It’s been a while since I reviewed a pre-built keyboard. That’s because I fell down the keyboard rabbit hole. When you first enter this hobby, you likely buy a pre-built mechanical keyboard from a gaming company. Later, you’re buying a case, PCB, plate, switches, cables, keycaps, everything separately. You’re taking apart switches and researching different lubes. Soon, you’re creating your own methods for clipping your stabilizers and your own band-aid mods for silencing them. Then you’re packing your cases with foam and modifying your switches. Eventually you’re making the kind of keyboards that professionals sell for thousands of dollars. You might even build one out of Lego.
It’s hard to review something when the parts came from everywhere. How do I review my custom-built keyboards as a whole? How do I review switches that I hand-lubed when they offer a different experience in the company’s own keyboard versus the one I built?
I bought a keyboard that came from a factory. It’s a strange experience, I forgot what it feels like. Truth be told, I was a little excited to be back here again. I’ll likely modify it myself eventually, but it’s nice to review a new keyboard that came as a complete package; something that came in a box with exactly the same look and feel someone else designed it to have.
I bought a NuPhy Air 60 V2. A low-profile keyboard! I even pre-ordered it! Why’d I do it? I’ve always thought low profile keyboards would be terrible. It seems strange that I’d order one. However, I’m a software engineer, and, while I can almost certainly do my job best from home, we’re being asked to come back into the office. Most of my interviews have been for hybrid positions. Some have even been fully in-office! I wanted a keyboard I could throw in a sling bag with my iPad mini to take to the office three or more days a week. I wanted something for travel, or setting up in a cafe to work someplace that wasn’t just my home office. As a result, I ordered NuPhy’s ultra-portable 60% keyboard and took it for a spin.
In This Article:
Specs
via NuPhy
- Width: 297.3mm (11.7″)
- Height: 107.2mm (4.22″)
- Thickness: 22mm (0.87″)
- Weight: 463g (1.02 lbs, 16.33oz, gosh Imperial measurements are silly)
- Switches: Gateron Low Profile (As tested: Moss)
- Connections: 2.4GHz wireless, Bluetooth 5.1, or Wired (USB-C)
- 2.4GHz Polling Rate: 1000Hz
- Bluetooth 5.1 Polling Rate: 125Hz
- Wired Polling Rate: 1000Hz
- Materials:
- Case: Aluminum and ABS
- Keycaps: Double-Shot PBT
- Firmware: QMK/VIA-capable
- Battery: 2,500mAh (30-150 hours of battery, dependent on use)
Portability
The entire purpose of this keyboard was portability. I wanted the comfort and ergonomics of a mechanical keyboard in a small package. But more than just being small, it had to be easy to pack up and take anywhere. The NuPhy seemed designed for exactly this purpose, especially thanks to accessories I could order with it. It’s a low-profile mechanical keyboard, which means it’s a slim mechanical keyboard, less than an inch in height on its own. It’s also a 60% keyboard, which means it does away with unnecessary keys like a function row or page navigation keys on the side. It’s as compact as a layout as a keyboard can have without sacrificing the keys you actually want to use. NuPhy’s layout keeps the arrow keys, making it far better than most 60% layouts, and even more convenient than the HHKB layout’s awful arrow situation.
Pack it Up
The NuFolio was a key reason I selected the Air60 V2 over other low profile keyboards. Of course, the 60% form factor with arrow keys was the main driver, but the fact that I could quickly pack up my keyboard with an iPad-supporting folio made it an attractive choice.
If purchased separately, the NuFolio is $29, but it was only $15 to add it to my order as part of a preorder deal. The NuFolio wraps around the keyboard, protecting it from impact and possibly some drops. Once unfolded, it can create a small shelf where you can put your phones or a tablet. I like to sit my phone on it when I’m working, even at my desk, but don’t want it charging. I can also use it to stand up my iPad for reviewing notes. An iPad mini, this folio, and the NuPhy Air 60 V2 make for a handy little writing setup, made better when combined with a small trackball mouse.
The button on the back of the folio that lets you create the shelf for your device is a little finicky. It can be something that’s not a smooth motion to set up, requiring you snap it in place with some force. What might be cool is a way to hold it at different angles, perhaps an adjustable strap or magnetic attachments.
