Review: Turtle Beach Kone II and Kone II Air

First Impressions:

The Kone II lineup features Turtle Beach’s ergonomic design and all the modern features and customization you will ever want in a mouse. The mice are extremely comfortable for long days at my desk as well as some marathon gaming sessions.

Mouse, mouses…mice?

Both mice feature an identical ergonomic design that fits extremely well in my hand. They also feature customizable RGB lighting, 26K DPI sensors, and 100M click pre-tensioned optical switches. In short, they look great and feel great!

I spent a month using both mice interchangeably as my daily drivers for productivity and gaming. I use a palm grip on my mice, and these were excellent for me. They are also advertised as supporting claw and fingertip-style grips as well. While I could not authentically test that, I would say that the shape would work for either style.

Beyond the ergonomic design, the aesthetic design is what I would describe as a mix between “gamery” and office-appropriate. Pop on the RGB to match your setup at home or use it in the office with no RGB and no one would even notice. I like the design, and it will be at home in almost any setup up (If you are looking for a matching keyboard, check out my review of the Vulkan TKL Pro II).

Finally, both mice feature extensive customization options. Turtle Beach’s Swarm software continues to impress—it feels lightweight and feature-rich. It is easy to navigate as your connected peripherals show up as images right in the software. Each mouse allows you to store 5 gaming profiles on-board, allowing you to switch without even going into the software. Every button on the mouse is customizable with a variety of built-in options (OS features, Browser features, etc.), as well as the ability to record your own macros. The most heavily advertised feature is the “Easy-Shift” ability of the mice. As the name suggests, the button chosen acts like pressing shift on your keyboard and allows you to hold the easy shift button down to transform the actions of the other buttons on the mouse. This effectively doubles the number of inputs available to you. Funny enough, I found this most useful for my day job. I make a lot of presentations and use screen clips a lot. I set the thumb button to the easy shift and set the easy shift function of left-click to be my screen clipping tool. Works beautifully in my workflow and I know I will be adding more functions in the future.

Differences

The Kone II and Kone II Air are nearly identical. Here are the two main differences. First, the obvious difference: the Kone II Air is wireless. Like my Burst Air II, the Kone II Air features Bluetooth mode for longer battery life (up to 350 hours) and an ultra-fast 2.4GHz wireless mode. One nice touch about what is included is the braided cable for the USB-A to USB-C connector. This allows the receiver to be mounted in a more convenient place with the cable run to the back of your PC (the included adhesive is a nice touch as well!)

On the wired Kone II, I want to mention how nice the braided cable is and, in my use, has never been a hindrance in the smooth gliding of the mouse.

Finally, the other major difference is that the Kone II Air features a neat little ability on its scroll wheel. There is a button that allows you to switch from a ratchet-style scroll wheel to a smooth free-spinning scroll wheel. I really like the smooth setting for productivity when I am scrolling through large documents and spreadsheets. When I need it to be more precise, I simply swap to the ratchet style—I have never used a mouse that has this capability, and I am not sure I can ever go back.

Final Thoughts

Priced at $69 for the wired Kone II and $119 for the Kone II Air, they are competitively priced. For the features and quality here, they are more than worth the money. If you are in the market for a new mouse for gaming and work, you will not be disappointed with either option.