefy battery.

👆 Excellent switches, side buttons, and scroll wheel. Every button and switch on the Keychron G3 is a joy to press, and there’s a satisfying weight to each one. You also get a pleasant ‘click’ sound that isn’t distracting like on other mice. The rubberized scroll wheel is also a nice touch.

🛜 Multi-device compatibility. You can connect the Keychron G3 via its 2.4GHz wireless dongle, Bluetooth, or USB-C. The 2.4GHz dongle provides a rock-solid connection, and the option to connect via Bluetooth means you can use it on other devices with the flick of a switch.

👏 The Keychron Launcher shames other brands. You can change every setting and update the firmware of the Keychron G3 using the Keychron Launcher web app. There’s no need to download a specific piece of software that may eat up your computer’s resources and take up storage space. It’s a fantastic experience that other brands should follow.

What I disliked about the Keychron G3 💔

✋ Doesn’t work with every grip type. If you’re strictly a palm-grip player, the Keychron G3 is harder to recommend. The mouse is shorter than most, which means your fingers may extend slightly past the front.

🤷‍♂️ Not the most exciting product out there. Even though the Keychron G3 has an LED light in the scroll wheel, it only turns on when the battery is low or you first connect the mouse. It means it’s not the most eye-catching gaming mouse, and it doesn’t have any special tech like the Logitech G Pro X2 Superstrike's haptic inductive technology.

Should you buy the Keychron G3? 🤔

Amazon: Keychron G3

Yes, if…

• ✅ You want a super-light gaming mouse.

• ✅ You’re a claw-grip player.

• ✅ You want a mouse that works across multiple devices.

No, if…

• ❌ You don’t play many competitive PC games.

• ❌ You’re not a fan of lightweight mice.

• ❌ You’re a palm-grip player.

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Adam Vjestica is The Shortcut’s Senior Editor. Formerly TechRadar’s Gaming Hardware Editor, Adam has also worked at Nintendo of Europe as a Content Marketing Editor, where he helped launch the Nintendo Switch. He also runs a retro gaming YouTube channel called Game on, boy! Follow him on X @ItsMrProducts.

🏆 Review Score: 2.5/5 – ‘Not Bad‘

✅ Pros:

• 😲 It’ll wow you with its haptic feedback

• 🎮 Low latency makes it perfect for gaming

• 👍 Comfortable to wear

❌ Cons:

• 😕 Doesn’t deliver 360-degree accuracy

• 🤷‍♂️ Putting on the vest each time is a hassle

• 💰 It’s expensive for what it offers

• 🫨 It can get loud

• 🪑 You need to be sitting upright to use it

Best Buy: Woojer Vest 4

Amazon: Woojer Vest 4

The Shortcut Review

The Woojer Vest 4 is the kind of product I genuinely respect. It’s incredibly niche and built for a very specific audience, so it was never destined for mainstream appeal – especially as an accessory. Even so, Woojer has pushed ahead and produced four versions of its haptic feedback vest, and there’s no denying that the Woojer Vest 4 succeeds at making gaming, music, and movies feel more immersive.

Compatible with practically every device, the Osci TRX2 transducers deliver accurate, powerful haptic feedback that elevates whatever you’re watching. It’s almost impossible for the Woojer Vest 4 not to put a smile on your face the first time you use it – the sensation is genuinely surreal.

It’s also incredibly responsive, never lagging behind the action – even in fast-paced competitive games like Counter-Strike 2. Fire a gun and you feel the kickback instantly. It’s a crucial detail, and thankfully one Woojer hasn’t overlooked.

While gaming with the vest adds another layer of fun, listening to music is arguably the Woojer Vest 4’s strongest use case. It converts sound frequencies into a consistently convincing physical experience, making familiar tracks feel fresh again. The powerful transducers breathed new life into songs I’ve heard countless times – like Kanye West’s ‘Welcome to Heartbreak’. It gave the Woojer Vest 4 a serious workout, but it never missed a beat.

The problem is that the novelty of the Woojer Vest 4 wears off surprisingly quickly. Even though the vest is lightweight, easy to put on, and relatively comfortable, it’s still a big ask to strap in every time you go to play a game or listen to music. It reminds me of 3D glasses: as transformative as 3D could be, most people simply couldn’t be bothered to watch a film in a darkened room with glasses on.

Woojer Vest 4 specs 🛠️

• Price: $499

• Connectivity: Wired, Bluetooth

• Size: One-size fits all (S-XXL)

The Woojer Vest 4 is also loud. The haptics are far from silent, so you’ll want a pair of noise-cancelling headphones on hand. I couldn’t imagine using the Woojer Vest 4 with open-back headphones, as the buzzing and vibration noises would be downright annoying‌.

And then there’s the price. At $499, it’s a substantial investment for something that I can’t imagine most people using every day unless they’re truly committed. Woojer also positions the vest as a relaxation tool, or even as a device for music mastering to bolster its value, but I’m not convinced.

Still, if you get the chance to try it, you absolutely should. Those first few hours are a genuine pleasure, and the vest’s accuracy, responsiveness, and overall comfort are a testament to how well it’s been designed. Sadly, our collective desire for convenience is what ultimately lets it down – though your mileage may vary. Read my full Woojer Vest 4 review below.

A review unit was provided by Woojer.

What I loved about the Woojer Vest 4 ❤️

😲 It has the wow factor. The first few hours with the Woojer Vest 4 are fantastic, as it adds a new layer of immersion to your favorite media. The powerful haptics deliver a convincing sensation in games – whether it’s the thump of explosions or the kick of firing a gun. Music is also a standout, with tracks taking on new life when you’re wearing the Woojer Vest 4.

🎮 Low latency makes it perfect for gaming. If the Woojer Vest 4’s haptics couldn’t keep up with the action on screen, it would be useless for gaming. Thankfully, it’s responsive enough that the feedback lines up almost perfectly with what’s happening in-game. You also get several EQ presets to choose from, so you can tailor the speed and intensity to your liking.

👍 Comfortable to wear. Once you’ve adjusted the straps, the Woojer Vest 4 is more comfortable than it looks. It isn’t overly heavy, and it won’t cause any of the visible fatigue you might get from wearing a VR headset for long periods. It does get a little warm after a while, though.

What I disliked about the Woojer Vest 4💔

🫨 Doesn’t deliver 360-degree haptics. If you were hoping the Woojer Vest 4 would let you know where you’re being shot from, you might be disappointed. The haptics provide a more generalized rumble based on the audio from your chosen content, rather than converting it into pinpoint directional feedback.

🤷‍♂️ Putting on the vest each time is a hassle. It may seem obvious, but the Woojer Vest 4 requires some effort to use – even if it’s minimal. By design, you need to strap it on every time, which creates a meaningful amount of friction that simply isn’t there when you’re picking up a gamepad or slipping on a pair of headphones.

💰 It isn’t cheap. At $500 (though you can find it for less), the Woojer Vest 4 is a lot of money for something that isn’t essential. Yes, it’s a great sensory experience, but at the end of the day it’s still a fancy accessory for other, more meaningful devices.

🫨 It’s loud. Woojer claims its patented Oscillating Frame Actuators are silent, and while that may technically be true, the vibrations cause vest’s plastic components to generate noise – especially when the vest is set to higher settings.

🪑 You consume content lying down. The Woojer Vest 4 works best if you’re sitting upright in a chair, and isn’t designed for those who prefer watching films or playing games while lying down.

Should you buy the Woojer Vest 4? 🤔

Best Buy: Woojer Vest 4

Amazon: Woojer Vest 4

Yes, if…

• ✅ You want to elevate your music, gaming, and movie-watching experience.

• ✅ You want to make VR gaming even more immersive.

• ✅ You like novel tech that does something different.

No, if…

• ❌ You’re a low-hassle, no thrills gamer who values convenience.

• ❌ You don’t have a pair of noise-cancelling headphones.

• ❌ You primarily enjoy consuming content while lying down.

Subscribe now

Adam Vjestica is The Shortcut’s Senior Editor. Formerly TechRadar’s Gaming Hardware Editor, Adam has also worked at Nintendo of Europe as a Content Marketing Editor, where he helped launch the Nintendo Switch. He also runs a retro gaming YouTube channel called Game on, boy! Follow him on X @ItsMrProducts.

$150 off Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra

🏆 Rating: 4.5/5

Editor’s Choice Award

Pros

• ✅ 🔒 Built-in Privacy Display – no stick-on film required

• ✅ 🤖 Galaxy AI is more agentic: book a cab with a single voice prompt

• ✅ 📸 Wider apertures + APV codec = a serious upgrade for video creators

• ✅ ⚡ Super-Fast Charging 3.0 hits 75% in just 30 minutes

• ✅ 📐 Slimmest Ultra design yet at just 7.9mm thin

• ✅ 🔭 39% NPU boost means AI features run seamlessly in the background

• ✅ 🎨 Unified color lineup across all three models – Cobalt Violet is my favorite

Cons

• ❌ 🧲 No MagSafe or PixelSnap-like feature

• ❌ 💰 Starts at $1,299 – same as the S25 Ultra, but trade-in deals help

• ❌ 🖋️ Still no S Pen Bluetooth – a loss carried over from the S25 Ultra

• ❌ 📸 Standard S26 and S26+ don’t get the wider apertures or APV codec

$150 off Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra

🔥 The Shortcut hot take

I’ve spent six months testing the Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra, and while last year’s S25 Ultra was the phone that made me care about AI, the S26 Ultra is the phone that makes me trust it. Samsung has quietly shifted from flashy AI party tricks to something more ambitious: an AI that acts for you, before you even ask.

While I am currently reviewing the Z Fold 8 right now, let me break down the two things that surprised me most about the S26 Ultra – and a few things that left me wanting more from Samsung’s new flagship S phone.

• 🔒 Privacy, at the pixel level. The S26 Ultra is the first smartphone in the world with a built-in Privacy Display – and unlike the peel-off privacy film you can buy on Amazon for $12, this one is integrated into the display itself. When you activate it, the pixels literally change how they disperse light, keeping your screen crystal clear for you while blurring it out for the person craning their neck next to you on the subway. I tested it under the bright conference lighting in San Francisco, and the effect is dramatic – from straight-on, the display looked as vivid as ever; from even a mild side angle, the screen became unreadable. It works in both portrait and landscape.

• 🤖 AI that does things – not just says things. Samsung has been building toward agentic AI since the S24 series, and the S26 Ultra feels like the moment it clicks. With Gemini as your agent, you can ask it to book a taxi – it handles the entire workflow, surfaces the confirmation, and asks you to tap once to confirm. That’s it. During our demo, it worked exactly as described. The S25 Ultra’s AI was impressive at cross-app commands; the S26 Ultra starts to feel like having a capable assistant who already knows your apps.

$150 off Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra

Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra review

📸 Wider apertures change everything in low light. The main camera on the S26 Ultra gets wider apertures – meaning more light hits the sensor. In a darkened room at Unpacked, photos looked noticeably brighter and sharper than what I remember from the same shots on the S25 Ultra. This is a real, visible improvement in my opinion.

🎬 APV codec is a big deal for creators. The S26 Ultra is the first Galaxy phone to support APV, a professional-grade video codec that Samsung describes as “visually lossless.” It’s designed for creators who edit repeatedly – the footage doesn’t degrade with each pass through an editor. If you shoot and edit a lot of video, this is the most compelling hardware upgrade Samsung has offered video creators in years.

🔭 50MP ultra-wide gets autofocus. The 200MP main camera got the aperture upgrade, and the 50MP ultra-wide also gains autofocus. For anyone who has ever been frustrated by a blurry ultra-wide close-up shot, this is a small but meaningful fix.

⚡ Super-Fast Charging 3.0 is genuinely faster. The S26 Ultra charges at up to 60W via wire and hits 75% in around 30 minutes. The S25 Ultra was already quick at 45W, but the S26 Ultra shortens downtime meaningfully for a phone with a 5,000mAh battery. This is one of the reasons to buy the S26 Ultra over the Galaxy Z Fold 8, which is capped at 45W.

📐 Slimmest ‘Ultra’ Samsung has ever made. At 7.9mm, the S26 Ultra is the thinnest Ultra yet. It’s nowhere near as thin as last year’s S25 Edge (5.8mm) or the iPhone Air (5.6mm), but it also doesn’t make concessions on hardware.

🧲 MagSafe is MIA – you’ll need a case for that. I’m disappointed Samsung didn’t include a magnetic back on the S26 phones. I love Apple’s MagSafe and Google’s PixelSnap, which make wireless Qi2 charging easier and allow me to snap my phone to this compact tripod (Amazon link) that I recommend to everyone. Samsung told me they chose to have the thinnest Ultra phone possible, and magnetic cases are in stock if you want this feature.

$150 off Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra

🐉 Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 for Galaxy. This is where Samsung's flagship phones excel over other Androids. It not only includes the latest Qualcomm chip, but it basically overclocks performance to ensure the S26 series feels snappier while the redesigned vapor chamber dissipates heat more efficiently from the sides of the processor rather than just below it.

🧠 39% NPU boost is the real performance story. Samsung is leading with CPU numbers (up 19% vs S25 Ultra) and GPU numbers (up 24%), but the NPU jump of 39% is what powers always-on Galaxy AI features. That’s the stat that matters most for the AI-forward experience Samsung is building.

📱 Now Nudge actually understands your messages contextually. If a friend texts asking for photos from your trip to New York, Galaxy AI surfaces those photos from your Gallery without you ever opening it. I asked Samsung’s team how it handles privacy and was told the photo analysis happens on-device. This matches my experience on the iPhone, at least from the iOS 27 preview beta.

🧹 Photo Assist lets you describe edits in plain English. Instead of tapping through menus, you just say what you want – “make it night” or “remove the stain on my shirt.” Samsung has also added the ability to change outfits in photos using Galaxy AI, and edits can be reviewed step-by-step and undone at any point. It feels more like a conversation than a photo editor.

🔍 Circle to Search now handles multiple objects at once. Samsung upgraded Circle to Search with multi-object recognition – circle a full outfit and it identifies the jacket, the shoes, and the bag simultaneously. For fashion shoppers, this is a genuinely useful upgrade over last year’s one-item-at-a-time approach.

📞 AI Call Screening is now proactive. An unknown number calls. Before you answer, AI Call Screening identifies the caller and summarizes why they’re calling. It can filter a spam call instantly, making it the kind of background AI feature that most people want in their lives.

$150 off Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra

🛡️ Privacy Alerts watches apps watching you. The S26 Ultra uses machine learning to alert you in real time when an app with device admin privileges is trying to access sensitive data – your location, call logs, or contacts – unnecessarily. Samsung is positioning this as “privacy at a system level,” not just a display-level trick.

🔐 Post-quantum cryptography extends to firmware. Samsung extended its PQC work to software verification and firmware protection on the S26 Ultra. This is future-proofing against quantum computing-era attacks, and it’s quietly one of the most enterprise-relevant features on this phone.

🎧 Galaxy Buds4 are a natural companion. The new Buds 4 series pairs with the S26 Ultra so you can invoke AI agents hands-free. The Buds 4 Pro adds Head Gestures just like the Apple AirPods Pro 3 – nod to accept a call, shake to decline – which sounds gimmicky but worked smoothly in our demo.

📄 Document Scan gets smarter. AI-powered Document Scan now removes distortions like creases and fingers automatically, then organizes multiple scans into a single PDF. This is one of those features that sounds minor until the moment you need to scan a crumpled receipt at an airport.

🎨 Cobalt Violet is the color to get. All three models share a unified design language and color lineup: Cobalt Violet, White, Black, Sky Blue, and Samsung Store exclusives in Pink Gold and Silver Shadow. Cobalt Violet is the standout – it reads as sophisticated rather than loud.

🌈 Creative Studio unifies creation and customization. Starting from a sketch, photo, or text prompt, Creative Studio can generate stickers, invitations, or wallpapers without switching tools. It’s Samsung’s answer to the question: “What do I actually do with generative AI on my phone?”

📡 Bluetooth 6.0 on Ultra and S26+. The standard Galaxy S26 makes do with Bluetooth 5.4. The Ultra and Plus get 6.0, which brings improved connection stability and is better suited for the growing ecosystem of Bluetooth audio accessories.

🖥️ ProScaler on Ultra and Plus only. ProScaler enhances image scaling so photos and videos appear sharper and more detailed on the screen – but it’s limited to the Ultra and S26+. Standard S26 users miss out.

🔋 5,000mAh battery – same as before, but faster to fill. Samsung hasn’t increased the battery size since the S22 Ultra era. The S26 Ultra’s advantage is efficiency: the more powerful NPU runs AI tasks without hammering the CPU, and Super-Fast Charging 3.0 makes the capacity less of a concern.