The folio is a hard case, with a soft felt liner and faux leather exterior. It has a refined appearance to it. Something that is somehow both nostalgic and classic, while appearing fresh and new. The “nostalgic tan” color pops while feeling professional. It’s an inspired design.
I also ordered NuPhy’s NuPack bag. This bag is made for either the Air60 or Air75, so there’s a little extra space if you’re using it with the smaller keyboard. There’s room for an iPad mini, the Air60 V2 and NuFolio, some cables and adapters, and, though it’s a tight fit, a wireless trackball mouse. I would have liked the bag to have just a little depth, more thickness. It wouldn’t have lost much in portability if it could expand more, perhaps with a flat bottom to the bag. That would have made it easy to pack more electronics or a trackball or mouse comfortably. As it is, I may not use it as much as I’d like because it’s just too slim to fit my whole portable setup without jamming it in the bag. It’s certainly cool, but I’d recommend a different electronics bag over it due to how shallow it is and bulky it gets when stuffed. The NuFolio in my Chrome bag might be a better fit.
Keyboard Hardware
The keyboard itself is the slimmest and lightest mechanical keyboard I own. At its widest point, the case of the keyboard is only 18mm high (a little under 0.75″). The keycaps bring it to about 22mm, under an inch tall. Most of my keyboards are twice as thick. On top of that, it’s a 60% keyboard, meaning it doesn’t waste space with function keys or an additional row of keys to the right of the backspace, enter, and arrow keys.
I did find that, on the train, it was a bit wide. I had barely enough room on the train’s tray for this and a trackball. Some space could be saved in the case and NuFolio, but not much. This is about as narrow as you can go with a traditional key layout.
Another change I’d like to see in a future version would be a space for the dongle. The keyboard comes with a little keeper that clips to a cable, somewhat defeating the purpose of being wireless. I don’t want to carry a cable around if I don’t have to. It’s a small enough dongle that I can just throw it in any bag, but it would be nice if it had some kind of compartment on the keyboard itself to store it. I’d give up battery life for that. I only ever need the battery to last a full day anyway, as I’d typically only use this wirelessly when on the go, and would prefer a wired connection.
Finally, there’s the sound (see the “Typing Experience” section below for a sound clip). I don’t think it’s too loud, and when I’ve used it in front of others, I had no complaints. I even used it in the quiet car of a train with no comments. Still, I was nervous it would be disruptive. I think more silencing would be tricky, but the sound mostly exists in the upstroke, and could be fixed in the switches themselves then, like the Boba U4Tx switches. However, this would significantly drive up costs. I’ve tried adding silencing O-rings, however, I found they made the keycap height inconsistent, as there just isn’t enough space in the switches or keycaps to house them without interfering with their connection to the switch. It’s a great poppy and thocky sound, but I would prefer a quieter portable keyboard. The best solution would be a small amount of silicone in the key, at the top of the stem, allowing it to soften the upstroke, as the Boba U4Tx switches do.
This is my most portable mechanical keyboard, by far. The closest I have to it is my Magic Keyboard for my iPad, and that’s far from being as comfortable to type on as a mechanical keyboard. If you’re looking to preserve the comfort of a mechanical keyboard, without taking up much space in a bag or on a table, this might be your best choice.
Switches
My NuPhy Air V60 V2 came with NuPhy’s low-profile “Moss” switches. These are MX-type custom low-profile switches made by Gateron. These are a tactile switch with around 3.0mm of travel (about 1mm less than a normal MX-style switch), and 1.7mm of pre-travel. The actuation force is a lightweight 60±15gf, with the bottom out force a lighter 55±5gf. It’s a single-stage spring and the POM stem is lubed from the factory.
Basically? It’s a smooth-feeling switch with a lightweight spring that has snappy, early tactility and a thocky sound.
Yes, thocky. This is a low-profile key switch that has thock. It’s a slightly higher pitch than you might be used to from larger keyboards with thocky switches, like something made with Holy Pandas, but still a decently thocky sound.
The feeling is a bit like a silicone popping toys. You know, the infinite bubble wrap? It’s a little like that. There’s a sort of soft yet snappiness to the tactility, and you quickly pass through it. It can be a little easy to bottom out, but it’s not overly abrupt. I haven’t noticed RSI pains, but your results may vary.
