you finally gave in to peer pressure from your geeky friends and you're
getting a mechanical keyboard but what key switches should you get now i'm on
the record saying that cherry mx switches are the gold standard but there
are tons of keyboard enthusiasts who strongly disagree with that statement so
today we are conducting a blind test
he's now nowhere near me is he with no less than 22 of the most popular
key switches to see which ones people including me
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now some of you may remember that we did do a blind key switch test in a previous
video but today's test is way better in basically every way we're testing way
more key switches all on the same board with the same key caps and with a way
bigger sample size of our weird quirky test subjects oh i don't like this chair
this is how we do it now we could have simply arranged all 22 keyboards around
the room and let people wander around free range but we figured they would get
too tired and unfocused to rigorously test each board so here's what we're
going to do instead we've divided the switches into three main categories
tactile linear and clicky switches so each participant will actually do three
rounds of testing that's right and within each round you only ever have two
keyboards in front of you at any given time you just tell me if you prefer
keyboard a or keyboard b and then i take away the losing board and give you a new
one and we used a random number generator to determine which order you
experience the keyboards in to remove even more bias so
you want to get started i do all right then we'll begin with round
one all the tactile keyboards
hmm
these are not the same what how are these even the same class
this is surprisingly different this one's so much more subdued
quiet stealthy oh oh no
oh oh
yeah yeah are these even mechanical
hmm it's kind of nice it's soft but not
mushy i mean this this might as well just be a membrane
oh beautiful oh am i gonna pick this one even though
i didn't like it right away these are brutal
no thank you i don't really like this one
that's your keyboard this is my keyboard that's it
two islands silence what's that
this is okay
this feels familiar very familiar
easier to type on smoother
these almost feel like they're more premium
it's okay it's the tesla
i don't like this one quite as much i can't quite describe why
this one's kind of chonky still feels a little membraney
oh no that's your keyboard that's my board
what is it zelios v2
neat it's not like overpowering in the noise it's smooth
it's very comfortable
this one sings to me you hear that
so much twanginess listen to that
b feels a little i don't know thin maybe it's just the
mechanical sound or the metal sounds
that's heavy uh this one's gotta have some strong
fingers to use this baby this one's weird it like takes more force to push
down right away like the tactile bumps at the top but
then it's kind of takes a lot of force throughout there's a lot of resistance
which i think is what makes it feel mushy heavy always felt like quality to
me but i never liked typing on it as much that
would be annoying for me i couldn't type on us all day i like them but there's no
way i'd be able to type on them comfortably all day
oh i hate that i don't like that i don't like this one
nope i feel like i'm at my eye exam all over
again and you don't know if the answers you're saying are right but it's just
all subjective so it doesn't matter unless there is a right and wrong this
is terrible i feel like i'm a typist in a courtroom
drama stenographer this one's mildly more
satisfying i i can't decide
oh these are pretty similar let me do tactile it's pretty light in
the press it just doesn't feel like it takes as much pressure to type a is
really easy i mean opposite
i was saying if i'm typing i would like this one more i have to choose this one
yeah this one's nicer this one feels pretty good but i'm pretty sure it's a clone
watch maybe just like totally wrong that would be pretty funny the one where you're like i hate that guess what that
was what cherry brown nailed it
what really i didn't know i'd like cherry browns
what a coincidence ah sweet
yeah actually i think the keyboard that Linus has at home that i really like is
a brown okay what what what category are we in
here linear ooh that's gonna be a tough one i can pretty much guarantee i'm
going to hate them all why what the relative test sort of like you know
do you want poop or diarrhea like
oh
this is easier to type on than this one
this is a bit more of what i want in like a linear switch like really low force
oh these these feel like blues i mean they're not
but they feel like it oh man you could really press these down
quick keyboard b feels really premium for some
reason it's like the switch just like has a tighter tolerance so it just goes
in smooth and like quickly very smooth very easy to press
these ones feel like a little bit more refined almost like the stroke is just
smoother overall it feels so tight and just more premium
for some reason right off the bat
i like this one just like just the feel of it and what is my champion called
six to nine tangerine oh 62 gram i just
said 16 man yes
yes i am a genius i'm a keyboard genius baby
the sound and like it just feels like slightly smoother maybe i don't know if
that's right but these are really easy going
i could type on these all day are they expensive
new one
is this um do you remember that oh
oh my god okay these are very soft holy crap
wow i felt like typing on boobs
oh god no no
i really like this i think i've ever typed on something
like this before it's fighting me
it's kind of nice
yeah it feels really nice i don't know it's so quiet
it's stealthy it's like a stealth keyboard
these are much heavier tiring and mushy wow so i guess some people
must really like having a lot of resistance on their keys eh what have i
chosen let's play the lottery the rosa rosalias
like if i was at a beach and i needed a keyboard to type on toes in the sand
type it away on the mechanical keyboard this would be the one
that sounds like the one i have at home
no i don't think i like this either am i dead or alive i don't know
these feel like blacks or something
too much actuation force these are too
heavy for me that's your keyboard cool
that is a gateron ink black
got her on gotta
oh boy
really light there's kind of a gritty feeling to this
oh i don't know this feels actually quite similar to
this one over here oh oh this is this is a tight race
i don't know these are so similar
these might even be the same thing for all i know