$150 off Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra

🎮 GPU up 24% – gaming and video capture benefit most. Samsung specifically highlighted gaming and video capture as the key use cases for the GPU boost. In the brief gaming demo I saw, the frame rate looked smooth even in demanding scenes.

🌙 Enhanced Nightography extends to selfies. The AI ISP improvements that have historically improved the rear cameras now extend to the 12MP front camera. Natural skin tones and finer detail in mixed lighting – tested under the varied lighting conditions at Unpacked, the selfie results looked noticeably cleaner than what I recall from the S25 Ultra’s front camera.

🎯 Horizontal lock in Super Steady video. Video Super Steady has a new horizontal lock option that keeps the frame level even when you’re moving fast – useful for action sports or just walking while recording. It’s the kind of stabilization feature I’d use constantly.

🤝 Bixby is more conversational this time. Samsung says you can now navigate settings and adjust your phone using natural language – no need for exact command phrasing. I asked Bixby to “make the screen a little dimmer” without using the word “brightness,” and it understood. Small win, meaningful progress.

🧩 Perplexity joins Gemini as an agent option. Alongside Bixby and Gemini, the S26 Ultra supports Perplexity as a selectable AI agent, set up via a single button press. For users who prefer Perplexity’s real-time web-sourced answers over Gemini’s broader task execution, this is a welcome addition.

📅 Release date: The Galaxy S26 series started shipping to customers on March 11, 2026, if you pre-ordered one of the phones at Samsung.com, Amazon, Best Buy, or major carriers. Samsung offered up to $900 off with an eligible trade-in, or $150 Samsung Credit toward accessories without a trade-in.

$150 off Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra

⚙️ Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra specs

• 📆 Release date: March 11, 2026

• 💰 Price: From $1,299.99

• 📺 Screen size: 6.9-inch QHD+ Dynamic AMOLED 2X

• 🏃‍♂️ Refresh rate: 1–120Hz adaptive

• 💡 Brightness: 2,600 nits peak

• 📸 Main camera: 200MP Wide AF

• 📸 Ultra-wide camera: 50MP Ultra Wide AF

• 📸 Telephoto cameras: 50MP (5x) / 10MP (3x)

• 🤳 Front camera: 12MP Wide AF

• ⚙️ Chipset: Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 for Galaxy (3nm)

• 🐏 RAM: 12GB (256GB/512GB) / 16GB (1TB)

• 🗄️ Storage: 256GB / 512GB / 1TB

• 🔋 Battery: 5,000mAh

• 🔌 Wired charging: Up to 60W (Super-Fast Charging 3.0)

• ⚡ Wireless charging: Up to 25W

• 📶 Connectivity: 5G (sub6 + mmWave), Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 6.0, UWB

• 📐 Dimensions: 78.1 x 163.6 x 7.9mm

• ⚖️ Weight: 214g

• 🌈 Colors: Cobalt Violet, White, Black, Sky Blue + Pink Gold and Silver Shadow (Samsung.com exclusive)

• 🤖 OS: Android 16, One UI 8.5

• 💦 Waterproof: IP68

$150 off Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra

• → Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 8 deals

• → Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 8 Ultra deals

• → Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 8 deals

• → Samsung Galaxy Watch Ultra 2 deals

• → Samsung Galaxy Watch 9 deals

• 🤏 12% thinner titanium build with enhanced rugged durability

• 🔆 5,000 nits peak brightness outshines Apple Watch Ultra 3’s 3,000 nits

• ⚙️ Snapdragon Wear Elite processor — faster app switching, NPU for AI, satellite messaging

• 🏃‍♂️ Trail Running mode tracks elevation/climbing, detects terrain impact, warns of overexertion

• 🚰 Real-time hydration tracking that prompts water/snack breaks with Nutrition Alerts

• 🤿 Dive-ready with an IP69 rating + EN13319 certification for depths up to 130 ft (40m)

• 🔋 35% larger 800mAh battery rated for 60 hours with Always-On Display

• 🏷️ Priced at $699, $50 more expensive than the original Samsung Galaxy Watch Ultra

• → Samsung Galaxy Watch Ultra 2 deals

The Samsung Galaxy Watch Ultra 2 is proving to be the high-end smartwatch the Apple Watch Ultra 3 should have been. On the surface, it features a slimmer design and a brighter display that peaks at 5,000 nits. Internally, Samsung has also upgraded the Galaxy Watch Ultra 2 with a faster Snapdragon Wear Elite processor and a 35% larger battery. Compared to the Apple Watch Ultra 3’s crummy list of upgrades, it’s easy to see Samsung is winning here. The only thing I don’t love about the Samsung Galaxy Watch Ultra 2 is its $50 more expensive at $699.

🤏 Slimmer titanium design. The Samsung Galaxy Watch Ultra 2 is 12% thinner than its predecessor while retaining the rugged titanium construction as its predecessor. This new model is only 10mm thick compared to the predecessor at 12mm thick. That’s only a 2mm difference, but it’s instantly noticeable when you’re wearing the new Galaxy Watch Ultra 2. It feels less like you have a poker chip strapped to your wrist, and it’s easier to slip under a long-sleeved shirt or jacket.

🔆 Brightest display. The other big notable change is the new brighter, 5000-nit display. The new screen makes an immediate impression with its vivid watchfaces and menus. 5,000 nits of brightness is far brighter than the 3,000-nit Apple Watch Ultra 3, and it’s likely to be brighter than even your smartphone and even your TV – unless you have one of TCL’s new SQD-Mini LED TVs at home. Simply taking pictures of the Galaxy Watch Ultra 2’s brighter display was easier, as the screen pops more with stronger contrast.

• → Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 8 deals

• → Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 8 Ultra deals

• → Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 8 deals

• → Samsung Galaxy Watch Ultra 2 deals

• → Samsung Galaxy Watch 9 deals

🪻Snapdragon Wear Elite. There’s also a brand new Snapdragon Wear Elite processor powering the Galaxy Watch Ultra 2. This is the biggest wearable chip upgrade we’ve seen in three years, and it adds an NPU for AI performance, satellite messaging, and serious battery life improvements. Immediately I can tell that apps open faster and stay running in the background while you switch between them on this new smartwatch. No more having to relaunch maps or a workout app when your notifications bring you to a different screen on this smartwatch.

🥾 Trail Running & Nutrition Alert. As ever, Samsung is pushing the Samsung Galaxy Watch Ultra 2 as the world’s best workout companion and has added Trail Running as an activity. This new activity will monitor your elevation and climbing progress. It’ll even detect terrain impact using the gyroscope and let you know when you’re hiking too hard to avoid injury. Samsung has also added a new Nutrition Alert that’ll trigger when its real-time hydration guidance notices you’ve sweat too much and it’s time to replenish with a water and snack break.

• → Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 8 deals

• → Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 8 Ultra deals

• → Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 8 deals

• → Samsung Galaxy Watch Ultra 2 deals

• → Samsung Galaxy Watch 9 deals

🤿 Dive-ready. On the opposite of climbing, the Samsung Galaxy Watch Ultra 2 is promising to be dive-ready with a heartier IP69 dust and waterproof rating. It can also handle deeper depths with an added EN13319 rating (basically the EU version of 10ATM), which will allow you to take this watch to depths of 130 feet (40 meters). Samsung also says it’s developing a diving app with Mares, a world-leading diving equipment brand, that will be available later this year.

🔋 35% increased battery life. The Samsung Galaxy Watch Ultra 2 comes with a larger 800mAh battery, a 35% increase in capacity compared to the previous Ultra model that came with 590mAh. Samsung rates its new smartwatch as lasting for 60 hours straight with Always-On Display turned on, but that was already roughly what you could get with the original Galaxy Watch Ultra. However this shakes out, we’ll test if the bigger battery has improved battery life with our stringent review testing.

• → Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 8 deals

• → Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 8 Ultra deals

• → Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 8 deals

• → Samsung Galaxy Watch Ultra 2 deals

• → Samsung Galaxy Watch 9 deals

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Kevin Lee is The Shortcut’s Creative Director. Follow him on Twitter @baggingspam

🏆 Review score: 3.5/5

✅ Pros

• ⚡ Fast PCIe 4.0 NVMe SSD read/write speeds

• 🚀 Big performance leap over Samsung 980

• 🔮 Excellent Magician software with migration support

• 🔋 Lower power consumption vs. 990 Pro

• ⚖️ Good performance with fast, ample system RAM

❌ Cons

• 🫥 DRAM-less design hurts overall system performance

• 🧭 Speed depends heavily on your RAM speed and capacity

• 📉 Major slowdown after 200+ GB file transfers

• 🤑 Barely cheaper than Samsung

Best Buy: Samsung 990 1TB - $269

Best Buy: Samsung 990 2TB - $529

The Shortcut Review

A new NVMe SSD in the year of RAMageddon!? The Samsung 990 SSD came as a real surprise when memory prices are surging, and products have disappeared from shelves and e-tailers. While I laud Samsung for offering consumers a new PCIe 4.0 NVMe storage option, even as other brands like Micron prioritize AI, this new storage drive isn’t a fantastic value.

At $269.99 for 1TB and $529.99 for 2TB, the Samsung 990 reflects the current memory market more than its entry-level positioning. Samsung argues the 990 delivers almost the same speeds as the Samsung 990 Pro, but at a much lower power level. However, its DRAM-less design compromises performance, as it relies on your own DDR4 or DDR5 system memory for cache. And once it runs out of system memory to use, it’ll convert its own flash storage as a secondary memory cache, but this proves to dramatically slow data transfer speeds.

Even with memory prices as high as they are, the Samsung 990 isn’t a fantastic bargain. It’s Samsung’s most bare component in years, while the 1TB Samsung 990 Evo Plus costs just $20 more and the 1TB Samsung 990 Pro can be had for $50 more.

Full Review

🧭 Speed test. The Samsung 990 is rated to deliver sequential read and write speeds of 7,150 MB/s and 6,450 MB/s, respectively. My benchmark results show almost identical figures, while the drive’s overall performance places it squarely behind the Samsung 990 Pro. More impressively, the Samsung 990 is a huge leap in performance over the Samsung 980. Not bad for a drive that’s basically been stripped down to its most basic NAND components.

🧠 Memory dependent. The Samsung 990’s DRAM-less configuration is supposed to help reduce costs for both pricey memory and the final price for you. However, it comes with a major compromise: using your own system memory as cache. That’s the same DDR4 or DDR5 RAM your PC is already using to run the OS, apps, games, and load basically anything.

This makes the Samsung 990’s performance entirely dependent on your RAM’s speed and capacity. I was able to achieve a good level of performance with my 32GB G.SKILL DDR5-6400 memory kit, but you’ll see slower speeds. Also, if you have less RAM overall, like only 16GB or 8GB, the Samsung 990 will sooner convert its own flash memory storage into a secondary cache.

Unfortunately, this creates another bottleneck, as the Samsung 900 is converting its quad-layer-cell NAND memory into single-layer-cell NAND that’s far slower than your system memory. If you want a tiny bit more speed for $50 more, consider the Samsung 990 Evo Plus, which uses slightly faster TLC NAND memory.

🏃‍♂️ Made to sprint. The Samsung 990 is a fast drive, but its greatest weakness is its lack of a dedicated cache for prolonged file transfers. After moving about 200GB of files, I saw the drive’s transfer speed drop down and waver between 300 MB/s and 30 MB/s. You’re rarely going to see this level of slowdown unless you’re moving 500GB of data at a time, but it occurs because it’s using its own flash storage as cache.

🔮 Software that works like Magic. Samsung truly has the best SSD management software, aptly named Magician. The most wondrous thing it does is migrate your boot drive from one Samsung storage device to another. No more having to reinstall Windows or save and load a backup. The app also presents all the SSD’s statistics up front, and you only have to dive into a single sub-menu to switch the drive from performance mode to economy mode.

🤑 That price. The price of the Samsung 990 stings at $269.99 for 1TB and $529.99 for 2TB. A year ago, paying that much would have afforded you double the capacity on a drive with its own built-in cache. It also doesn’t seem like that much of a bargain when the 1TB Samsung 990 Evo Plus costs $289, and even the $319 Samsung 990 Pro is just $50 more. Worse yet, the $529 Samsung 990 has also launched during a week when both the 2TB Samsung Evo Plus and the Samsung 990 Pro are on sale for $369 and $389, respectively.

Should you buy the Samsung 990 SSD?

Best Buy: Samsung 990 1TB - $269

Best Buy: Samsung 990 2TB - $529

✅ Yes, if…

• ⚡ You want flagship PCIe 4.0 SSD speeds for less money

• 🎮 You’re not a gamer or have extremely large files to move

• 🔋 You want a more power-efficient PC

❌ No, if…

• 💵 $20-$50 more for a faster drive is in your budget (get the Samsung 990 Pro instead)

• 🚛 Most of your computing involves large files or gaming (get the Samsung 990 Pro instead)

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Kevin Lee is The Shortcut’s Creative Director. Follow him on Twitter @baggingspam

You probably ask yourself every fall whether you should install the big, fancy software upgrade that Apple releases with its new iPhones. Last year’s iOS 26 was a bit polarizing with the huge Liquid Glass redesign and all the changes to apps you use each day, and it resulted in some users complaining about performance issues and an inability to see everything as clearly as they used to.

That’s why I’m happy to report that’s all changing this fall. I’ve been testing Apple’s next round of software updates on my own personal iPhone and Apple Watch, and the 2027 platforms have gotten a lot better. Both iOS 27 and watchOS 27 (which are now in public beta) fix many of the issues you might have had with the previous round of updates, and they introduce new features that make Apple’s software feel modern and more capable than ever before.

After experimenting with the iOS 27 and watchOS 27 betas for the past few weeks, these 7 upgrades stood out the most and convinced me that whether you have a new iPhone 17 Pro Max or one from years ago, a recent Apple Watch Ultra 3 or an aging model, you need to install these updates.

Disclosure: The versions of iOS 27 and watchOS 27 I’ve been testing are technically betas and not stable enough for public release. While Apple has dropped the public betas that are less buggy and prone to crashes, we recommend waiting until the fall when Apple says it’ll roll out the updates to everyone.

⬆️ 7 reasons you’ll want to upgrade to iOS 27 and watchOS 27 this fall

🚀 Everything is getting way faster

• iOS 27: It’s actually insane how much faster iOS 27 feels on my iPhone. I’ve tested the update on my iPhone 17 Pro Max and iPhone Air, and yet despite those phones coming out less than a year ago, the new software makes them feel noticeably faster than before. Apps open quicker, multitasking is snappier, and the whole system feels more responsive. My phones weren’t slow to begin with, but thanks to all the under-the-hood improvements in iOS 27, they can’t help but get faster. Anyone with an iPhone older than mine will want to rush to grab this update just for the sake of performance.

• watchOS 27: Similarly, my Apple Watch Ultra 3 is a bit snappier thanks to watchOS 27. Apple made a bunch of improvements under the hood to make it faster and more responsive, and I can feel the difference. It’s not quite as noticeable as it is on my iPhone, but things like the Control Center will spring to life quicker, while widgets take less time to load. If you have a less-powerful Apple Watch on your wrist, you’ll appreciate these changes immensely.

🫧 Liquid Glass won’t annoy you anymore

• iOS 27: Apple is making a big change to how Liquid Glass looks on your iPhone. Not only is it easier to see text and iconography out of the box, but now, you can granularly adjust the transparency of the UI to whatever you’d like. Whether you want it crystal-clear, a little bit tinted, or completely frosted, the new slider in the Settings app lets you tweak it to your liking. It’s a lot better than the options in iOS 26, which were limited to only clear or frosted.

• watchOS 27: Liquid Glass looks a lot better on the Apple Watch thanks to watchOS 27. Apple tweaked a lot of the UI elements to make things easier to see, with some more frosted than others. I’ve also noticed that buttons are easier to make out, as are notifications. Nothing was impossible to see in watchOS 26, but the visual enhancements here are welcome.

🤖 Yes, Siri AI is that good

• iOS 27: After years of Siri being the butt of every joke about how bad virtual assistants are, I’m happy to report that Apple’s assistant is finally good. Built with new Apple Foundation Models that rely on Gemini technology, Siri AI is far more powerful, more contextual, and way more useful than ever before. It knows everything about you and what’s on your phone, so it can provide contextual responses based on whatever you say. I’ve asked Siri to dig up info I knew I had somewhere but couldn’t find it, and it was able to do so effortlessly. It can comb through your email, read your texts, and more to understand what you’re talking about, enhancing the experience tremendously. It can also understand what’s on your screen, which made it easy to ask Siri to add a recipe’s ingredients I pulled up to my shopping list and set a reminder for a pop-up I saw on Instagram for this weekend.