There’s very little stem wobble there. The tighter tolerances of the design and the box-like stem likely contribute to that.
I do think that, along with the low keycap height, I make more typos in part because of how light these switches are. I’d much prefer a 65g switch, just a little more pressure to help prevent accidental presses. A slightly heavier spring would do wonders for these switches. Unfortunately, it’s the heaviest key switch they offer.
The Complete Switch Options
NuPhy will currently let you order your keyboard with a surprising number of switches. These include the NuPhy custom Aloe, Cowberry, Wisteria, and the aforementioned Moss. Along with that, you can also pick Gateron’s Red 2.0, Blue 2.0, or Brown 2.0 switches. I grabbed a few Gateron’s Blue 2.0 switches to use for the function key and escape key. I like to give my keyboards variety on select keys. Gateron’s blue low-profile switches have an audible click and sharp tactility, similar to that of clickbar Box switches, like Box Jade switches. That’s because the mechanism is similar. They’re great for the escape key, which I like to feel snappy and raw. Gateron’s red switches are linear, and Brown switches are tactile, though I haven’t had a chance to try these out.
As for NuPhy’s custom switches, a brief description of each is below:
- Cowberry
- Linear (no tactile bump during press)
- Actuation force: 45±15gf
- Bottom-out force: 55gf
- 3.0mm total travel
- Aloe
- Linear
- Actuation force: 37±15gf
- Bottom-out force: 40gf
- 3.2mm total travel
- Daisy
- Linear
- Actuation force: 48±15gf
- Bottom-out force: 55±5gf
- 3.2mm total travel
- Wisteria
- Tactile (bump felt during press, before bottom)
- Actuation force: 55±15gf
- Bottom-out force: 50±5gf
- 3.2mm total travel
- Moss
- Tactile
- Actuation force: 60±15gf
- Bottom-out force: 55±5gf
- 3.0mm total travel
All of these go with a trend I’ve noticed in mechanical switches, the race to the bottom, as far as spring strength is concerned. Many new and bespoke switches have under 62g of force, with these mostly being under 60! I noticed that, when going back to a keyboard with a higher actuation force, a keyboard with Box Royal switches, I had a harder time typing. I had to press much harder than I remembered on each key. I couldn’t believe it had become difficult for me. It’s almost as if these soft keys atrophied my fingers! I don’t like this trend, keys shouldn’t be so mushy. I may even look into doing a spring swap. I move between keyboards often, but after using this one too long, it’ll take some time go build my finger strength back up.
Connectivity
You probably assumed that you could connect this keyboard to a device via a cable. You’re correct! The keyboard has a USB-C interface. You can use the included USB-C to USB-A cable to connect it to a device, or use a short USB-C to USB-C cable, also included. The USB-C to USB-A has a 90º angle on the end because this keyboard has the USB-C port on the side of the keyboard. The idea behind this odd location was if you’re placing your keyboard over top of your MacBook’s keyboard, the cable could go from the USB-C port on the side of your keyboard to the one on your Mac more directly. It also makes using the folio easier with a tablet. It’s a small but useful quirk, and a well thought-out piece of design.
Wireless
Outside of a wired connection, which, as I’ll discuss in the battery section, might not be something you want to always use, you also have wireless connections. Here you can find Bluetooth 5.1 connections for up to three different devices. You can switch between them as easily as pressing the FN key and either ‘Q’, ‘W’, or ‘E’ keys. The polling rate, that is, how frequently it can send an update to your machine, is 125Hz. You likely wouldn’t want to use it for gaming, but it’ll work fine for normal typing, as you could have a response time to a keypress as slow as 8ms. Bluetooth does have decent range, though, working at at least 25 feet away from the host machine.
The wireless dongle, on the other hand, has a 1,000Hz polling rate. It works with a 2.4Ghz wireless spectrum and you can select it with Fn + ‘R’. However, forget it exists. You shouldn’t use it. It may sacrifice security for that speed.
