Every gaming mouse is on a diet these days. And that’s been largely spurred on by the advent of major brands, like Logitech and Razer, massively reducing the weight of what most people would expect from normal gaming mice. But with the Logitech Pro X Superlight, a new revision to the hugely successful Pro Wireless mouse, Logitech might have gone too far.
With the advent of rival mice — wireless and wired — dropping under the 70 gram mark, Logitech clearly felt there was room for a second spin on their popular gaming mouse. The G Pro Wireless has been a huge success, which is why a three-year old device is still retailing for just under $200. It’s well built, has a great battery life, and Logitech’s sensor, chassis design and clicks are on par with anything else you’d find.
Also: there’s no holes. That’s one trend that Logitech hasn’t jumped on board with, and the company’s been hugely rewarded for it. While plenty of keen competitive gamers are excited for lighter devices they can flick around, there’s many others who don’t want to expose the internal wiring to extra dust, spillage and the other chaos that takes place on a gaming table.
So Logitech’s been happily selling the G Pro Wireless at a premium. But now, the Pro X Superlight takes its place.
There’s some immediate changes you’ll notice upon seeing the Pro X Superlight. The mouse feet have changed in size; they’re much larger than what shipped on the original Pro Wireless, with a mouse feet now extending around the entirety of the base plate (as opposed to three separate, smaller skates).
As a result, you’ll notice that the Pro X Superlight glides around a mouse pad more smoothly than its predecessor. That’s largely thanks to the extra surface area, and there’s even a replacement cap with an extra mouse skate on the top.
The Pro X Superlight comes in at 63 grams, and it’s done without changes largely to the core chassis. It’s not completely the same: the clicks on the scroll wheel are much more muted with the Superlight. The left and right side buttons are much harder to push, and they don’t have the crisp, clicky feel of other Logitech products.
Most of the weight reduction has come from removing just about everything possible. You can’t move the Pro Wireless’s side buttons to the right hand side anymore: that module’s been removed. A lot of weight has been removed from the PCB as well, with the internal layout also changed slightly.
The left mouse click feels a little lighter and crisper in the Superlight, which makes sense given it’s what people will be tapping the most. The changes in design haven’t all been positive though: there’s no DPI button on the bottom of the mouse anymore, a change that effectively makes Logitech’s bulky G Hub software mandatory.
Also, if you’re the kind of person who wants USB-C on everything, bad news: the Superlight still has a micro-USB charging port.
So how much appeal does the Superlight really have? It’s basically targeting existing Pro Wireless owners who have FOMO from looking at the weight reductions in other gaming mice. The original Pro Wireless is still an excellent mouse, and at around 78-83 grams (depending on whether you use the faceplate or not) it’s a pretty well balanced mouse too. The battery life with the Superlight is reportedly improved from 48 hours to 70 hours, although there’s a trick to that: you could get around 70 hours of battery with the original Pro Wireless by disabling the LED lighting, so you’re functionally getting the same deal.
The balance is something that I couldn’t quite shake in my time with the Ultralight, either. The original Wireless was well centred, thanks to the extra internals, extra charging LEDs and side modules. You certainly notice the weight difference with those removed, but it also felt like the weight balance has shifted forward slightly, too.
Still, to get a mouse this light without having to rely on a honeycomb chassis or other sorts of absurd tricks is impressive. But does that make the Superlight worth $279?
It’s hard to recommend. The loss of functionality might not matter for those who exclusively use 1080p monitors — having a low DPI for gaming is great, but once you start browsing a 1440p or 4K Windows desktop, you’ll immediately want slightly higher sensitivity. The G Hub software will let you do that, but you have to unbind one of your core mouse buttons (I ended up sacrificing Mouse 3, used for scrolling in browsers and quickly closing browser tabs) to do it.
And the G Hub software isn’t as flexible as other manufacturers: it won’t let you save profiles to the mouse directly, so you can’t setup your mouse the way you like it and then immediately uninstall the Logitech software. Even Razer lets you do this these days, and it’s something that Logitech used to let you do.
I’m not usually one to complain about the lack of RGB, but it’s weird to have a top-tier gaming mouse that basically eschews RGB entirely. You should also know if you’re in Australia that the Superlight’s chassis has the same glossy exterior as before.
It’s nice in the hand, but it doesn’t hold up as well as other mice when the really hot summer days arrive. Over the last fortnight, where Sydney has seen a couple of 35 degree-plus days, I found myself reaching for honeycomb-shaped mice or the Razer Viper Ultimate. All those holes, as it turns out, can be super helpful on an absolute stinker. (The Superlight does come with little grips that you can attach to the side of the mouse, but they’re quite thin with not much adhesive, so I wouldn’t personally use them.)
So the Superlight’s value really comes down to how much you obsessively care about weight. Logitech’s sensor is world class, and both the Pro Wireless and Superlight are probably the best mice when it comes to saving power and waking up from hibernation. And it’s nice that all of these improvements have been made without any of the structural issues that so many ultralight mice face.
But the Pro Wireless has these benefits too, while being $70 cheaper. That doesn’t mean the Superlight isn’t a great mouse, though. I just wish Logitech had added an extra gram or two to the device to include the DPI button. That would have made it a lot easier to live with, especially since there’s no ability to save profiles onto the mouse.
But if you don’t care about that, and using 400 or 800 DPI for literally everything in Windows is fine for you, and you play a ton of competitive shooters, then you’ll notice and appreciate the Superlight’s refinements. Most people, however, would probably find better bang for their buck in the older Pro Wireless, the Viper Ultimate, or the smaller G305. (And if you can live with wires, there’s a lot of great alternatives that are much cheaper.)
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