• watchOS 27: It goes without saying that a smart watch will make you feel like James Bond whenever you talk to it, and that same feeling shows itself once again with watchOS 27. Siri AI’s ability to carry a conversation is even more convenient on the watch; you can just keep talking to it and get ideas for a workout plan, cooking tips, and more. I use it a lot to keep track of reminders and steps for recipes while I’m preparing dinner. And since it knows everything about you, all of the same personal context perks I enjoy on my iPhone are also here.

💬 Sending pictures with your texts is more reliable

• iOS 27: Ever send a picture with a text message with less-than-reliable service, only for both to fail to send? Apple fixed this with iOS 27, and it’s one of those things you don’t realize you need until you have it. I’ve sent dozens of photos with texts at this point, and not only will I get a progress bar telling me whether a photo will send, but my iPhone will also automatically retry to send a picture or video if it fails the first time. Messages will also more reliably sync your text chains with your other devices, which I greatly appreciate given the sheer amount of devices on my Apple account.

🛜 Faster AirDrop that you didn’t know you needed

• iOS 27: Another thing you didn’t realize you’d need on your iPhone: way faster AirDrop. Across all of Apple’s systems, AirDrop is getting up to 80% faster at transferring files, which is a big deal. The few times I’ve transferred files between two OS 27 platforms, it’s definitely seemed faster. I want to dive more into how much it can handle with the speed improvements now that I’m running macOS Golden Gate, so stay tuned.

💳 The Wallet app might change your life

• iOS 27: The Wallet app is getting a lot of big updates, and there are two that are probably going to change your life. Thanks to Siri AI, you can point your camera at a receipt, select the items you ordered, and instantly know how much you owe the host of your group. I haven’t gone out in a minute so I haven’t been able to test this, but I can tell a lot of people will like this. Another thing: recurring subscriptions. The Wallet app will give you insights into your subscriptions and alert you when one’s coming up. I had this feature notify me that my Spotify subscription was going to renew in a few days, and it make me excited for how useful it could be in the future for subscriptions that I don’t actually care about.

• watchOS 27: There are also updates for Wallet in watchOS 27. You can add any pass that has a QR code attached to it to your virtual wallet, then pull them up on your Apple Watch or add them to your Smart Stack. I’m going to a concert this weekend that this is going to come in handy for big time.

⌚️ Your wrist feels smarter – and makes more sense

• watchOS 27: Apple made three big UI changes to the Apple Watch that help it feel way smarter beyond interacting with Siri AI. The Smart Stack is better at recommending widgets it thinks you’ll want to reference during the day, which I’ve noticed is far more in tune with my daily habits. Press the Digital Crown and you’ll get a much smaller grid of apps; it’s only the ones that Siri AI thinks you’ll want to open, and in testing watchOS 27, it’s done a good job at recommending apps that I want to open. There’s also a new pinch gesture: tap your index finger and thumb once to select something. This makes navigating your watch with one hand way easier than before, and honestly, I can’t believe it took Apple this long to add it.

📆 When does iOS 27 and watchOS 27 come out?

Apple is set to release iOS 27 and watchOS 27 this fall for all users. I’ll continue testing the new platforms alongside macOS Golden Gate and visionOS 27 until then. Stay tuned for more coverage on The Shortcut, our Instagram page, and on The Shortcut Live!

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Max Buondonno is an editor at The Shortcut and co-host of The Shortcut Live. He’s been reporting on the latest consumer technology since 2015, with his work featured on CNN Underscored, ZDNET, How-To Geek, XDA, TheStreet, and more. Follow him on X @LegendaryScoop and Instagram @LegendaryScoop.

🏆 Review Score: 4/5 – ‘Great!‘

✅ Pros:

• 👂 Exceptional sound quality

• 🔋 Amazingly long battery life

• 🔈 Hi-Res audio support

• 👍 THX Spatial audio included

• 🎧 Incredibly comfortable

• 👏 Works on PC, PS5, Nintendo Switch, Switch 2, and Bluetooth

• 🤓 Clever USB-A or USB-C dongle

• 🌈 Tasteful RGB lighting

• 📱 Desktop and mobile apps let you dial in your EQ settings

❌ Cons:

• 😔 No simultaneous Bluetooth and game audio

• 🎤 Microphone quality is poor

• 😤 Bluetooth pairing to more than one device is cumbersome

• 🥵 Earcups aren’t very breathable

• 😷 Horrible chemical smell when first unboxing

Amazon: Edifier G5 Max

The Shortcut Review

I’m rarely surprised by a product these days, but the Edifier G5 Max admittedly caught me off guard. Despite its rather gamer-centric design language and various technical promises – Hi-Res audio, THX Spatial audio, a staggering 305 hours of battery life in Bluetooth mode – I wasn’t expecting the G5 Max to become the headset I end up using each night once I’d finished my review. But that’s exactly what’s happened.

• 🎧 Best Edifier G5 Max EQ settings: get even better sound with these simple tweaks

For a closed-back headset, I was shocked by just how expansive and wide the soundstage was, and how clear, balanced, and detailed the audio sounded. I could hear audio cues in the Resident Evil 2 remake that had previously passed me by, and the shuffling, groaning zombies and stomping heavy feet of Mr. X as he roamed through Raccoon City police station never felt so menacing.

With a little tweaking of the low-end in the EQ, I found myself gravitating towards the Edifier G5 Max instead of my trusty Razer Blackshark V3 Pro – quite an achievement, considering the Blackshark V3 Pro costs $100 more and includes ANC. I even enjoyed the THX Spatial implementation on the G5 Max, which I immediately turned off on the Razer Blackshark V3 Pro as it always sounded overly tinny and artificial.

Edifier G5 Max specs 🛠️

• Price: $149.99

• Connection: 2.4GHz wireless, USB-A/USB-C, Bluetooth

• Weight: 305 grams

• Colors: white, black

The Edifier G5 Max may be one of the best-sounding gaming headsets I’ve tested in a while, and I even enjoyed them when listening to music using the supplied preset. Listening on Apple Music to Slipknot’s ‘Duality’, which bombards you with different guitar riffs, vocals, and percussion all at once, came through beautifully, with nothing muddied or overpowered.

The sub-bass is a bit lacking compared to other headsets I’ve tried, and sadly it can’t really be rectified. However, you’re still getting a really well-rounded audio profile that isn’t too bright or drowned out by lower frequencies.

If all you care about is the audio performance of a gaming headset, then the Edifier G5 Max is pretty easy to recommend. Where it falls down, however, is the headset’s microphone, which I’d describe as average at best. Even though there is a detachable boom mic and a built-in mic, neither delivered a natural-sounding recording during my testing. The mic’s noise gate was also overly aggressive, cutting off the first few seconds of a word when beginning a sentence.

Other nice-to-have features, like simultaneous audio and Bluetooth playback, are also missing, and as comfortable as they are to wear thanks to their super light build and protein leather ear cushions, my head would get noticeably hotter than when wearing other headsets – not ideal during the UK heatwave.

It’s obvious the Edifier G5 Max gaming headset isn’t perfect, then. But its audio does some serious heavy lifting to make it my current daily driver. Read my full Edifier G5 Max review below for more.

A review unit was provided by Edifier.

What I loved about the Edifier G5 Max ❤️

👂 Exceptional sound quality. The sound profile of the Edifier G5 Max is perfect for gaming, with a pleasing balance of low, mid, and high frequencies working in tandem instead of competing against one another. Some gaming headsets can be too bright, too muddy, or deliver a middling sound that satisfies no one. However, the Edifier G5 Max delivers the type of expansive and detailed audio that you usually only get from open-back headphones.

🔋 Amazingly long battery life. I charged the Edifier G5 Max once during my review and apparently still have 80% battery left. Edifier says you can expect up to 305 hours in Bluetooth mode and 227 hours in 2.4 GHz mode at 50% volume with the RGB off, and I believe that to be accurate. Simply put, you won’t have to worry about battery life with these cans.

🔈 Hi-Res audio support. Music lovers can enjoy Hi-Res audio with the Edifier G5 Max, and it’s something that will be more of a selling point now that Spotify has finally caught up with the competition. Listening to my favorite tracks on Apple Music in lossless quality using the default music profile was a real pleasure.

👍 THX Spatial audio included. I haven’t had the best experience with THX Spatial audio in the past, as it’s always sounded far more artificial than Dolby Atmos and DTS Headphone:X. However, the implementation on the Edifier G5 Max sounds fantastic and natural. What’s really nice is that when using the music EQ, THX Spatial is disabled, so you don’t have to keep turning it on and off depending on whether you’re gaming or listening to music.

🎧 Incredibly comfortable. At just over 300 grams, the Edifier G5 Max is super light with zero clamping force. My ears fit comfortably in the cups, and the protein leather pads are lovely and soft. The swiveling earcups are also always nice to have, and I found the headset band never moved from the position I wanted after it was adjusted, which can happen on other headsets.

👏 Works on PC, PS5, Nintendo Switch, Switch 2, and Bluetooth. I tested the G5 Max gaming headset on PS5, PC, and Bluetooth primarily, and it sounded great on every device I connected it to. PS5 owners should go through the 3D spatial audio setup to get the most out of it, as it really makes a difference once you dial in your profile.

🤓 Clever USB-A or USB-C dongle. Most headsets either come with a USB-A or USB-C dongle, but the Edifier G5 Max can work either way. It’s such a simple innovation, but one that means you don’t have to bother with an adapter. You also have more flexibility if you’re running out of USB ports.

🌈 Tasteful RGB lighting. RGB lighting on headsets is really only for streamers’ benefit, but it’s here if you want it. It’s thankfully understated, and you can choose between different settings, colors, and brightness levels.

📱 Desktop and mobile apps let you dial in your EQ settings. Every good headset lets you tinker and tweak its audio profile to your liking, and the Edifier G5 Max is no different. You can change the settings either through the desktop Hecate app or the Edifier ConneX mobile app. There are also presets for specific games to choose from if you’re not comfortable creating your own EQ.

What I disliked about the Edifier G5 Max 💔

😔 No simultaneous Bluetooth and game audio. For the price of $150, I’d have expected the Edifier G5 Max to support simultaneous Bluetooth and game audio. It’s a feature that should really be included at this price.

🎤 Microphone quality is poor. There’s no getting past the Edifier G5 Max’s poor microphone quality. Even when fiddling with the EQ, I couldn’t make it sound pleasing, and the noise gate would often cut off words.

😤 Bluetooth pairing to more than one device is cumbersome. You can’t pair the G5 Max to a new Bluetooth device unless you forget an existing connection. There isn’t a dedicated pairing button, which is rather annoying.

🥵 Earcups aren’t very breathable. They might not have active noise cancelling, but the Edifier G5 Max earcups have excellent passive noise isolation. However, I was getting hotter than usual when wearing headphones, as the earcups aren’t very breathable.

😷 Horrible chemical smell when first unboxing. The Edifier G5 Max absolutely stank of a strong, headache-inducing chemical-like substance when I first unboxed them. The smell was so pungent that I had to leave the headphones on my desk for a day or two before I could start using them. I’ve never encountered this before, and it’s something I hope Edifier can fix in the future, as it’s really unpleasant and doesn’t make a great first impression.

Should you buy the Edifier G5 Max? 🤔

Amazon: Edifier G5 Max

Yes, if…

• ✅ You care solely about audio and don’t really need a top-class microphone.

• ✅ You want a wireless headset that barely ever needs charging.

• ✅ You’re after a gaming headset that sounds great for games and music.

No, if…

• ❌ You listen to a Bluetooth device when gaming and need simultaneous audio.

• ❌ You’re someone who likes a lot of bass and sub-bass above all else.

• ❌ You game in a hot room and need a breathable headset.

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Adam Vjestica is The Shortcut’s Senior Editor. Formerly TechRadar’s Gaming Hardware Editor, Adam has also worked at Nintendo of Europe as a Content Marketing Editor, where he helped launch the Nintendo Switch. He also runs a retro gaming YouTube channel called Game on, boy! Follow him on X @ItsMrProducts.

• 🔭 24-600mm f2.8-4 Zeiss lens combines the 25x zoom range of 3-4 lenses into one

• 📸 ideal travel camera for capturing both wide landscapes and zoomed-in street subjects.

• ֎ Lens aperture narrows from f2.4 to a locked f4 by 103mm

• 🖼️ 1-inch Exmor 20.1MP sensor is mid-range in resolution

• ⚙️ Stacked Bionz XR processor speeds up processing and burst shooting

• 🎬 Sony’s full modern video suite adds 10-bit 4:2:2 S-Log 3 and LUT support

• 🧠 Sony’s AI chip drives subject recognition, color, and exposure, and overall improves autofocus

• 🔋 New Z-battery claims 50% longer life than the previous W-battery

• 🏷️ Priced at $2,299 and available later this August

The Sony RX10 V is the brand’s first superzoom camera in nearly nine years. While it features the same 24-600mm equivalent f2.4-4 Zeiss Vario-Sonnar 25x zoom lens, nearly everything else about the camera is new. For starters, it features a new 20.1MP 1-inch Exmor sensor that stacked with a processor to help drive 30fps burst shooting speeds. The sensor also supports all of Sony’s modern video standards including 4K 120fps capture, S-Log3, and you can import up to 16 LUTs.

Sony has also updated the look of the RX10 V with a more squared off body mimicking the dimensions and controls of the Sony a7 series – including the latest Sony a7R VI. RIP to the hunched down, streamlined bridge cameras of the 2000s, but the RX10 V has gained several more useful dials, more pronounced buttons, and a larger grip. Sony also promises the RX10 V will have 50% more battery life, swapping out the terrible W-batteries for its Z-batteries.

This camera should prove to be the ultimate travel camera, even if it doesn’t have a selfie screen. However, it costs as much as a transatlantic flight at $2,299. We’ll soon know whether its worthy of this steep price tag, but so far I’ve had a lot of fun shooting with the new Sony RX10 V in the past day.

🔭 Big zoom. The biggest draw and first thing you’ll notice about this camera is its 24-600mm f2.8 to f4 Zeiss lens. That 25x range allows me to capture wide shots of the NYC landscape to zoom in on the most interesting characters I see on the street. This makes the camera a fantastic travel companion, as it essentially combines three to four lenses into a single piece of glass.

֎ Variable aperture. Unfortunately, the Sony RX10 V’s big zoom lens has the downside of a variable aperture that starts shrinking from f2.4 after the tinniest increment of zoom at 25mm. At 103mm, the lens locks in at an f4 aperture for the rest of the focal range. It’s not a huge pain to work around, but if you tire of tweaking your settings around the aperture changing all the time, there are P- and S-modes.

🖼️ 20.1MP sensor. The Sony RX10 V features a 20.1MP 1-inch Exmor image sensor that’s mid-range in resolution, but it’s both backside-illuminated and fully stacked. The stacked nature of this sensor overlays it with Sony’s Bionz XR processor to speed up image processing and burst shooting that goes to 30fps, up from the previous Sony RX10 IV’s 24fps.

🎬 Modern video specs. The best upgrades from the RX10 V’s new Exmor sensor are that it features all of Sony’s modern video features, including S-Log 3 shooting at 10-bit and 4.2.2. It also supports LUTs, so you can see how your footage will look at the start of your edit as you’re filming.

🧠AI chip. As with all of Sony’s modern camera releases, the RX10 V comes rocking an AI chip that powers everything from subject recognition to color reproduction and exposure control. The most immediate benefit I experienced was the RX10 V’s greatly improved autofocus, which allowed me to lock onto fast-moving subjects even at max zoom and while shooting through a crowd.

🔋 50% more battery. The RX10 V now works with Sony’s Z-batteries, which the company claims offers 50% longer battery life than its previous W-batteries. I haven’t fully tested the RX10 V’s longevity in a day, but after shooting 100-odd photos, including bursts, I only exhausted the battery by 15%.

• Up next: I can have any camera I want, but here’s why I keep coming back to the Sony ZV-E1

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Kevin Lee is The Shortcut’s Creative Director. Follow him on Twitter @baggingspam

🏆 Review Score: 4.5/5 – ‘Awesome!‘

🏅 Editor’s Choice Award

✅ Pros:

• 🤏 Super portable design

• 👏 Supports every display mode

• 🤝 Switch between dock mode or tabletop mode

• 💰 Far cheaper than the official Switch 2 dock

• 🥶 The console stays cool when gaming

❌ Cons:

• 😢 No HDMI CEC support

• 🤷‍♂️ Open design won’t suit every setup

• 👋 Only has one USB-A port

Amazon: GuliKit Dock for Switch 2

The Shortcut Review

The GuliKit Dock for Nintendo Switch 2 is one of those accessories that comes along and almost trumps the original design in everyway. Compared to the official Nintendo Switch 2 dock, it’s a fraction of the size, includes practically every feature you’d want, and even provides a superior way to enjoy tabletop mode. It’s also considerably more affordable than Nintendo’s offering.