Wireless Security Flaws
NuPhy doesn’t claim that the dongle uses encryption anywhere on their website. It may not be the most secure way to connect. Usually, if a company has done the right thing, they brag about it. They’ll list the encryption as a feature, so people buying the product for work will know it’s safe. I assume there is no encryption, though NuPhy refuses to come clean. Support seemed to claim there were security measures in place when I asked, but would not go into details or claim they were using any specific security measures. Telling me they were using AES-128 would be easy, if true, but they refused to mention any encryption protocols. They claimed I’d be safe, without saying how. What a nightmare that would be for their legal team if I wasn’t. I honestly thought about grabbing a Flipper Zero and wiring up an RF adapter to check it myself.
On their Discord, NuPhy representatives ignore any questions about whether or not they encrypt the communication through the wireless dongle. Why? Why ignore that? The only rational reason I could come up with is that they don’t believe in the security of their dongle, but don’t want to admit that publicly. If someone was selling you a lock and refused to answer whether or not it would open for any key, you might start to suspect it’s a bad lock.
I don’t recommend using the wireless adapter in public or if you work for any high-security agencies, like government, banking or finances, or healthcare. Those fields would require tested security protocols, not a strangely-worded email assuring “safety.”
NuPhy has completely dodged the question on forums, and never got back to me when I asked what protocol they were using for encryption after I was told it would be “hard” for someone to “decrypt” sent text, which is hardly the only problem with insecure wireless USB adapters. It’s extremely sketchy that NuPhy won’t tell users whether or not their wireless dongle is secure, and that leads me to believe it is not. The way they treat users who ask about it is, frankly, disgusting. Not offering encryption on a wireless access point to your machine is already damnable. Ignoring customers who ask about it, however, makes it seem as though that they know they’re doing something wrong and decided to double down on it. When I asked similar questions of Elecom, who also have an unencrypted wireless dongle for their Bitra trackball, they replied with details within a day. NuPhy has requests for this information going back years with no response. It’s unprofessional and unforgivable. NuPhy has to change this in future versions.
Bluetooth Interference and Broken Firmware
If you’re using wireless communication in public, you might want to lean on the more secure Bluetooth standard than the wireless dongle, which may or may not have encryption. However, if you’re also going to use your Bluetooth headphones and a Bluetooth trackball, trackpad, or mouse at that coffee shop, you might run into issues. I found that, on my Mac, I’ll occasionally notice terrible audio interference that’ll make my music impossible to listen to if I’m using my NuPhy Air60 V2 along with other Bluetooth accessories. My Elecom trackball and Bang and Olufsen headphones are enough to break this connection. Assigning the same device to multiple Bluetooth save slots doesn’t seem to change the interference level.
You’ll need a firmware update to fix the Bluetooth issue with repeating characters. In the original launch version of this firmware, holding any modifier key down for more than a few seconds would make the keyboard unresponsive before it would come back, repeating the last key typed a few dozen times. The process isn’t difficult, but do it right away if you buy one. It’ll clear out your keyboard customizations anyway. I still notice the occasional missed character over Bluetooth, but it’s a lot better than it was.
Even with the fixes, Bluetooth is slow for gaming and has occasional interference issues, wireless is fast but potentially insecure, and wired could damage the battery over time by keeping it always at 100%.
If you’re wondering how the hell you’re supposed to connect this to your device, you’re asking the right questions, and I don’t have a good answer. I switch between the only connections that seem like they could be secure: Bluetooth and wired, letting it drain until it becomes unreliable, then plugging it back in.
Battery Life
Battery life is impressive on this. Using the auto-sleep feature, which is the default, as well as the RGB backlighting, it can last you a little over a week without a charge. This was the keyboard I used all the time, as I had been unemployed during most of this testing period and was using it for personal projects, from writing to coding, all day long. Had I just been using it at home or at an office, I’m sure I could have stretched out the battery life far longer.
The battery life indicator isn’t reliable. I had found it would report 100% battery for a few days, then 99%, 75%, and shortly after that, it would be dropping down to 20%. You might notice it even dropping out, becoming a poor connection, long before it’s supposedly at “0%.” Poor battery management isn’t something you want to see when you consider the lithium ion battery pack in this is incredibly flammable and quite large. I should hope they could at least accurately estimate the battery level. NuPhy does say their new PCBs have built-in overcharge protection, and the battery itself also has overcharge protection. This should help keep it from swelling and eventually rupturing and burning if you choose to plug it in all the time, but I personally won’t risk that. You should let your electronics drain a bit from time to time.