oh these are really close but i guess i'm going to stick with a
telios i've never heard of that what's that like if you like
linear cherry keyboards that's probably great
i don't i just like things that are easy to type on and don't require much force
is this a common one to like oh can i go back to the one with the red
ones on the bottom oh we doing clicky next you know i used
to like clicky keyboards i really don't anymore
they're all loud hey just the way people like them right it's like if you were
like if you were like trying to type without bothering somebody and you're like
what's the password i really do not like hooky switches oh
it's more Jake's thing this could be the best category i already love it
click here stronger faster
this is not bad
whoa whoa
that's a sharp click the click on this is very noticeably different if it was
cherry i would be very surprised
i really like keyboard v it really gives me that very sharp feedback that i'm
actually hitting things if i was trying to piss off my roommate
oh definitely this one this one's like i'm just pressing down and it's like
okay yeah you're pressing boom all right that's fine this one's like engaged
i have a feeling this one is polarizing because the click is very like
affirmative yeah yeah i don't want to engage thrusters every
time i click you're going to run out of fuel that way
it's like a short throw but like so nice sounding
nope the more i type on it the worse it gets their mind okay these ones are
slightly lighter than this keyboard who would use this what a monster
and i think i like that because they are a little bit faster but they do have a
nice definite click you gotta live alone i'm sorry
this one's definitely more clicky and part of me really likes that
all right what do we got here sherbert sure bet sherbert sherbert sure
bet sherbet sherbert sherbert sherbet
sherbet sherbert sherbet sherbert those are brand new i think
that's a nice sounding switch it feels good stabilization's nice
yeah they feel great
wait this one's like almost like grainier
these feel a lot like blues the click is so
emphasized that i would almost say that they're like fake blues
i think oh yes i like i like clicky
a lot more this is a bit more familiar feeling
i think this one definitely feels more like keyboards that i have
experience with i'm trying to keep that bias out of the picture i think
that these are blues but i don't know if you told me one of these was a cherry
i would guess that it was this one i'm going to guess that these are like
the box jades or box navies
now this sounds kind of hollow if i'm gonna pick a keyboard based on what it sounds like it better sound good this is
a kale blue sure
wow i threw quite a few out because they didn't have enough force
oh this one really gives you feedback like you can really feel that you're
typing this feels familiar
oh the click on these switches wow that is
aggressive looks like i'm on a typewriter
it just makes you feel like you're getting into the mainframe
it's almost fatiguing to listen to in the same way that when you listen to like really accurate high-resolution
headphones that can be fatiguing because it's like too realistic
so satisfying to click oh my god
very heavy like brake force like there's
a lot of resistance before it goes i think it's all in the way it just like
travels down this feels really tight i think if i had these switches in like
my control and shift that would be cool or like on a numpad but i wouldn't want
to be typing on these all day
this feels horrible keep it okay we're done done
i don't know let's see
box jade i'm happy with that that's sick
a new contender enters the ring
oh so much louder though these are very obnoxious this is like if
you want your co-workers to hate you oh the sound of those are brutal
but i like the feel of them that is one generic ass clicky keyboard
you like that nope
oh cherry yeah well that's a generic keyboard
goes to show you how personal a decision this is
these are clicky but not obnoxious
very suave i like them
don't like that this one's more like a oh
i feel like if i was writing it'd be good but i don't write that much
yeah it's okay a little mushy i think
this one right here also kind of weird it has the same sort of like not very
much for slots of force not very much that feels odd
nope just from a gaming perspective i would definitely go with b again that's the
keyboard this is it the box white
cool that seems pretty good i've i've never felt happier i still would not
pick this actually because i like the other one better but silence
they should go back to cookie and then get a divorce
that was actually a ton of fun and i am floored by the results that we got we
saw a lot of the same switches winning again and again pretty much regardless
of the participant's apparent enthusiast level and then oddly enough
cherry switches almost never won in the
linear and clicky categories but the mx browns were by far the most popular
switch among the tactile switches i don't know if that's because of weaker
competition in the category uh or if it's because lots of participants were
familiar with brown so they just feel like home or maybe it's just plain
old a good switch or some combination of the three funnily enough even though i
daily drive browns i was one of the ones that didn't end up choosing browns now
guys of course we couldn't test every switch in existence we would have really
liked to have included logitech's roamer g's for example but those switches use a
different keycap mount so we would have needed a custom solution so in the end
we asked the community and we tried to source most of the popular ones that
they asked for big thanks to drop.com for sending over 25 of their control
keyboards full of switches as well as michael at novel keys henry at zeal
generation and jason at the key company for providing all these awesome
enthusiast switches you guys are heroes and i'm positive there's going to be a
lot of people at our office rethinking their keyboards now that they know
what's out there i feel like my mind is open open to a message
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description so thanks for watching guys if you enjoyed this video and you're looking
for uh you know what let's do a throwback call out why don't you check
out our tour of the omron factory that we did with logitech where we checked
out the creation of their roamer g switches you know why don't we link the
cherry factory tour as well that'd be pretty sweet how are these things made
now you'll know is my head like oriented up in a weird way i almost feel like
stevie wonder maybe you don't put that in