• 👍 GuliKit’s Nintendo Switch 2 TMR analog sticks are the perfect upgrade – just don’t make the same mistakes I did

It makes the GuliKit Dock for Switch 2 the perfect pick for those who would like a second dock around the home, or if you want to play your Switch 2 on a TV when on holiday, but don’t want to pack Nintendo’s bulky hardware.

GuliKit Dock for Switch 2 specs 🛠️

• Price: $29.99

• Compatibility: Nintendo Switch 2, Nintendo Switch, Nintendo Switch OLED

There are a few missed opportunities with the GuliKit Dock that stop it from being a wholehearted recommendation. The lack of HDMI CEC support is my biggest issue, and the open-style design won’t suit every home. However, for just $30, you’d be hard-pressed to find a better third-party dock. Read my full GuliKit Dock for Switch 2 review below.

A review unit was provided by GuliKit.

What I loved about the GuliKit Dock for Switch 2 ❤️

🤏 Fits in the palm of your hand. The GuliKit Dock for Switch 2 is super compact and portable, and its clever design includes a magnetic dust cover that clips onto the top to give your console extra support. It’s a great space-saving option over Nintendo’s bulkier official dock, and a must for those who like to travel but want to still play the Switch 2 on a TV.

👏 Supports every display mode. You don’t need to worry about the Nintendo Switch 2 not displaying properly when using the GuliKit Dock. It supports 4K/60Hz, 2K/120Hz, and 1080p/120Hz video output. It even has Auto Low Latency Mode (ALLM), which automatically changes your display to the display setting with the lowest input lag, usually called ‘Game mode’. HDR is also supported, so you’re getting all the same benefits as the official Nintendo Switch 2 dock.

🥶 Keeps things cool. Unlike other Switch 2 docks I’ve used, the GuliKit Dock provides ample airflow for the system. There isn’t a dedicated fan like with Nintendo’s official dock, but I never noticed the fans kicking up like with other versions, especially when undocking the console during gameplay.

💰 Considerably cheaper than the official Switch 2 dock. At $29.99, the GuliKit Dock is a fantastic option for those who want a second dock for the bedroom or office for their Switch 2. Nintendo wants $124.99 for its Switch 2 dock, and while you may get another AC adapter, you’re essentially paying $95 more for it.

👍 Works with the Switch 2, Switch, and Switch OLED. Unlike the Switch 2 dock, you can use the older Switch and Switch OLED with the GuliKit Dock.

🤝 Two modes in one. The GuliKit Dock also works as a tabletop mode charging stand. Simply press the ‘Dock Mode’ button on the back, and you can switch between the two display modes. Very handy.

💼 You can keep your Switch 2 case on. If you use a protective case on your Switch 2, a neat feature about the GuliKit Dock is that it has a three-level adjustment switch for the USB-C port that supports cases up to 1mm thick. Your mileage may vary with this feature, and I’ve admittedly only tested it without a case on.

🙏 Firmware can be updated. In the unlikely event that a Nintendo Switch 2 update stops support for third-party docks, the GuliKit Dock can be updated, allowing for future compatibility and peace of mind.

What I disliked about the GuliKit Dock for Switch 2💔

😢 No HDMI CEC support. HDMI CEC support is a feature that I always take for granted until it’s gone. The convenience of having my TV turn on whenever I start the Switch 2 shouldn’t be overlooked, and it was admittedly annoying having to reach for the remote when using the GuliKit Dock.

1️⃣ One fewer USB port. The GuliKit Dock only has one USB-A port instead of two like the official Switch 2 dock. If you need another port, you’re sadly out of luck, which could be restrictive depending on your setup.

🤕 Exposed design won’t be for everyone. The Nintendo Switch 2 sits proudly in the GuliKit Dock, with its screen completely exposed. It looks great, and allows the dock to function as a charging stand for tabletop mode. But if you have a house full of kids or pets running around, having the screen displayed means it’s susceptible to accidental scratches, knocks, or the device even toppling over.

Should you buy the GuliKit Dock for Switch 2? 🤔

Amazon: GuliKit Dock for Switch 2

Yes, if…

• ✅ You travel and want a portable dock you can take on the go.

• ✅ You’re after a more space-saving design.

• ✅ You’re in the market for a second, more affordable Switch 2 dock.

No, if…

• ❌ You rely on HDMI CEC support to turn on your TV and home entertainment system.

• ❌ You’re worried about the Switch 2’s screen being exposed.

• ❌ You have more than one USB-A device connected to your dock.

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Adam Vjestica is The Shortcut’s Senior Editor. Formerly TechRadar’s Gaming Hardware Editor, Adam has also worked at Nintendo of Europe as a Content Marketing Editor, where he helped launch the Nintendo Switch. He also runs a retro gaming YouTube channel called Game on, boy! Follow him on X @ItsMrProducts.

🏆 Review score: 4/5

🏅 Editor’s Choice Award

✅ Pros

• 🔊 Noticably louder and more dynamic than all other competing smart speakers

• 🎼 Impressive sound delivers warm, crisp mids with resonating bass

• 📲 Heos app supports up to 64 speakers in 32 groups – 2x more than the Sonos app

• 💡 Visually streamlined Heos app makes configuring multi-room audio easy

• 🔌 3.5mm aux input included without any USB-dongle

❌ Cons

• ↕️ Largest of all the current smart speakers

• 📉 Default settings can degrade the sound quality of this speaker

• ⛔ No native support for Google Assistant or Alexa+

• 🗣️ Siri voice control requires a separate HomePod

• 🚧 Speaker groups are only accessible through the Heos app

Walmart: Denon Home 200 - $399

Best Buy: Denon Home 200 - $399

Amazon: Denon Home 200 - $399

The Shortcut Review

The $399 Denon Home 200 has come out on top as the best-sounding smart speaker. I’ve been putting Denon’s newest Wi-Fi and Bluetooth speaker to the test against all its modern rivals, including the $219 Sonos Era 100, $349 Apple HomePod 2, and $299 Bose Ultra Lifestyle Speaker, and the Denon Home 200 has consistently sounded louder and more dynamic with crisper mids and resonating bass.

That said, the Denon Home 200 is by no means perfect. It’s much bigger than all its competitors and nowhere nearly as smart. The speaker comes with no built-in support for Google Assistant or Alexa+, and while you can talk to Siri, you’ll need to have an Apple HomePod already set up in your home to use it.

This speaker also lacks a physical upfiring speaker, so if you want genuine, non-virtualized Dolby Atmos audio, you’ll have to trade up to the $599 Denon Home 400 or get the Bose Ultra Lifestyle Speaker instead.

Despite those limitations, for purely stereo sound, the Denon Home 200 is the best smart speaker for listening to music. And if you’re looking to create a stereo pair of Denon Home 200 units or an even bigger group of speakers, the Heos app offers a more visually streamlined experience that’s accessible to anyone on your Wi-Fi network. Just make sure to change the default app settings that can actually hamper the Denon Home 200’s audio quality.

Full Review

📏 Biggie-sized. The Denon Home 200 stands out as the largest smart home speaker next to the Sonos Era 100, Bose Ultra Home Speaker, and Apple HomePod 2. At 8.5 inches tall, the Home 200 is closer in size to an air purifier. Despite its larger size, its simple but elegant aluminum base and fabric exterior are muted enough that it just blends in with the rest of your home decor.

🔊 Big sound. The Denon Home 200 drives stereo sound with serious bass all on its own thanks to its dual tweeters and a 4-inch woofer. This makes the Denon Home 200 sound significantly louder than the Sonos Era 100. The Home 200 produces a more expansive soundscape with resonating bass, brighter highs, and crisp vocals. The Sonos Era 100 projects wider stereo sound with clearer vocals, but personally, the Home 200 just left a bigger impression, no matter which song I played on both speakers.

🏆 Better than the rest. I was blown away by how much better the Denon Home 200 sounded, and it also came out on top in head-to-head comparisons with the Apple HomePod 2 and the brand-new Bose Ultra Lifestyle Speaker, playing a variety of tracks like Black Eye, Hurt, Not Like Us, and Can I Kick It. The Denon Home 200 consistently produced more dynamism between the highs, mids, and lows. Comparatively, the HomePod 2 produces the cleanest sound, while the Bose Ultra Lifestyle Speaker delivers size-defying audio that’s almost as loud as the Denon Home 200 and also features a physically upfiring speaker.

🧠 Not so smart. I can hardly call the Denon Home 200 a smart speaker, as it lacks native support for Google Assistant or Alexa. The mics on the Home 200 are there purely to support Siri, but even then, it’s only available if you already have a HomePod connected in your home. If you’re looking for a truly smart speaker, you might be better off with Alexa on the Bose Ultra Speaker or the Sonos Era 100 that comes with the brand’s own smart assistant and Google Assistant.

🛜 Ready to connect. The Denon Home 200 comes with several connectivity options, including Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, USB-C, and a 3.5mm aux input (that doesn’t require an adapter like Sonos). It can also connect directly to a variety of music apps through Spotify, Tidal, and Qobuz Connect. AirPlay 2 is on tap, too, so you can stream audio directly to the Denon Home 200 with any Apple device. Google Cast is the only thing missing on this speaker, so if you’re an Android user, look to Sonos or Bose instead.

👨‍👩‍👦‍👦 Groupies. Denon’s Heos app allows you to pair the Home 200 into all sorts of speaker setups, and you can go for broke by assigning up to 64 products into 32 different zones. That’s double Sonos’s limit, which only allows up to 32 devices in a single Sonos system. I also like how visually streamlined the Heos app is compared to Sonos, as it puts rooms front and center in the app without having to dive into submenus.

Surprisingly, I was also able to group Denon speakers that my coworker set up on his own account, whereas a Sonos system can only be edited by its sole owner. Sonos, however, has a leg up on letting you access speaker groups from the Spotify app, whereas I can only use grouped Denon speakers from the Heos app.

📺 Home theater ready. Beyond creating speaker groups, the Home 200 can also be paired with the Denon Home 550 soundbar to serve as rear satellites in a home theater setup. However, as the Home 200 doesn’t feature any physically upfiring speakers, it can only virtualize Dolby Atmos audio. If you want the real McCoy for your home theater setup with a Denon system, you’ll have to step up to the Denon Home 400 for genuine upfiring speakers.

🎚️ Check those settings. As much as I like the Heos app, it assigns some strange default settings to the Denon Home 200 speaker. For starters, the default “Auto” sound mode actually attempts to virtualize all sound into spatial audio. While I usually love spatial audio on headphones like the AirPods Max 2 and Sony WH-1000XM6, I don’t expect it from a speaker designed specifically for stereo sound.

Additionally, Multi-room Audio Quality is set to normal by default, which compresses audio to 256kbps AAC format, defeating the whole point of streaming lossless audio over Wi-Fi. Even the most meager home Wi-Fi will handle uncompressed 16-bit, 44.1 kHz streaming across rooms.

🎛️ Playlist speed dial. On top of the usual set of playback and volume touch controls, the Denon Home 200 features three programmable preset buttons you can assign to play your favorite playlists and radio stations. You have to set it all up in the Denon Heos app, but once you do, you can press the buttons at any time to start playing music without reaching for your smartphone. I love the one-button playback shortcut, and it works across a variety of apps, including Spotify, Pandora, Amazon Music HD, Tidal, Qobuz, and SiriusXM.

Should you buy the Denon Home 200?

Walmart: Denon Home 200 - $399

Best Buy: Denon Home 200 - $399

Amazon: Denon Home 200 - $399

✅ Yes, if…

• 🔊 You want the loudest and best-sounding smart speaker

• 🎼 You want to hear more dynamism from your music with crisper mids and resonant bass

• 🧑‍🧑‍🧒‍🧒 You want to group a huge number of speakers into separate rooms

• 🏠 You want a smart home speaker setup that’s accessible to everyone in your household

❌ No, if…

• 💵 $399 for a single smart speaker is too much (get the Sonos Era 100 instead)

• 📺 You need a satellite speaker for your home theater setup (get the Denon Home 400 instead)

• 🪜 True, non-virtualized Dolby Atmos is a must (get the Bose Ultra Lifestyle Speaker instead)

• 🗣️ You want a smart speaker you can talk to (get the Sonos Era 100 instead)

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Kevin Lee is The Shortcut’s Creative Director. Follow him on Twitter @baggingspam

🏆 Rating: 4/5

✅ Pros

• 👓 Lightweight design that looks like normal glasses

• 📺 Bright display that fades away when not in use

• 🤓 Prescription lenses available

• 👆 Easy to control

• 🧠 Smart features like live translations, conversation transcriptions, and more

• 🤖 Even AI enables convenient hands-free control

• 🔋 Up to two weeks of battery life

• No camera for guaranteed privacy

❌ Cons

• 👾 Some features feel like bloatware

• 🧐 Frame styles might not be for everyone

• 💰 They get expensive… fast

The Shortcut review

As smart glasses continue to pick up steam, companies are experimenting with different implementations, purposes, and form factors until the “perfect pair” arrives (think Apple Vision Pro-level performance, but in a pair of regular glasses from LensCrafters). Even Realities is one of the latest companies to give this a swing, and the G2 glasses I’ve been testing have really impressed me.

The Even G2 are a big upgrade from the company’s original G1 pair, with a 75% larger display than before, better AI features, a sharper design, and one very important upgrade (for me): a green color option. You can customize your pair with prescription lenses, too, which I requested for my review sample.

After wearing them every day for the past couple of months, the Even G2 have proven to be more useful than I thought. It’s handy being able to see important notifications come in without looking at your phone, and some of the smart features like the teleprompter and live translations feel like must-haves, even though you might not use them every day. Some of the software is a bit buggy, and Even AI isn’t exempt from that, but the G2 are a very promising pair of smart glasses that are great for the office and everyday life. But if you’re looking to play music or take pictures with your glasses, you’ll have to look elsewhere.

Even Realities: G2 smart glasses

Review notes

👓 A seemingly impossible design. Picking up the Even G2 glasses for the first time, I couldn’t believe how thin and lightweight they were. Made from magnesium and titanium, the glasses weigh just 36 grams and - somehow - fit all the necessary components to power the display, Bluetooth, navigation, and other features into tiny nubs on the arms and in the frame. Put them on and they’ll live comfortably on your face, like any pair of normal glasses from LensCrafters. This is one of the most important aspects of finding a good pair of smart glasses; they need to feel normal on your face, and I’m happy to report the Even G2s definitely do.

😎 Style options are limited, but still good-looking. Even Realities offers the G2 in two different frame shapes: The “G2 A” and “G2 B.” The former is the one I have with a vintage, rounded frame and a flat top. The latter is more rectangular and modern. Despite only offering two variations, both look good in person, especially the G2 A. You can also choose among three color options: grey, brown, and green. I opted for the green finish, which has gold accents on the arms, and they fit my personal aesthetic very well. You can also submit your prescription when ordering (although only single vision prescriptions are accepted) and get a pair of matching clip-ons for blocking out the sun.

📸 No cameras in sight. One of the biggest design choices Even made was excluding cameras from the design of the G2 glasses. These aren’t designed to take pictures, videos, or tell you about the world around you. Instead, the glasses focus on AI integration in the display to give you facts, insights into your day, reminders, and more, saving all the photo-taking for your smartphone. It’s better for privacy, of course, and it means that Even was able to slim down the design quite a bit since it didn’t need to fit a camera. Of course, if the reason you want smart glasses is to take first-person photos, these aren’t for you. I’d personally much rather have no camera if it means I get a design like this in exchange.

📺 Big screen that’s easy to see… The most impressive thing about the Even G2 is how good the display is. It’s a bit hard to describe how big it is, but it can appear closer to your face or farther away, depending on your preference. I have it set a bit closer to my eyes, and when notifications come in or I trigger the screen myself, it’s effortless to see what’s going on and read the information I need. The display appears in both eyes as overly simplistic green lines and text, with an animation here and there for loading screens and such. It doesn’t have insane graphics or high-quality visual elements, but it gets the job done well.

☀️ … except in the sunshine. The only time it’s difficult to see the screen is when you’re out in the sun. I walked around Flatiron one afternoon and saw a notification come in when I was staring at the building itself, but then when I focused my attention on the blue sky above, the screen was virtually impossible to see. You’ll find yourself readjusting your glance to look at the display more often than you think (unless you primarily stay indoors with the glasses, of course).

🌈 Some weird lens reflections. Because the displays are integrated into the lenses of the Even G2 (where else would they be?), you do see some weird light reflections if you tilt your head the right way. There’s also a noticeable blurriness where the display begins and the lenses end, which can be jarring if you’re reading small text. Both of these issues are generally easy to avoid, but coming from a normal pair of glasses to these, you’ll probably notice this just as much as I did.