I’ll plug it in and use it like a normal wired keyboard while it’s charging. You likely have a USB-C cable at your computer already, perhaps for your keyboard, so this isn’t an issue.
The battery is a surprisingly large 2,500mAh battery. It’s slightly larger than the battery in the iPhone 13 mini. While the Phone 13 mini does have a small battery, by phone standards, and barely lasts a full day, this has far lower energy demands, and this battery level should last you around a week. With the backlight on, you could likely get 30-40 hours out of it, with 50 or more with the backlight off, according to NuPhy. That seems like a fair estimation.
Keycaps
The keycaps that came with this are NuPhy’s nSA profile double-shot keycaps made from PBT plastic. Put plainly, these keycaps are made with two layers of high-quality plastic with a cutout in the top layer for the symbol, which presses through that cutout. It means the legends on the top of your keycaps will never fade away. The nSA profile is NuPhy’s own take on a low profile keycap with a spherical top, like a slimmer DSA keycap. This just means the corners of the keycap are higher than the center, useful for helping guide your fingers to the center of the keys. Finally, PBT is a durable plastic with good texture and sound signature. It’s more durable and has a matte texture, as opposed to the ABS frequently used in keyboards which can develop a shine more quickly.
I also tested some of NuPhy’s older nSA keycaps, their shine-through ABS keycaps. The new double-shot PBT keycaps they’re shipping these with have a deeper sound, more thocky, less clacky. The new keycaps are measurably better than their older ABS-based keycaps. However, you may value shine-through more than texture and feel, and if that’s the case, go for their shine-through ABS keycaps.
They feel nice to type on, though I’ll admit, I make more typos with these keycaps than I do most of my other keyboards. They could be slightly taller, with more space between keys, to give just a little more room. I do like that the top arrow key has a tiny indicator on it, so you can easily find the arrow keys by feel alone. This is especially useful because the shift and delete keys around it are the same 1u size, so it can prevent accidental presses.
Other Keycaps
The keycaps might be thicker than the keyboard…
You might be wondering, since the switches are using MX-style stems, are these compatible with other keycap sets? For example, can you use them with full-sized SA keycaps? The short answer is yes. However, there are some limitations. Most keycaps have a top, the sort of body of the keycap, that is flush on the bottom with the stem, the part that connects to the key switch. However, the nSA profile that NuPhy uses has a slightly longer stem than the keycap housing. This is to prevent the keycap from making contact with the plate. It prevents keycap key clack. However, standard keycaps won’t have this. Instead, you’ll make contact, which makes these keycaps much louder. Some keycaps might not be able to press all the way down. You could potentially (I didn’t test this) use keycap O-rings to increase their height so they don’t make as much contact with the board. I tested with an SA profile keycap set I had on hand, and, while it worked, it was obviously a poor choice due to sound and height.
Typing Experience
A low profile switch that gets activated quickly. Keycaps that leave little space between the tops of keys. These are features that will lead to many typos. The uniform height of the keycaps means they’re not sculpted to fit the curvature of your fingers. Most keycaps for mechanical keyboards have a “sculpt” to them, different angles depending on the row. Those curve the keycap up to meet your fingers so they come closer to your hand. You don’t have to stretch as far to reach the top or bottom row, making each row more comfortable and pushing your fingers towards the home row. These keycaps do not have that.
In my testing, I’m consistently around 20 words-per-minute (wpm) slower on this keyboard than my typical keyboard. Once, I hit my usual typing speed of around 130wpm, but usually I struggle to break 100wpm, and never break 110wpm. I’m a fast typist, but struggle with this keyboard more than most. The flat key caps and low travel means I make more typos than I’d like. That said, if I can hit 100wpm on this keyboard, it shouldn’t slow you down very much if you’re not breaking 100wpm already.
I found that the low height required a smaller wrist rest than what I was using. I actually made my own out of some cork, glass packaging padded wrap, an old flannel shirt, and some duct tape. It’s more rigid than most wrist rests, which let me dial in the height better. I found this improved my comfort a lot. You’ll want something around 18-22mm in height, in my experience.