👆 Easy to navigate. Double-tap the back end of either arm on the glasses and the display will appear. From there, Even makes it easy to navigate the interface. A series of swipes up, down, left, and right will cycle through the news, stocks, your calendar, reminders, and your fitness data (assuming you’re wearing an Even R1 ring, which I’m not). Long-press either arm to bring up a separate menu to open your notifications, live translations, a teleprompter, navigation, Even AI, a conversation mode, and more. You can also tilt your head upwards to bring up the dashboard hands-free, although I turned that off the first time I enjoyed a cold one while wearing them. Even says the R1 ring makes it even easier to navigate the interface, but I didn’t get to test it during my review, although other reviews I’ve read about it don’t paint it in a particularly bright light.

📲 Simple but useful features. Much of the G2 glasses’ functionality is simple. It leverages AI to enable hands-free commands such as setting reminders, learning new information, and more. In Conversate mode, you can record conversations and have them transcribed in real time, then go back on your phone and reference it later. There’s also a feature called Prep Notes that displays any notes you want to have in front of you during a conversation, a teleprompter, and live translations for reading what someone’s saying in a different language. You can even see real-time definitions and descriptions for subjects and words brought up during conversations, which, conveniently, can help you sound smarter than you are when speaking with someone.

🤖 Even AI is great for going hands-free. When wearing the glasses, you can say “Hey Even” to trigger Even AI. Powered by Even Search or Perplexity (I chose the latter), the AI lets you ask questions and do research, create reminders, take notes, and more. You can also control your glasses and ask it to open certain features like your notifications and live translations, which is convenient if your hands are full.

🏪 An ever-growing list with Even Hub… During my time reviewing the glasses, Even updated them with its new Even Hub, a place where developers can publish new plug-ins for the G2s to enable more features. I tried out a few, including a weather app, a plug-in for viewing New York City subway times, a Spotify media player, and even a paddle game. Over time, new apps and experiences will be added and further flesh out what these glasses can do.

👾 … that quickly becomes bloatware. The problem? A lot of it is bloatware. It isn’t that the ideas for each plug-in are bad, and they don’t come pre-installed on the glasses and get in your way, either. But if you want to use something like the weather chart, more often than not, the feature won’t work. That’s because it needs to sync with data from your phone, and the G2s aren’t constantly talking to your phone over Bluetooth, whether due to a bug in the connection or a power-efficiency thing. You need your phone open for the data to sync, so why not just use your phone to check the weather at that point? Even needs to work on the implementation of these features, or make the next version of the glasses more powerful so they don’t run into the same problems. There are good ideas in the Even Hub, but they can’t be executed that well at this stage.

☑️ My favorite features. After using the Even G2 glasses for a while, I realized that I use them almost like a smartwatch. A lot of what I find useful is rooted in glanceable information. However, other features benefit from the microphones and AI built into them, helping me in my workflow each day. Here’s what stood out to me most when using the G2s each day for work and at home.

• 🛎️ Notifications: It’s handy being able to see important texts or emails fly into view when you’re typing away, or walking to your next meeting. You can set granular controls for all of your notifications, too, so that you aren’t constantly bombarded with them.

• 📋 To-do lists: Having a to-do list on your glasses is underrated as all get-out. I love being able to swipe it into view and check on what I have to do next during the day. Plus, you can use the AI to quickly add things to do your to-do list.

• 🗣️ Transcriptions: Seeing what someone is saying as they’re saying it is great for conversations in two languages or if you’re hard of hearing.

• 📆 Calendars: Quickly checking my calendar on the go has been clutch for staying up to date on busy weeks at Swider Studios. Whether we’re covering a new smartphone launch or hosting an event at our space, it’s surprisingly convenient to have your calendar right on your face.

🔋 Two weeks of battery life. It’s really easy to cruise through a couple of weeks of usage with the Even G2 glasses. Not only do the glasses last up to two days on a full charge, but the case they come in supplies up to seven extra charges, so you can charge them once and forget about it for about 10-14 days. Unless you’re transcribing every conversation or reading e-books on these things (which is something you can do through Even Hub, by the way), you’ll likely have the same great battery life that I do.

💰 The price creeps higher and higher. Right off the bat, if you want the Even G2s in either frame option, they’ll set you back $599. That’s $220 more than what Meta charges for its Ray-Ban smart glasses. With prescription lenses, you’ll pay a minimum of $159 extra, depending on how intense your prescription is. Then, if you want the R1 ring to control them with, you’ll need to shell out an additional $249, bringing your (potential) total to $1,007 before tax. There’s no skirting around it - these are expensive glasses, and a huge commitment for a product in such a young market.

Should you buy the Even Realities G2 glasses?

Yes, if…

• ✅ You want smart glasses that look normal

• ✅ You’d find all the AI features helpful at work and day-to-day

• ✅ You don’t want a camera on your glasses

• ✅ You’re an early adopter

No, if…

• ❌ You don’t want to spend over $600 on glasses (get the Meta Glasses)

• ❌ You want to be able to take photos and videos (get the Meta Ray-Ban Gen 2)

• ❌ You want better graphics than green lines and text (get the Meta Ray-Ban Display)

Even Realities: G2 smart glasses

Max Buondonno is an editor at The Shortcut and co-host of The Shortcut Live. He’s been reporting on the latest consumer technology since 2015, with his work featured on CNN Underscored, ZDNET, How-To Geek, XDA, TheStreet, and more. Follow him on X @LegendaryScoop and Instagram @LegendaryScoop.

🏆 Review score: 4.5/5

🏅 Editor’s Choice Award

✅ Pros

• 🎮 Wickedly powerful and long-lasting

• 📈 Approaching desktop Nvidia RTX 5050 graphics performance

• 🏃‍♂️ Endurance Mode sets the processor at lower 15-17W and 3-5W power modes

• 🕹️ Greatly improved inputs with Hall-Effect thumbsticks, rounder buttons, and a new metal-gated D-Pad

• 🫨 HD haptics converts simple rumble into nuanced vibrations

• 🧑‍🤝‍🧑 Intel XeSS 3 gives you Multi-Frame Generation on the go

❌ Cons

• 👾 Early graphical glitches cause glowing artifacts

• ↔️ This handheld is super wide and long-chinned

• 💰 $1,799 price is equal to that of a gaming laptop

• 🤑 $1,799 could also buy you a PS5, Xbox Series X, and Nintendo Switch 2

Best Buy: MSI Claw 8 EX AI+ - $1,799

The Shortcut Review

The MSI Claw 8 EX AI+ is the most powerful gaming handheld in the world, and it’s all thanks to Intel’s new Arc G3 Extreme processor. This new chip allows this gaming handheld to completely leapfrog every past gaming handheld, delivering far higher fps, letting you play more games on the go, and with higher-quality settings. With up to 45W of graphics power, the MSI Claw 8 EX AI+ and its Intel Arc G3 Extreme processor are so powerful that they can even outperform entry-level gaming laptops and rival mini desktops, including the new Steam Machine.

Benchmarking the MSI Claw 8 EX AI+ and its Intel Arc G3 Extreme shows why this gaming handheld is truly next-gen. The up to 45W processor posted scores and frame rates so high that Intel is approaching desktop Nvidia RTX 5050-level graphics power. On the flip side, this chip can easily play AAA games like Forza Horizon 6 and Battlefield 6 and still deliver a playable 30 fps experience with high-quality graphics at full resolution. Or if you’re playing 2D platformers, RPGs, and other less graphically strenuous games, you can game for 10+ hours with the processor sipping 3-5W of power in efficiency mode.

It also helps the MSI Claw 8 EX AI+ feel light and ergonomic, thanks to its Xbox-inspired controller handles. MSI has also improved all the inputs with Hall Effect thumbsticks, rounder ABXY face buttons, and a metal dome around the D-Pad. MSI is even evolving the rumble in the Claw 8 EX AI+ into what it calls HD haptics, which can precisely deliver vibrations to simulate their real-world feel. This handheld really now feels like a great controller that just happens to have a screen, while most gaming handhelds focus on being PC gaming devices with controller buttons added on.

Before you get too excited, the $1,799 price is way too high, even with the $1,699 introductory price included. You can thank RAMaggedon and tariffs for ballooning the price of everything, including a $949 Steam Deck OLED. For the same $1,799 price, you could buy a PS5, Xbox Series X, and Nintendo Switch 2 combined, or a full-on gaming laptop. If you’re really ready to pay that price, MSI Claw 8 EX AI+ won’t disappoint you; there really isn’t a better-performing or better-handling gaming handheld than it right now.

Full Review

🏋️‍♂️ Power stance. The Intel Arc G3 Extreme has proven itself more powerful than the AMD Ryzen Z2 Extreme in every one of our benchmarks. The increase in fps isn’t in the 10-15 range I saw from the jump going from AMD’s Z1 to Z2 chips either; the Intel Arc G3 Extreme shows a consistent 15+ frame-per-second increase over even the most powerful AMD-powered handhelds like the Asus ROG Xbox Ally X and Lenovo Legion Go 2. The gen-over-gen improvement between the Lunar Lake chip in the original MSI Claw 8 AI+ is even more staggering. This is truly a next-gen gaming handheld.

📈 More games, higher settings. The MSI Claw 8 EX AI+ not only plays all the games we’ve tested at higher frame rates but also runs them at higher settings. We’ve only run CyberPunk 2077 with CDProject Red’s Steam Deck preset on gaming handhelds, but the Claw 8 EX AI+ is still able to get 60fps even with high-quality settings. Other games that struggled to run smoothly on AMD’s Ryzen Z2 Extreme, even on low settings like Hogwarts’ Legacy and Borderlands 4, play at 60fps with medium settings on the MSI Claw 8 EX AI+. This also includes brand new titles like LEGO Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight, which I could play at high-quality settings and full resolution.

⚙️ Intel inside. All of this gaming prowess comes from the Arc G3 Extreme that Intel derived from its Panther Lake series of processors. It’s the first chip Intel has truly developed for gaming, first by cutting down the CPU core count while maintaining 12 Xe3 cores. This chip has also been practically co-engineered by MSI, as Intel pulled from all of MSI’s learnings from its last two and a half years of building handhelds, starting with the original MSI Claw and, subsequently, the much-improved MSI Claw 8 AI+.

🪭 Cooling. MSI hasn’t forgotten to upgrade the MSI Claw 8 EX AI+’s cooling to match the more powerful processor. This handheld features MSI’s new Cooler Boost HyperFlow tech, which adds a second fan and two heat pipes, providing an additional five watts of cooling. Both fans also push 25% higher pressure airflow, which should keep temps low and steady. This all kept the MSI Claw 8 EX AI+ just warm to the touch while testing, even as I asked the system to run games at high-quality settings and full resolution.

🎮 Gaming comfortably. The MSI Claw 8 EX AI+ doesn’t just run like a dream, it feels like one. Thanks to a new pair of flared-out grips and a 20g lighter weight, the MSI Claw 8 EX AI+ is much easier to hold. Like the Asus ROG Xbox Ally X, MSI took inspiration from the Xbox controller to give its handheld a new shape while also adding a laser-etched micro-dot texture for just a little more grip. Unlike the smooth-skinned MSI Claw 8 AI+, this texture doesn’t require you to white-knuckle-grip onto it, further reducing hand strain.

↔️ Wide load. While I have to commend MSI for improving the ergonomics and controls of the Claw 8 EX AI+, it seems to have left the design on the sidelines. This is by far the widest gaming handheld I’ve wrapped my hands around. The MSI Claw 8 EX AI+ is also so wide and tall that it barely fits into even my oversized tomtoc sling case. This handheld also comes with a considerable chin that’s only there to help contain the battery. If you want a better-looking Intel Arc G3 Extreme-powered gaming handheld, the Acer Predator Atlas 8 will ship later this holiday season.

🕹️ More like a great controller with a screen. MSI has also improved every input on the Claw 8 EX AI+, starting with a new pair of Hall-Effect thumbsticks that should never degrade and are immune to stick drift. The ABXY face buttons have also been resurfaced with rounded edges, making them more comfortable to press. Even the D-Pad has been upgraded with an additional metal gate, making it snappier for fighting games.

🫨 HD Haptics. The last thing I expected MSI to improve upon was rumble, but MSI has really developed a new system here. First, MSI replaced the bog-standard rumble motor with a 6-axis IMU vibration motor that can convey subtler haptic feedback. At the same time, MSI developed a new algorithm that translates native rumble into HD Haptics to simulate more immersive feedback, such as the reverberation from stepping onto a metal floor. I personally felt the most difference in vibration while playing Forza Horizon 6, with a distinct difference in feel between the engine rumble, spinning my tires, and a full-on crash.

📼 Rerun specs. While there’s a lot new outside and inside the MSI Claw 8 EX AI+, there’s a fair bit that’s the same as MSI’s last Intel-powered and even the AMD-powered MSI Claw A8. Namely, this Claw still features an eight-inch IPS display that tops out at 500 nits, making it yet another PC gaming handheld that can’t display HDR when the Switch 2’s screen is just as bright. MSI has also stuck to 1TB of storage and 24GB of shared memory.

🔋 Battle-ready battery. Like all other modern handhelds, the Claw 8 EX AI+ comes with an 80 Whr battery, but MSI has managed to squeeze more longevity out of it with AI and power-efficiency algorithms. Once again, MSI has come out on top with our battery benchmark with the longest two-hour and 37-minute run. This handheld lasts even longer while playing actual games. I could play Battlefield 6 for more than three hours.

🏃‍♂️ Endurance mode. If you want even longer battery life, Intel has implemented a new endurance mode that limits your frame rate to 30fps but puts the processor into a lower-power state that sips just 3-5W of juice. In this mode, I played Hades II for nearly 10 hours. Endurance mode also works for hearty AAA games like Forza Horizon 6 and LEGO Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight. Both games still ran at a playable 30 fps without having to turn down the settings from high quality, and the processor only needed 14-17W of power.

Should you buy the MSI Claw 8 EX AI+?

Best Buy: MSI Claw 8 EX AI+ - $1,799

✅ Yes, if…

• You want the most powerful gaming handheld in the world

• You want nearly Nvidia RTX 5050 graphics power on the go

• You want to play more games on a handheld with higher settings

• You want to play games on battery for more than 10 hours

• You’re selling your AMD Ryzen Z2 Extreme-powered gaming handheld right after reading this

❌ No, if…

• You want a better-looking and smaller handheld (wait for the Acer Predator Atlas 8 instead)

• You’re in the market for a gaming laptop instead

• You’d rather buy a PS5, Xbox Series X, and Nintendo Switch 2 for the same price

Subscribe now

Kevin Lee is The Shortcut’s Creative Director. Follow him on Twitter @baggingspam

🏆 Review score: 4.5/5

🏅 Editor’s Choice Award

✅ Pros

• 🎮 Fantastic ergonomic shape that’s a joy to hold for hours

• 🕹️ TMR sticks feel like traditional thumbsticks, but with more precision and no drift

• 😶‍🌫️ Removable faceplate hides all the modular parts and mode toggle switches

• 🫆 Touchpad doubles as a PC trackpad

• 🔫 Tactile and clicky microswitch triggers and buttons all around

• 🔘 Shortcut buttons for mic, volume, and custom commands

❌ Cons

• 🤏 Few additional parts come included, and none are currently available online

• 🪫 17-hour battery life is shorter than other competing controllers

• 🫨 No adaptive triggers or haptic feedback at all

Best Buy: Scuf Omega - $219

Amazon: Scuf Omega - $219

The Shortcut Review

The Scuf Omega is a controller for a higher level of play at $219. The asking price is hefty, but you feel the quality of this controller as soon as you pick it up. Its solid, seamless design speaks confidence, and it feels great in the hand thanks to its thicker controller handles and rubberized grips. Every button sounds off with a reassuring click you can feel, and this extends to the triggers when they’re locked in their shorter-travel mode.

Popping off this controller’s front panel reveals a plethora of removable buttons and mode toggles. Unfortunately, the modular controller comes with only a few additional parts (really just longer or concave thumbsticks). The Scuf Omega’s 17-hour battery life also falls short of competitors like the 20-hour Victrix Pro BFG Reloaded and the 36-hour Razer Raiju V3 Pro.

Despite those shortcomings, the Scuf Omega is a fine PS5 controller and an even better one for PC gaming, thanks to its touchpad doubling as a trackpad for navigating Windows 11. This is a tool for serious gaming that puts control and precision above all.

Full Review

🎮 Joy to hold. The Scuf Omega has a fantastic ergonomic shape that makes it a joy to hold for hours on end. It hues closely to the general size and shape to the DualSense controller, but the Scuf Omega is a little bit wider, and the handles are fuller, so you don’t have to close your fingers tightly around them. There’s also a wonderful rubberized grip that helps you keep your purchase on this controller even as your hands get sweaty from extended play.

🕹️ TMR sticks. More and more controllers have been switching from Hall-Effect to TMR sticks, and the Scuf Omega follows suit. TMR or Tunneling Magnetoresistance follows the same principle of using contactless magnetic sensing technology to avoid the physical degradation and drift issues of traditional thumbsticks. What makes TMR sticks superior to Hall Effect is that they’re more precise, faster-responding, less power-hungry, and, most notably, they have a bit more resistance, giving the same feel as a fully physical thumbstick.

🔘 Buttons on buttons. Underside shortcut buttons are nothing new on premium controllers, but the Scuf Omega adds a pair of additional side buttons and a row of five G-keys. While playing on my PS5 Pro, these buttons just give me another way to tap the face buttons without taking my thumbs off the sticks. On the PC, however, these buttons give me all sorts of ways to create custom macros to call in stratagems in Helldivers 2 or quick-save in The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion.

🔫 Micro switch triggers. Every button on the Scuf Omega uses satisfyingly clicky, tactile microswitches, including the triggers, once you’ve swapped them to their shorter-travel mode. Each trigger has a small switch that lets you switch from a soft pull to an instant click, which comes in super handy for shooters like Battlefield 6. This is basically the opposite of an Adaptive Trigger that will actually fight against you for a more immersive gameplay experience. I personally prefer being able to fire faster with the Scuf Omega.

🗃️ Pop the lid. As with other Scuf controllers, you can pop the entire faceplate for a new aesthetic, but on the Omega, this also reveals all its swappable parts and toggleable settings. I love this design choice as it makes the controller clean and seamless. With its top lid off, you can easily switch this controller between wireless and Bluetooth, or between PS5 and PC modes. You can just as easily swap out all the controller’s parts, including the face buttons, D-Pad buttons, thumbsticks, and even the faceplate – unfortunately, though, it just doesn’t come with many actual parts to swap in.

🫥 Where are the parts? For a modular controller, the Scuf Omega doesn’t have very many of them. The controller comes with only four sets of replaceable sticks. Otherwise, there are no alternative D-Pad or face buttons. By comparison, the Xbox Elite 2 Wireless comes with at least one additional D-Pad cover. Meanwhile, the Victrix Pro BFG Reloaded lets you change the left thumbstick’s orientation and swap out the entire right side of the controller for a six-button fighting game layout. Scuf tells me it has more parts on the way, but for now, it only has replacement sticks in its store.

🫆 Useful touchpad. The Scuf Omega’s trackpad works just as well as the DualSense’s, giving you four-way gesture controls for PS5 Pro games like Ghost of Yotei. Amazingly, this PS5 trackpad also doubles as a PC touchpad, so I use it as a makeshift mouse. This comes in especially useful for games with a ton of loot, like Diablo 4 or Borderlands 4, as I can easily hover over items to mark them as junk or favorite them without needing a separate mouse. I can also navigate Windows 11 to launch games from my Xbox or Steam app and download updates.

📲 Smartphone app. You can fully configure how the Scuf Omega works from its smartphone companion app. This includes calibrating the thumbsticks, programming all shortcut buttons, updating firmware, configuring RGB lighting, and controlling audio. It’s a nice implementation as the app is fast and changes apply in real time.

🪫 Middling battery life. The Scuf Omega’s battery life sits at 17 hours, which is more than enough for up to three full days of gaming. It’s a little longer lasting than the DualSense Edge, which can only run for four to six hours. But there are far longer-lasting controllers like the 20-hour Victrix Pro BFG Reloaded and 36-hour Razer Raiju V3 Pro Wireless.

Should you buy the Scuf Omega?

Best Buy: Scuf Omega - $219

Amazon: Scuf Omega - $219

✅ Yes, if…

• 🎮 You want a better feeling and a more customizable DualSense controller

• 🕹️ You dread thumbstick drift

• 🔘 You need more shortcut buttons on your controller

• 🖱️ You want a PC gaming controller that can also navigate Windows 11 in a pinch

❌ No, if…

• ➕ You want more swappable parts for your customizable controller (get the Victrix Pro BFG Reloaded instead)

• 🫨 You need the immersion and haptic feedback from Sony’s Adaptive Triggers (get the DualSense Edge instead)

• 🔋 Long battery life is a must (get the Razer Raiju V3 Pro instead)

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Kevin Lee is The Shortcut’s Creative Director. Follow him on Twitter @baggingspam

🏆 Rating: 4/5

✅ Pros

• 🚀 Fantastic performance thanks to the Snapdragon X2 Elite

• 🔋 Battery life that lasts all day (and then some)

• 📐 Sleek design that’s lightweight and thin

• ⌨️ Very comfortable keyboard

• 📺 OLED display is perfect for watching videos

❌ Cons

• 💰 You have to pay a premium to get a 2.8K 120Hz display

• 📷 1080p webcam isn’t as sharp or clear as others

• 🕹️ Gaming isn’t one of its strong suits

• 👆 Diving-board trackpad feels dated

The Shortcut review

Lenovo is no stranger to making some of the best Windows laptops on the market, and the Yoga Slim 7x Gen 11 (2026) fits perfectly in that category. It’s an upgraded version of the 2024 model that helped put the ARM-based Snapdragon X Elite chip on the map, which proved to be an incredible performer in the laptop. The new version of the laptop includes the Snapdragon X2 Elite, an even more capable chip, and it doesn’t disappoint.

After three weeks of testing this $1,379.99 laptop, it’s proven to be not just a great Windows laptop, but also a great MacBook Air alternative. Between its design, performance, battery life, and size, it’s a fantastic option if you want the perks of a MacBook Air, minus macOS.

With very few compromises and a reasonable price, the Yoga Slim 7x is a great choice for anyone who just needs a good laptop. Unless you plan to play heavy games or edit complex videos, it’s ideal for nearly every workflow.

Best Buy: Yoga Slim 7x (2026)

Review notes

📐 Same thin-and-light design. When I unboxed the Slim 7x, I did a double-take to make sure it wasn’t the old version. The new model has the same exact design as the original, which isn’t a bad thing. The laptop weighs just over 2.5 pounds and measures 13.9mm thick (just over half an inch), making it ideal for portability. The 14-inch screen also keeps its footprint compact, so it won’t take up much room in your bag. As a productivity machine for on the go, this laptop aces it.

🔵 Hope you like blue. Similarly, much like the last generation, Lenovo is only selling this laptop in a dark blue finish. While it does look nice straight out of the box, it collects fingerprints like a magnet. It’s pretty easy to clean, but you’ll be doing it often if you want it to look its best all the time. I just decided to ignore it and hope that Lenovo eventually ships a version in dark gray or silver.

📺 A lovely OLED screen… The 14-inch display on the Yoga Slim 7x uses an OLED panel, which helps make colors vibrant and punchy. Black levels remain deep and rich, and there’s support for HDR content with Dolby Vision. It’s also a touchscreen, which is always a nice touch. It really is a lovely screen, but there’s a catch: there are two tiers.

💰 … but for a price. I was sent a Yoga Slim 7x with a Full HD 60Hz display. While that isn’t necessarily a dealbreaker, the old model came standard with a 2.8K 90Hz display, which looks sharper and smoother in comparison. That option is still available in Lenovo’s lineup (with an upgraded 120Hz refresh rate, too), but you have to pay an extra $200-$300 depending on which model you’re eyeing up. Again, it’s not a dealbreaker, but it’d be nice if the better screen came standard as it did on the old Slim 7x.

⌨️ Comfortable keyboard with a dated trackpad. I love the keyboard on this laptop. Lenovo never fails to impress with its ability to make a comfortable keyboard, and the Slim 7x delivers. Key travel is satisfying with good clicking sounds across the board, and it’s great for long typing sessions. The trackpad is another story; while it’s certainly functional and capable enough for multi-touch gestures, the diving board mechanism feels dated in 2026. With so many premium laptops switching to haptic touchpads, it’d be nice to see Lenovo bring one to one of its premier Snapdragon-powered laptops.

🍎 MacBook Air-like performance. The Snapdragon X2 Elite inside the Yoga Slim 7x is a game-changer for anyone coming from older, inefficient Intel chips. It uses a similar ARM architecture as Apple’s M series, and it delivers even better performance than the first X Elite chip. With up to 31% faster CPU performance, better graphics, and better AI processing, the Slim 7x is a speedster. This is where the most parallels between it and the MacBook Air come into play; it’s way faster than you think, it sips power, and it’s somehow crammed into a laptop this thin and light. All that for under $1,500 is pretty great.

✅ Great for productivity, general use, and more. This is a very powerful laptop for the price and its size, which makes it ideal for anyone who needs something dependable to get work done on the go. The boosted CPU performance makes the experience feel smooth and snappy, and with up to 32GB of RAM, you can keep a bunch of stuff running at the same time with no issue. Even the 16GB model I’ve been testing has handled all the apps I need every day like Google Chrome (with a bunch of tabs open), Spotify, Lightroom, Slack, and Todoist.

🔥 It runs warm, but only under serious stress. You have to have a ton of things going on this laptop for it to get warm. Unlike a MacBook Air that will stay cool during almost any workload, the Yoga Slim 7x will eventually reach a point where it gets quite hot in the middle of the base toward the hinge. I noticed this a couple of times when sitting outside working; between the heat of the New York City sun and Lightroom running on all cylinders, it didn’t stand a chance staying cool. Most of the time, it’ll be fine, but it’s definitely susceptible to heating up.

🕹️ Gamers: skip this one. If there’s one thing the Yoga Slim 7x isn’t designed for, it’s gaming. Trying to get your favorite titles to run on all cylinders with an ARM-based Windows laptop is tough to begin with, and between the lackluster graphics and middling heat management, it’s not a great idea to buy this laptop in hopes of playing Red Dead Redemption 2 on the go.

🔋 Battery life that lasts all day. The efficiency of the Snapdragon X2 Elite coupled with the 70WHr battery give the Yoga Slim 7x impressive endurance. It can last a full 8-hour day with no issue with my heavier-than-average usage. Those who stick to typical office work and productivity apps can probably extend it to 12-14 hours of usage, which falls way behind Lenovo’s claim of 20-24 hours of usage but is still enough to be considered great battery life. Plus, the supplied 65W charger is fast enough to juice up the laptop in well under two hours from 0%.

🔌 Limited IO. The Yoga Slim 7x has three USB 4 ports on its sides and… that’s it. There’s no SD card reader, HDMI port, or even a headphone jack. You’re stuck with just three USB-C ports. Granted, they’re very versatile ports that all support 40Gbps speeds, but if you want to connect anything beyond a USB-C cable, you’ll have to use an adapter.

🔊 Middling speakers and webcam. The speakers on this laptop have a decent amount of bass, but don’t provide much clarity or richness for listening to music. They’re passable for video calls and listening to podcasts, but for anything more, you’ll want a Bluetooth speaker or a pair of headphones. Meanwhile, the 1080p webcam is sharp (and can be electronically disabled with a physical switch on the side of the Slim 7x), but makes you look washed out and grainy in most lighting conditions. Again, fine for video calls, but not the best on the market.

Should you buy the Yoga Slim 7x Gen 11?

Yes, if…

• ✅ You want great performance and battery life

• ✅ You need a thin and light laptop

• ✅ You want a Windows-powered alternative to the MacBook Air

No, if…

• ❌ You need more ports beyond USB-C (get the ThinkPad X1 Carbon)

• ❌ You’re a gamer (get the Lenovo Legion 7i Gen 10)

• ❌ You want a nicer screen for less money (get the Acer Swift 16)

Best Buy: Yoga Slim 7x (2026)

Max Buondonno is an editor at The Shortcut and co-host of The Shortcut Live. He’s been reporting on the latest consumer technology since 2015, with his work featured on CNN Underscored, ZDNET, How-To Geek, XDA, TheStreet, and more. Follow him on X @LegendaryScoop and Instagram @LegendaryScoop.

🏆 Review score: 4/5

🏅 Editor’s Choice Award

✅ Pros

• 🤏 Compact foldable design that’s super portable

• 🖱️ Ergonomic arch fits right in your hand

• ➘ Fast and accurate pointer tracking over Bluetooth or Logitech’s Bolt receiver

• ↕️ Touch panel delivers the same scrolling performance as a real scroll wheel

• 🫆 2x customizable touchpanel buttons

• 🔋 22-hour battery that’s fully user replaceable

❌ Cons

• 🤙 Thumb and pinky fingers are left hanging on this small mouse

• 🧱 Harsh left-and-right click buttons with almost no travel

Logitech Mobi Fold - $79

Logitech Mobi Fold for Business - $89

The Shortcut Review

The Logitech Mobi Fold might be the best way to spend $79 if you’re constantly in need of a foldable wireless mouse on the go. It’s Logitech’s latest travel mouse that folds like a makeup compact, giving you a far more comfortable way to mouse around on your laptop and tablet.

There have been other transforming mice like the Microsoft Arc and Lenovo Yoga mouse, but the Logitech Mobi Fold is truly the smallest, for better or worse. The best thing this mouse has going for it is that it’s so small, you can fit it anywhere, including folding it over your pocket like a foldable phone. Users with larger hands might find it awkward to drag their thumbs and pinkies as they hang off the small face of this mouse. But aside from the harsh left- and right-click buttons on this mouse, it offers a quick, accurate, and seamless pointer for a variety of devices.

The Logitech Mobi Fold won’t be replacing my Logitech MX Master 4 as my everyday mouse anytime soon, but this is a great travel mouse for whenever I’m away from the office or home.

Full Review

🧳 Travel ready. The Logitech Mobi Fold is truly the smallest mouse I’ve ever used. When folded, it’s about the size of two portable SSDs stacked together. Unfolding the mouse puts it into its arched shape for use, and its surprisingly ergonomic design. The arched back fits perfectly into the palm of your hand, while it’s just wide enough for three fingers to rest on it. That does leave your thumb and pinky hanging, which isn’t my preference, but it’s something you can get used to after a few days to a full week of usage.

🛜 Bluetooth connection. Unlike most Logitech mice, the Mobi Fold doesn’t come with a Bolt USB dongle unless you buy the $ 10-more-expensive “for Business” model. The good news is that even basic Bluetooth lets you connect to up to three devices across Windows, macOS, Chrome OS, Android, iPadOS, and Linux. Connecting this mouse to Android devices and Chromebooks is especially quick because it’s Fast Pair-enabled, so you can simply turn the Mobi Fold on, and there’ll be a prompt to pair the mouse right on your device.

🎯 Laser tracking. Even with basic Bluetooth connectivity, the Logitech Mobi Fold delivers fast and accurate tracking. Dragging my cursor over specific cells in Excel or placing the typing indicator right between letters is simple with the Logitech Mobi Fold. Having this mouse connected to Logitech’s Bolt receiver makes the cursor move even smoother, but the accuracy isn’t improved over Bluetooth.

🖱️ Harsh buttons. Unfortunately, the biggest letdown on the Logitech Mobi Fold is its only physical buttons, the left and right clicks. There’s hardly any travel, and clicking either button feels especially stiff whenever you press them from the middle. For the best clicking feel, you practically have to have your fingers draped over the front edge of the left-and right-click buttons. While it’s admirable, Logitech still included physical buttons on a mouse this thin; even the Apple Magic Mouse has a better clicking feel than the Mobi Fold.

↕️ Scroll panel. In keeping with the Mobi Fold flat profile, this mouse has a touch panel in place of a traditional scroll wheel. This feels nowhere near as tactile as a scroll wheel, but the scroll panel performs exactly the same. I performed a side-by-side test with the Logitech Mobi Fold and Logitech MX Master 4 to confirm this. The Mobi Fold also offers adaptive touch scrolling, so you can flick the scroll panel to quickly jump up and down a webpage or document.

🫆 Touch panel taps. The Logitech Mobi Fold’s touch panel works for more than just scrolling; it’s also a two-virtual-button middle click that offers multiple functions. Double-tapping the middle touch panel lets you zoom in on almost any application. Alternatively, for web browsers, you can tap the top of the panel to jump forward or the bottom to go back to a previous webpage. There are more functions you can assign through the Logi Options+ software.

📋 Software. Logi Options+ gives you plenty of options to customize the Mobi Fold to your liking, including pointer speed and button reassignments. The biggest customization applies to the two touchpanel buttons, which you can reassign as a shortcut to Logitech’s new Action Ring or even to open ChatGPT.

🔋 Battery life. Logitech promises that the Mobi Fold offers 22 hours of nonstop use, enough to last a full 30 days, and that tracks with my usage. After almost a full month of sporadic usage at cafes, the Taipei airport, and anywhere outside of The Shortcut’s NYC office, I’m still at over 35% battery. What’s even better is that the battery is fully replaceable, and it’s easily accessed by prying off the back panel of the mouse’s main body. These batteries likely need to be bought directly from Logitech, but it’s great that you can extend this mouse’s longevity.