At first, I thought the highest setting on the back feet would be best for me. The flat nature would mean that I’d need a tilt to make it feel more like a normal keyboard. However, I found that laying it flat or using the middle foot position is the best for my typing accuracy and comfort. I’m glad this keyboard has three different angles you can rest the keyboard at. It helps you find a comfortable typing angle more easily.
Customization
One of the best things about mechanical keyboards is how highly customizable they are. Each board a canvas for your thoughts on key tactility, sound, keycap shape and appearance, and even the underlying firmware, all yours for the editing. The NuPhy Air60 V2 brought with it QMK firmware. This is an open-sourced firmware that is easy to edit however you’d like. You can add macros, functional layers, and even change the backlighting. With this, there’s also support for an in-browser tool, Via, which makes customizing keyboard firmware as easy as drag and drop… after you put in the effort to get started.
Keycaps, Colors
Out of the box, there are many ways to customize your keyboard. You can choose what the side lights display, as well as the backlight behind your keys. The backlight is dim, and certainly won’t shine through those nice PBT keycaps, but if the keycap materials aren’t as important to you as that, NuPhy does make shine-through keycaps that will show your backlight more.
As I mentioned before, you can use just about any MX-compatible keycaps, as long as you have enough to cover the single unit shift key and slightly shorter than average left shift. You’ll be better off with their low profile keycaps that reduce clack, but the choice is yours.
Via and QMK
Usually, when I have a QMK keyboard, I use a website to build the firmware, then I use QMK Toolkit to install it on the keyboard. I tired to back up the firmware on the NuPhy this way, but as I was working to do it this way, I had another idea: why not give Via a shot? Via hasn’t worked well for me on most of my keyboards that enable it. Plus, it doesn’t work in most of my browsers (I use Vivaldi to get it working).
It’s supposed to just recognize your keyboard and load the default keymap. It doesn’t always do this. It definitely didn’t recognize my NuPhy board. NuPhy hadn’t gotten their keyboard definitions added to the QMK codebase yet, I had to dig around on their site to find the .json file to load. However, it seems as though Via will recognize the keyboard immediately now. That makes customizing it as easy as dragging icons around.
One thing that impressed me was the layer support. Many keyboards will have low limits to the number of layers you can add. This is because each layer is a whole new set of key instructions. I’ve already generated firmware that was far too large to fit on my keyboard and needed to abandon some macro layers I built. However, with the NuPhy, I was able to add plenty of layers. I always add an extra function key, so one can operate as the functions for the keyboard or any printed instructions on the keycaps, and the other can work as functionality. I build in macros and key combinations that make software development easier. It was great adding everything I wanted to the configuration, and not needing to worry about generating firmware that was too large. I’m sure there’s a limit, but I didn’t hit it.
It’s surprising that such a slim case is still so customizable. Often, when something becomes more portable, you have to give up aspects of the full-sized version that you’ll miss. Customization certainly wasn’t one of those.
Other Notes
Customer Services Failings
One thing I noticed when I pulled up NuPhy’s page was its Fakespot ranking. It’s not good. I’ve noticed this sometimes happens with companies that do group buys and preorders. Sometimes, they’ll take a large number of orders before production begins, and delays upset customers who have already waited so long. I was wary, but placed my pre-order anyway.
Once the NuPhy Air60 V2 shipped, it got to me quickly. However, despite being one of the earlier preorders, I was towards the tail-end of the shipping, on the final day it could go out. Sometimes a situation like that would upset someone, who could leave a bad review. But I know that sometimes these things don’t happen in the order they came in. I ordered a NuFolio, NuPack, and an extra set of keys with my order. It was a more complex order than someone just ordering the keyboard. That makes things take longer. Not every customer will consider that before rating something.
Sometimes, the customer isn’t right, but good customer support can explain most issues, quieting complaints.
When I asked support about the security of their dongle, they weren’t responsive. It took a few days to get any answer, and even then, it wasn’t a real answer. Others have experienced the same problem, from NuPhy’s subreddit to their Discord. It’s clear the company won’t have good customer support to fall back on when something goes wrong.