Logitech Mobi Fold - $79

Logitech Mobi Fold for Business - $89

• Up next: Asus ROG Harpe II Extreme Edition 20: a golden make over for a legendary gaming mouse

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Kevin Lee is The Shortcut’s Creative Director. Follow him on Twitter @baggingspam

• 💻 Surface Laptop Ultra is the most excitingly powerful Windows 11 laptop in years

• 🪙 Wrapped in a premium aluminum chassis that feels like one solid block of metal

• 📺 2000-nit 15-inch mini LED display is searingly bright with fantastic contrast

• 🫨 Haptic touchpad simulates clicks and adds a tactile confirmation while hovering over Windows 11 elements

• 💪 Ready for heavy creative applications like Adobe Premiere Pro and Unreal Engine 5

• 🎮 Runs Alan Wake 2, Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, Fortnite, Pragmata, and more ray traced games at a smooth 60+ frames per second at full resolution

The Surface Laptop Ultra has gotten me the most excited I’ve been for a Surface product in years. Microsoft’s newest flagship laptop combines a premium all-aluminum design, a luxurious HDR mini-LED display, a haptic touchpad, and Nvidia’s promising new RTX Spark ARM processors, which should make it the strongest high-performance, AI-focused challenger to the MacBook Pro.

At Computex 2026, we’ve had hands-on time with this laptop, tackling intense creative workflows in Adobe Premiere and rendering an explorable virtual environment in Unreal Engine 5. The Surface Laptop Ultra has also proven itself to be a very capable gaming laptop, handily playing Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, and Alan Wake 2. Even through emulation, Pragmata and Fornite were perfectly playable on this laptop.

There’s still a huge mystery as too how much the Surface Laptop Ultra will cost when it arrives this fall, but the Surface Laptop Ultra seems like the most serious MacBook Pro competitor Microsoft or any Windows 11 laptop produce has ever produced.

Full Review

😍 A real beauty. The Surface Laptop Ultra is a beautiful piece of machined aluminum. There aren’t any gaps and hardly any screws to reveal that this thing is anything less than a solid block of milled aluminum. The chassis is also impressively thin at 18mm, but it appears to be even thinner thanks to its raised pedestal design. Despite all the power and Microsoft’s most powerful cooling system yet (more on that later), it weighs under 4.5 pounds, just like the MacBook Pro.

📺 2000-nit HDR display. Opening the lid, with a single finger, mind you, reveals an equally beautiful 15-inch mini-LED touchscreen with a resolution of 2880 × 1920 and 120Hz refresh rate. The display also delivers 4K TV-level HDR brightness at a maximum of 2,000 nits. It makes games look especially fantastic. I was blown away by how good the sun-drenched rainforest scenes from Indiana Jones and the Great Circle looked on the Surface Laptop Ultra. Even this Windows 11 desktop that Microsoft chose shows how much contrast the Surface Laptop Ultra can display.

🫨 Haptic touchpad. The trackpad on the Surface Laptop Ultra is the largest Microsoft has put in any Surface device, and it now also vibrates with haptic feedback. What’s interesting is Microsoft doesn’t just use haptics to simulate a mouse click, but the trackpad also vibrates while you hover over the X-button to close applications. Alternatively, the haptics will shake when you bring a window to the top of the screen and drag it along different split desktop presets. Even though it’s entirely virtual, the haptics add a nice tactile confirmation while you’re interacting with elements in Windows. I hope Microsoft adds more in the near future.

🥊 A huge contender. The Nvidia RTX Spark is bolting out of the gate with some of the biggest specs we’ve seen for a laptop processor. It features a custom 20-core Grate Note CPU that promises up to 1 petaflop worth of AI performance. Nvidia says this is the first time a device has been powerful enough to run 120-billion-parameter AI models on-device rather than servers or systems with multiple GPUs.

The onboard graphics offer an equally impressive 6,144 Blackwell CUDA cores, which should closely match the graphics performance of an RTX 5070 laptop GPU, though with a maximum power draw of 80W. Configuration can also feature up to 128GB of shared memory; however, I also saw plenty of machines with just 64GB of RAM, and Nvidia has told journalists that there will be configs with as little as 16GB of RAM.

🎨 Creative workflows. Windows on ARM will be a hurdle for Microsoft and Nvidia to clear with the Surface Laptop Ultra and other RTX Spark laptops, but both companies are already working hard to ensure everything works when they launch this fall. On the smaller scale, Adobe is already optimizing Premiere Pro. Nvidia presented a shootout between Premiere Pro and Premiere Pro enhanced for RTX Spark, and the latter rendered a scene 2x faster. The RTX Spark will also have accelerated 4.2.2. video support, so you’ll be able to take footage straight from your Canon, Nikon, Sony, or DJI Pocket 4 and edit in full resolution without any stuttering, whereas current devices require down-rezed proxies to smoothly play back media.

I was also able to seamlessly fly around a five-kilometer square virtual environment in Unreal Engine 5, all running on a Surface Laptop Ultra. What was even more impressive was that the entire application was emulated using Nvidia’s Prisim software, which Nvidia claims adds only 5%-10% CPU overhead.

🎮 All the gaming-ready RTX features. The Surface Laptop Ultra comes with a Blackwell GPU that supports all of Nvidia’s major gaming features to date. That includes all of the DLSS 4.5 features, like the 2nd-gen transformer model, Multi-Frame Generation, Nvidia Reflex, and even the upcoming path tracing arriving on all Nvidia 50-series GPUs this August.

The sheer GPU power of the RTX Spark already allows the Surface Laptop Ultra to run Alan Wake 2, Indiana Jones and the Great Circle at full resolution with well over 60 fps. All the games were running with Ray Tracing, or RTX turned on, DLSS set to Balanced, and 2x MFG, and hardly any latency. Native game support on ARM is still spotty, but that didn’t seem to be an issue as Pragmata and Fornite played without issue despite being emulated on the Surface Laptop Ultra.

💨 Proper cooling. A Surface Laptop Ultra running at full tilt sounds about as loud as a portable fan on full power. Microsoft told me the fans in this laptop are the biggest fans it’s ever put in a Surface device, giving it 2.5x that of Surface Laptop 8th Gen. Aside from bigger fans, Microsoft has carefully engineered its thermal solutions with a new copper cold plate and vents so the airflow can hit every component before the heat gets pushed out.

• Up next: Nvidia RTX Spark laptops: pictures of every model from Computex 2026

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Kevin Lee is The Shortcut’s Creative Director. Follow him on Twitter @baggingspam

🏆 Review score: 4/5

🏅 Editor’s Choice Award

✅ Pros

• ✨ Stunning mix of gold, transparent plastic, and RGB that melds together

• 🎯 65K sensor captures micromovements for competitive FPS shooters

• 🖱️ 100m click lifespan and Corning Gorilla Glass mouse feet will stand the test of time

• ⚙️ Gear Link configuration website saves you from having to download software

❌ Cons

• 🤑 $259 is a lot for a gaming mouse

• 💦 Potentially too slick to hold for gamers with sweaty hands

• ⚖️ 8K polling rate reduces max DPI to 50K and battery life to 37 hours

• 🪶 82g is a little heavy for the ultra-lightweight mouse category

ROG Harpe II Extreme Editon 20 - $259

The Shortcut Review

The Asus ROG Harpe II Extreme Edition 20 is a remix of the brand’s celebrated ultra-lightweight gaming mouse. It’s been given a transparent shell, 24K gold plating, and a ridiculously sensitive 65K sensor for competitive play, but all of this comes at the high price of $259. I’ll be honest, the Asus ROG Harpe II Extreme Edition 20 won me on aesthetics alone. The mix of the smoky transparent shell, shiny gold within, RGB, and futuristic decals just hits the cyberpunk aesthetic I love. The fact that it has a fantastic hand shape, long-lasting microswitch mouse buttons, Corning Gorilla Glass mouse feet, and uses the Gear Link website to configure settings instead of downloading software is just icing on this great gaming mouse.

The Asus ROG Harpe II Extreme Edition 20 falters in a few ways. The slick design can be a detriment, as its transparent surface is entirely smooth and can slip out of a sweaty hand, especially for gamers with a claw or fingertip grip. You also can’t use this mouse at its maximum 8K polling rate without two trade-offs: a lower maximum DPI of 50K and reduced battery life to 37 hours. This 82-gram mouse also isn’t the lightest of ultra-lightweight clickers if that’s your main priority.

The real reason to buy the Asus ROG Harpe II Extreme Edition 20 is its aesthetics and longevity. Its mouse switches and Corning glass skates won’t quit on you for years, and you’ll have the bragging rights of owning a gold-plated gaming mouse for all that time too.

Full Review

✨ 24K gold-plated. The Asus ROG Harpe II Extreme Edition 20 leaves a hell of an impression, combining a smoky transparent shell, a 24K gold-plated inner frame, more gold on the scroll wheel and side buttons, and RGB lighting. This gaming mouse is also decked out with decals celebrating ROG’s 20th anniversary, giving it an even more cyber-edged feel. That might all sound like too many clashing aesthetics at once, but it coalesces into a “Cyberpunk 2077 but cleaner” sort of style. It’s gorgeous.

⚠️ Slippery when wet. This is one slick-looking mouse, but it can also get a little too slick if you have sweaty palms. The entire transparent shell is smooth, and while this wasn’t an issue for my palm grip, those with a claw or fingertip grip might have trouble keeping a hold of the Asus ROG Harpe II Extreme Edition 20. Asus includes a few strips of grip tape, but this ends up covering the whole point of a transparent mouse. I wish Asus had micro-etched the surface for added grip, since it has the technology to emboss ROG and Xbox logos all over the equally transparent Asus ROG Xbox Ally X20.

🖱️ 100,000,000 clicks ready. The Asus ROG Harpe II Extreme Edition 20 wasn’t just built pretty; it was designed to last. The ROG Optical Micro switches under each mouse button are rated for a 100 million click lifespan that’s sure to last for years, even if your StarCraft 2 APM rate is in the 400+ range. The mouse’s feet/skates are also made of Corning Gorilla Glass, which will basically never need to be replaced, unlike the silicone pads used by most other mice.

☄️ 65,000 DPI sensor. This mouse features a 65,000 DPI sensor that’s quite a bit faster than the already-sensitive 42,000 DPI sensor on the previous Asus ROG Harpe II Ace. At a maximum of 65K DPI, the Asus ROG Harpe II Extreme Edition 20 can track even the slightest mouse movements, which is essential in shooters like Counter-Strike 2 and Valorant.

This mouse is designed to read the smallest movements. For example, the lift-off distance can be adjusted to be as small as 0.7-1.7mm. If you’re mouse aiming with your whole arm (as you should be), the Asus ROG Harpe II Extreme Edition 20 also supports a maximum acceleration of 70g and a maximum speed of 800 inches per second (IPS).

ROG Harpe II Extreme Editon 20 - $259

⚡ 8,000Hz polling at a cost. If you want the best lag-free connection for competitive gaming, you’ll want to plug in the SpeedNova 8K dongle. It unlocks the Asus ROG Harpe II Extreme Edition 20 8K polling rate; however, it comes at a fairly high cost: reducing the max DPI to 50,000 and shortening battery life to just 37 hours. That might still sound like a lot of time to game, but this mouse’s regular battery life reaches 195 hours at a 1K polling rate.

🖥️ No install needed. Unlike so many peripherals, there’s no software installation required with the Asus ROG Harpe II Extreme Edition 20. You can simply load the Gear Link website, connect your mouse, and then you’re free to tweak all the settings without downloading a thing.

You can go in deep to tweak the ROG Harpe II Extreme Edition 20 to your exact liking with angle tuning and snapping, DPI adjustments, including separate X and Y axes, and debounce delay. You can also calibrate the mouse’s sensor to your desk surface or pick one of the presets if you own an Asus ROG mousepad. Lastly, there’s a Zone Mode toggle that locks the mouse to its highest settings, saving you the hassle of jumping into the app to turn everything up manually.

ROG Harpe II Extreme Editon 20 - $259

• Up next: Asus ROG Azoth Extreme Edition 20 review: the most expensive gaming keyboard I’ve ever loved

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Kevin Lee is The Shortcut’s Creative Director. Follow him on Twitter @baggingspam

🏆 Review score: 4.5/5

🏅 Editor’s Choice Award

✅ Pros

• 🪎 Premium build quality with solid metal, carbon fiber, and gold-plated accents

• ⌨️ Adjustable typing feel with just a lever for a hard or soft key touch

• 🤫 Fully silent typing thanks to three layers of dampening

• ⚡ Boosted 8,000Hz polling rate works over wireless and wired

• 🌐 Web-based Gear Link app almost fully removes the need for software installation

• 🔋 92-hour battery life with RGB and screen, 1600 hours without

❌ Cons

• 🤑 $600!!!

• 🧲 No hall-effect or optical keyswitch options with tunable actuation distance

• ⬇️ Companion app installation required to work with Gear Link

• 💰 It costs $600

Asus ROG Azoth Extreme Edition 20 - $699

The Shortcut Review

Asus ROG Azoth Extreme Edition 20 is the ultimate 75% mechanical keyboard for enthusiasts and competitive gamers. Its build quality is impeccable, with a mix of solid metal, carbon fiber, three layers of damping, prelubed key switches, and stabilizers. The 20th-anniversary ROG edition further elevates the ROG Azoth Extreme by adding gold-plated parts and a slick black color scheme. This is a peripheral built for keyboard enthusiasts without having to actually build it.

For competitive gamers, it offers a blazing-fast 8,000Hz polling rate that works over wireless or wired connections. The adjustable key feel lets you take the edge off the hard, crisp key travel for a softer keypress during everyday typing. And you’ll never be left with a dead wireless keyboard thanks to its extended 1,600-hour battery life, just in case its regular 92 hours of battery life just isn’t enough.

The only thing missing here is a hall-effect or magnetic key option, if you want to dial in your key travel exactly. The price is also pretty astronomical at $599, $100 more than the original Asus ROG Azoth Extreme. That’s so expensive for a mainstream keyboard, but it really caters to the hardest of hardcore keyboard enthusiasts. Another thing going for it is that this is a one-off special-edition 20th Anniversary ROG Edition keyboard that will never be reproduced.

Full Review

🛡️ Full Metal Jacket. The Asus ROG Azoth Extreme Edition 20 is a rugged gaming keyboard made with a full aluminum alloy chassis. However, unlike other keyboards that use a thin sheet of pressed metal, this keyboard has a metal slab on its underside and an even thicker aluminum collar wrapped around the rear. This keyboard’s full metal jacket makes it incredibly heavy. This is the keyboard you never want to fall on a tiled floor or your foot. The keyboard also ships in a premium cardboard box that weighs three pounds on its own, giving you a strong sense of its heft as soon as you pick it up.

🪎 I love gold. The other most striking thing about the Asus ROG Azoth Extreme Edition 20 is all the plated gold you’ll find on it, including the entire palm rest’s underside, the diamond-cut edges, screws, magnetic feet, and the flip-out card on the keyboard’s underside. The keyboard’s default amber-colored backlight shines through the clear keycaps, blending with the gold and making it look like the whole thing is glowing with treasure inside. I love this golden aesthetic, and it helps elevate the panache of this keyboard even if it comes at the expense of an extra $100

🎚️ Adjustable typing feel. Aesthetics aside, the Asus ROG Azoth Extreme Edition 20 has a fantastically smooth, uniform, and quiet typing feel. You can also set the resistance with a lever underneath the keyboard that manipulates the adjustable gasket mount to give the keys an either a soft or hard feel. The soft feel offers a little more bounce and flex, making it easier on your fingers while typing a long document. The hard feel is definitely all about crisp feedback to really let you know you’re hitting the keys, and this is, of course, best for gaming. This is a great feature, as it gives me two distinct keyswitch experiences without having to physically swap them out, though you could do that if you wanted to.

⌨️ Just my type. The ROG Azoth Extreme Edition 20 comes with two options for key switches: a clicky NX Storm or a linear NX Snow. My review sample came with NX Snow, which is great, but not my favorite, so I can always buy the NX Storm set and hotswap them onto the whole keyboard or just my main set of gaming keys like WASD, shift, left control, etc.

Asus ROG Azoth Extreme Edition 20 - $699

🤫 Silent mode. No matter which keyswitch you go with, this is a very quiet keyboard, and it’s all thanks to the keyboard’s three layers of dampening. There’s a Poron dampening foam that silences keystrokes, while a deeper layer of Poron on the switch pad cushions switches from hitting the PCB directly, and lastly, a silicon pad minimizes sounds from resonating in the keyboard. All the larger keys also have foam stabilizers that prevent them from clattering.

🛜 Tri-Mode connection. The Asus ROG Azoth Extreme Edition 20 gives you three ways to connect: wireless, wired, and Bluetooth. With Bluetooth alone, you can connect to up to three devices simultaneously. The Asus ROG Azoth Extreme Edition 20 also comes with an 8000Hz ROG Polling Rate Booster that works with both wireless and wired play, giving you the most responsive keyboard for competitive play.

⚙️ Gear Link with a companion app. One of my favorite features of Asus’ ROG peripherals is that they use a web client to manage everything, so no software installation is needed. Unfortunately, that’s not 100% true of the Asus ROG Azoth Extreme Edition 20, as it still requires one companion app to fully work with the software. Otherwise, you can tweak the lighting, set up macros, and do everything from the Gear Link website. to install any needless software to get the most out of Asus’s new keyboard.

🔋 1,600+ hour battery life. The Asus ROG Azoth offers a long battery life of 92 hours, even with both the OLED screen and the keyboard’s RGB backlighting enabled. However, if you don’t want to charge this keyboard for the rest of the year, the battery life extends to 1,600 hours if you turn off all the lights and screens. That’s also a great fallback if you’re ever dipping into the red while in a multiplayer match or a multi-hour raid.

Asus ROG Azoth Extreme Edition 20 - $699

• Up next: Asus ROG Falchion Ace 75 HE review: this eSports-grade gaming keyboard erases input lag

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Kevin Lee is The Shortcut’s Creative Director. Follow him on Twitter @baggingspam

🏆 Review Score: 4/5 – ‘Great!’

✅ Pros:

• 📺 Outputs N64 games at 720p, 1080p, or 4K

• 😍 Plays games exactly how you remember with no input lag or visual quirks

• 👍 Different display modes and scaling options are available

• 🎮 Compatible with wired and Bluetooth N64 controllers

• 💡 Nice touches like the cartridge light elevate the already unique design

• 🤫 Silent in operation

• 💰 Cheaper than the Analogue 3D

• 🙏 Plays all your original N64 games, and new titles are on the way

• 🛜 Can be updated over-the-air thanks to Wi-Fi

❌ Cons:

• 🤷‍♂️ Won’t magically make your N64 games look like remasters

• 👀 Alternatives like Switch Online are available

• 🆚 The Analogue 3D system software is more mature and boasts more features

• 😞 ModRetro’s M64 Pro controller is sold separately

ModRetro: M64

GameStop: Smoke ModRetro M64

GameStop: Smoke ModRetro M64

The Shortcut Review

*This review is based on a pre-production M64 unit provided by ModRetro. Hardware and software are not final.*

The N64 remains my favorite console of all time. I played it religiously with my older brother growing up, sinking countless hours into the plethora of multiplayer and single-player games available.

However, thanks to the cruel passage of time, the N64 has become harder to enjoy. Try hooking one up to a modern display, if you can even find the right cables, and you’ll be met with a frankly off-putting image that quickly dampens even the most stalwart of fans’ enthusiasm.

That’s why the prospect of the ModRetro M64, a modernized Nintendo 64 that can easily connect to a 4K TV while retaining the accuracy and classic look of the original system, was such a tantalizing one.

ModRetro M64 specs 🛠️

• Price: $199 early bird pricing, $229 after June 1, 2026

• Resolution: 720p, 1080p, 4K

• Colors: Green, Purple, Red, Clear

• Release date: July 28, 2026

And while the M64 is very much in its early stages (there are several big updates planned at launch and in the months ahead), it’s been a blast revisiting the games that shaped my childhood without having to contend with the usual barriers to entry.

🚀 Ready to rumble. The M64 makes a strong first impression, even in its pre-production form. Not only does the hardware feel premium, with a bold identity and a translucent two-tone shell that lets you see the circuitry inside, but it boots up blazingly fast, often loading a game in under five seconds.

😎 No ordinary N64. The M64 also has other unique features, like the useful and powerful cartridge eject mechanism that shoots your game up into the air, which makes it easier to remove. Little thoughtful touches help to elevate the overall experience, like the LED light which shows off a game’s artwork and when an update is installing, the chunky dedicated wheel to navigate the UI, and the silent performance under load all combine to make one pleasing package.

Hold up, wait a minute

However, it’s important to set your expectations about what the M64 can actually do.

👉 It won’t remaster your N64 games. It’s easy to think that because the M64 can output at 4K resolution, it will magically upscale and make every game you play look razor sharp, and provide crystal-clear textures and detail. And that simply isn’t the case.

Yes, N64 games will look significantly better than when running off the original N64’s video output, and there are some neat display options to choose from to tailor things to your liking. You can stretch the image, choose from different scaling options like Integer, Integer+, Bilinear or Lanczos scaling, and even select a Clean, CRT or Scanlines display profile, along with customizing your own. There is a bevy of settings to tweak and play with.

But this is ‌still the same 240p to 480p, often blurry resolution and jaggy graphics that the Nintendo 64 provides. Unless you crank up the sharpening and experiment with some of the more advanced settings, don’t expect any dramatic difference in this respect, and that goes for the sometimes questionable performance in certain games.

You know that section in GoldenEye 007 that tanks the framerate on the Dam level? Yeah, it’ll do that on the M64, too. This will undoubtedly disappoint some people, though the console’s promised overclocking feature could rectify these issues, but sadly it wasn’t available to test.

Update: A new update has added various overclocking levels that can dramatically improve a game’s performance. Conker’s Bad Fur Day, which runs at a notoriously sluggish and inconsistent frame rate, often hovering below 30fps, runs far smoother with the overclock setting on ‘Insane’. It’s an excellent feature.

Do you need the M64?

🤔 Isn’t Switch Online better? If you have a Nintendo Switch or Switch 2, you can play many N64 games at a higher resolution, and often with improved framerates. Grab the N64 wireless controller that Nintendo released, and you’ll have the benefits of native controls, save states, rewind, a pleasing CRT filter, and the option to play local multiplayer games online. Which is probably enough for most nostalgic gamers.

🎮 Play any game you want. The big caveat, however, is that not every N64 game is available on Switch Online – and some never will be. There’s still no Super Smash Bros. or Conker’s Bad Fur Day. You’ll never be able to play the best wrestling games of all time like WWF No Mercy. And Donkey Kong 64 only just made an appearance. Want to play licensed games like South Park again? Forget about it.

It’s worth noting that at the time of review, only one game in my collection failed to boot: Star Wars: Rogue Squadron. However, this may be fixed by the time the console ships. You can see a list of games that are currently experiencing major or minor issues when running on the M64 here.

All that glitters is not gold

😖 Emulation woes. But as nice as emulation can be, there are several downsides. There’s noticeable input lag to deal with, and often bugs, glitches, or visual oddities that were never present in the original version. Many games launched with issues on Switch Online, and some still aren’t quite right. Oh, and if you stop subscribing to Switch Online, you’ll also lose access to all the games. No more N64 for you.

That isn’t the case with the ModRetro M64, which plays all your physical N64 games (from any region) just as you remembered them, and everything feels just as responsive as it should. Your existing accessories will also work, including controllers, Rumble Paks, Controller Paks, and more.

👍 It just feels right. Honestly, it’s easy to downplay what a difference input lag can make, but whenever I play Mario Golf 64 on Switch Online, I find it hard to get the shot timings down. On the M64, I could produce a “Nice Shot!” time and time again. Switching between GoldenEye 007 on the M64 and Switch 2 produced a similar result. Moving Bond around felt heavy and slow via emulation, yet light and responsive on the ModRetro M64. To N64 purists like me, that makes a massive difference.

It’s also worth praising the M64’s excellent sound reproduction, which is far superior to that of Nintendo Switch Online. At the same volume level on my LG OLED CX, the M64 produced a far more detailed and fuller soundscape, while Switch Online sounded flat and rather lifeless in comparison, requiring the volume to be increased significantly.

Just the beginning

The ModRetro M64 is off to a solid start, then, and there’s huge potential for it to become even better.

📅 Day one update. By the time the first units ship to customers, an over-the-air firmware update will add EverDrive-64 X5 and X7, and Summercart 64 compatibility. Overclocking will also be available to boost the performance of some games, along with a built-in Controller Pak, and a translucent video settings menu.

👏 Post-launch support. After shipping, support is planned for video passthrough for the ModRetro Chromatic, and a Chromatic Transfer Pak (Pokémon Stadium, anyone?). In-game notifications, console LED color customization, and more video processing, effects, and filters are also on the way, along with the ability to hot-swap carts.

🆕 New N64 games! Perhaps the coolest thing about the M64, though, is that, like with the ModRetro Chromatic, new and classic games will be released for the system. On June 1, 2026, ModRetro will release Xeno Crisis, Xibalba 64, Extreme-G Turbo Fusion, and the iconic Buck Bumble. New N64 games in 2026? What a time to be alive!

💰 The price of nostalgia. At $229 ($199 if you got the early bird discount), the M64 compares favorably to the other N64 remake on the market, the Analogue 3D, which currently costs $269.99. Neither includes a controller as standard, but both work with existing N64 gamepads.

You’ll have to stump up an additional $89 for the ModRetro M64 Pro controller, which works wired or wireless and has a TMR analog stick, Bluetooth, built-in rumble, a rechargeable battery pack (or the option for AA batteries) and matches the ergonomics of the original N64 controller. It feels super premium thanks to its ceramic-coated aluminum back and weighs about as much as an Xbox Elite Series 2 controller. It can also turn on the system, and accessing the quick menu to turn it off is as simple as pressing Start + Z. For comparison, the 8BitDo 64 pad for the Analogue 3D is $40.

🆚 How does it compare to the Analogue 3D? Unfortunately, I don’t have an Analogue 3D to compare the two consoles directly, but it will be interesting to see how the M64 fares in future head-to-heads. For what it’s worth, ModRetro’s Palmer Luckey has stated that the M64 is cheaper, built with superior hardware, is fully open-source, and has lower latency. Plus, there’s native support for CRTs. However, the Analogue 3D system software is more mature and recently added save states.

The ultimate N64?

Unlike the ModRetro Chromatic, which has obvious benefits over playing games on the original Game Boy or Game Boy Color – specifically the screen – the ModRetro M64 is a more understated upgrade.

It achieves the goal of making the N64 more accessible again and greatly improves the look of titles you know and love when played on a modern display. With Wi-Fi and several updates planned, the M64 will also become even more capable in the future, which is an exciting proposition.

The M64 might not be the ultimate Nintendo 64 revival just yet, but it’s a fantastic glow-up of Nintendo’s beloved console that will only get better. If you have some N64 cartridges you want to revisit, this is the best way to do it.

Should you buy the ModRetro M64? 🤔

ModRetro: M64

Yes, if…

• ✅ You love the N64 and want an easier way to play your favorite games.

• ✅ You don’t own a CRT or display that does the N64’s video output justice.

• ✅ You’d like some more modern features like wireless controller support.

No, if…

• ❌ You’re quite content playing N64 games on Nintendo Switch Online.

• ❌ You don’t have an existing library of Nintendo 64 games.

• ❌ You never really liked the N64 to begin with.

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Adam Vjestica is The Shortcut’s Senior Editor. Formerly TechRadar’s Gaming Hardware Editor, Adam has also worked at Nintendo of Europe as a Content Marketing Editor, where he helped launch the Nintendo Switch. He also runs a retro gaming YouTube channel called Game on, boy! Follow him on X @ItsMrProducts.

• 🎮 Asus has perfected the ROG Xbox Ally X with a bigger 7.4-inch OLED screen

• 📺 The new ROG Nebula HDR display adds 1,400-nit HDR brightness and 600-nit SDR brightness with Dolby Vision support

• 🪟 Also added: tougher Gorilla Glass Victus and Corning DXC Anti-Reflection coating

• 🕹️ Directional inputs upgraded with Gulikit TMR thumbsticks and a transforming D-pad

• 🔴 Rounder buttons, more tactile bumpers, and longer impulse trigger pulls

• 📸 Action button replaces Library shortcut for quick screenshots and gameplay recording

• 👓 Bundled with Asus ROG XReal R1 mixed-reality glasses for a 171” virtual screen

• 🤑 Price TBA, but it’ll be expensive, as it combines the $999 Asus ROG Xbox Ally X and the $849 ROG XReal R1 glasses into an upgraded, limited-edition package

The Asus ROG Xbox Ally X was practically the perfect gaming handheld except for its aging screen. Well, Asus has a new limited-edition ROG Xbox Ally X20 that fixes all those issues with an OLED screen and other welcome upgrades.

The new OLED screen is INCREDIBLE. 1,400-nit HDR brightness, 600-nit SDR brightness, pitch-black blacks, Dolby Vision support, and a slightly larger 7.4-inch display, too – all of which make the Asus ROG Xbox Ally X20 practically the Steam Deck OLED 2.0.

The Asus ROG Xbox Ally X20 also has a fancy transparent shell. Other touches that help elevate this special 20th-anniversary Xbox Ally X are the light-up classic Xbox logo and gold accents. The controls have also been improved with Gulikit TMR thumbsticks and a D-Pad that rotates to switch between four-way and eight-way inputs.

Now the catch is that not only is the Asus ROG Xbox Ally X20 a limited-edition model, but it’s also only being sold as a bundle with the Asus ROG Xreal R1 glasses. You can plug the glasses directly into this handheld to enjoy a virtual 171-inch screen. While it’s a nice add-on device, it will only make the bundle more expensive. Asus hasn’t confirmed the price yet, but it’ll probably be in the $2,000-$2,500 range as it combines an upgraded $999 Asus ROG Xbox Ally X with the $859 Asus ROG Xreal R1 Glasses.

🫥 Transparent casing. Electronics with transparent housing are always cooler, and that’s especially true of the Asus ROG Xbox Ally X20. It looks immaculate, and you can appreciate the circuitry within, vibration motors whirr to life, and how hard the fan is spinning to keep the system cool. I also love the gold accents and the classic Xbox logo that now lights up. The controller handles also have a rubber texture, as Asus has taken inspiration from the Xbox Elite Wireless Controller for the ROG Xbox Ally X20, which plays into the improved controls too.

🕹️ TMR sticks and a new D-Pad. The Asus ROG Xbox Ally X20 has a new pair of Gulikit TMR thumbsticks that’ll be driftproof forever. TMR sticks are an upgrade over even the Hall Effect sticks on the new MSI Claw 8 EX AI+, as they have a bit more resistance to emulate traditional thumbsticks. If you’re more of a D-Pad person, that’s also been upgraded with a transforming gimmick. Twisting the D-Pad switches it between four-way and eight-way input, a useful feature for playing 2D platformers or fighting games. Asus has also made subtle improvements to every control with rounder buttons, firmer shoulder bumpers, and a longer travel on the impulse triggers.

📺 OLED at last. I’ve been screaming for more gaming handhelds to adopt OLED screens or at least HDR displays, and it’s finally here on the Asus ROG Xbox Ally X20. The new ROG Nebula HDR display is beautiful to look at, with HDR peak brightness increased to 1,400 nits to support both HDR and Dolby Vision. SDR brightness is a tick brighter at 600 nit, so even if you’re playing an old-school game, you’ll be able to see this screen better anywhere. The pitch-black contrast that only OLED can achieve will also make me want to play all my games on this gaming handheld.

↔️ Bigger screen. Asus’ new OLED screen is also a tiny bit bigger at 7.4 inches. 0.4 inches isn’t a size bump, but it helps spread out the pixels a tiny bit, so I don’t have to squint as hard to see things on the ROG Xbox Ally X20. I wished the extra screen space would have added another row of vertical pixels, but the screen resolution here is still 1,920 x 1,080.

The display is now also made with tougher Gorilla Glass Victus, so it won’t scratch as easily. There’s also a Corning DXC Anti-Reflection coating that helps block out glare without making the screen matte. The display also supports FreeSync Premium Pro on top of VRR, which includes native HDR support and Low Framerate Compensation when fps dips below the 48-120Hz range that VRR is designed to smooth out.

🌬️ Improved cooling. Asus hasn’t changed anything about the internal components of its limited-edition handheld, but it has improved the cooling. The most notable change is the longer ventilation strip along the top of the ROG Xbox Ally X20, but Asus told me they also rearranged the internals so there’s more airflow going out.

👓 Bundled VR headset. The last new addition to the Asus ROG Xbox Ally X20 is that it comes bundled with Asus’ new ROG XReal R1 glasses. These 240Hz micro-OLED FHD gaming glasses plug into the Asus ROG Xbox Ally X20 to give you a virtual 171-inch 3D screen. There’s no way to buy the Asus ROG Xbox Ally X20 on its own, so while this will likely increase the price by at least $849, it’s worth it if you’ve ever wished you could play with a huge gaming screen anywhere.

• Up next: Acer Predator Atlas 8 hands-on review: Intel’s best shot at gaming handheld supremacy

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Kevin Lee is The Shortcut’s Creative Director. Follow him on Twitter @baggingspam