Portable MacBook Keyboard
One cool feature of this keyboard is how the rubber feet on the bottom are designed. They fit perfectly between the keys on a MacBook keyboard. This allows you to place it on top of your keyboard. It’s raised, so you’ll either need a wrist rest or just be comfortable with hovering without resting your wrists. You also cannot easily reach TouchID like this, so logging in to your computer or services, or authenticating settings and payments may be difficult. It’s not impossible to reach, just slightly obscured to the point you’ll have to lift the keyboard. This isn’t an incredibly comfortable way to type, but if you have RSI form the short travel of MacBook keys and want something better, you can manage it.
Repairs
In the mechanical keyboard community, you’ll often find that you can buy all the parts for a keyboard in a kit, or you can buy them separately. I like this. You can buy just the PCB if something is damaged there. NuPhy will sell you switches and keycaps separately, but not the PCB or, more importantly, the battery. I want to be able to replace this battery. One day, it might start swelling, or simply lose its ability to hold a charge. When that happens, I want to be able to take apart this keyboard, unplug the battery, take it to a recycling center, and buy a new battery to swap in. I want it to be that easy. NuPhy did put some stickers over at least one screw, but it is generally easy to take apart this keyboard if you’re careful with the clips in the back. You just can’t order parts directly from the website, and will likely violate any warranty by taking it apart though.
Customer service was unresponsive with my issues around security, I don’t know how good they’d be at helping you procure parts. I’d much rather be able to buy the parts online whenever I want.
This isn’t something you’d see for all companies though. I wish I could do the same with the MacBook Pro on my desk. I miss the days when I could easily swap out my own memory and battery on my computer. Apple got rid of all of that, and the rest of the industry followed. However, mechanical keyboards are an enthusiast niche. We expect to be able to service this equipment on our own. I’d love to see NuPhy support that themselves.
Sustainability
The packaging had a lot of plastic. The keyboard itself was fine. It had a cardboard box. However, all the other accessories, the keycaps, NuFolio, and NuPack, all came with a large amount of plastic. There’s no reason for this. Some small profit savings, perhaps, at the expense of filing landfills and even our bodies with plastic.
Overall 7/10
I have happily and comfortably used this at my desk for almost two months now. I was not expecting to like a low-profile keyboard so much. I got this thinking that, like my Elecom Bitra mouse, it would be something I don’t use frequently. However, I’ve enjoyed this keyboard. It has a poppy/thocky sound to it, the keys travel more than I expected for this size, and it’s easily customizable. My biggest complaint is the lack of security protocols on the wireless dongle, or at least their complete reluctance to answer any questions about it. A keyboard should never have an unencrypted dongle, especially if it’s for travel. It’s far more dangerous to have a keyboard with an unencrypted dongle than a mouse. This is inexcusable. I also don’t like how much plastic they use in their accessory packaging.
I like this keyboard, although I’m not sure how much I can trust the company. Their reluctance to answer simple questions about very real security concerns is damning. I also found support unhelpful with issues related to the Bluetooth, which they seemingly fixed with a firmware update I had to download and install.
If you’re looking for a slim Bluetooth keyboard you can easily pack in a bag, this might still be your best bet, despite the flaws. Don’t use the wireless dongle, as it’s likely far less secure than Bluetooth or a wired connection. However, if you want a small mechanical keyboard you can bring to the cafe or office three days a week, no other company is offering something as small and light as this. Other low-profile manufacturers have, oddly, not released a 60% keyboard, despite this being the obvious size for a portable keyboard. In some ways, NuPhy is the best here because of the failings of everyone around them. That said, it is an excellent keyboard on its own too.
The NuPhy Air60 V2 starts at $109.95 for Gateron switches, and $119.95 for their custom switches. The NuFolio, which I highly recommend you get with it, will be an additional $29. This is a great portable keyboard, even if it might have an insecure dongle, poor customer service, and difficult repairs due to parts not being sold individually. If you’re looking for an on-the-go mechanical keyboard, this is your best option.
Pros:
- A low-profile keyboard that feels good to type on _and_sounds good
- Comfortable to use
- Portable, and NuFolio is useful, even at the desk
- Connects to 3 Bluetooth devices
- Decent battery life
- Works with some standard MX-compatible keycaps
Cons:
- Likely insecure wireless dongle no one from the company wants to talk about
- Would prefer easily replaced batteries and parts available online
- Poor customer service