Logitech is known for making the best gaming mouse time and again.
Price: $69.99 on Amazon
Available: Now
What We Liked:
- Solid, almost mechanical feel in the hand
- Tons of button customization
- Innovative weight displacement system
What We Didn’t:
- Could be a bit small for those with larger hands
- Scroll wheel only has two settings; too stiff or too loose
Gaming mice are a dime a dozen these days, with hundreds of non-descript companies on Amazon flooding the market with cheap, extreme looking mice promising “the best in gaming accuracy around”.
Read: Best Gaming PC 2018 Reviews
But what about old-school manufacturers who have been in the game for decades, like Logitech? Are they still able to produce quality products for their high-quality price? Or have one of the kings of the industry finally been usurped? Read on in our guide to find out.
Design
From the moment you open the box, the G502 exudes a no-nonsense aura of business over pleasure, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Its rigid, futuristic lines look like the last thing you’d want to put your hand on out of fear of getting poked, but once you actually put it to use, everything starts to make sense.
Its many buttons are distinct enough from each other that you never accidentally press the wrong one, and its four various LEDs make sure you can always see where you’re clicking, even in the dark.
Related: If you like this mouse, you might be interested in our Logitech G500S Gaming Mouse Review.
Features
The G502 comes packed with many of the features that gamers have come to expect on their mice, as well as a few bonus extras to spice things up. The mouse comes with 10 completely customizable buttons around its shell, which using Logitech’s own software can be used to switch around the basic functions however you see fit. Want your right-click to be your left-click instead? No problem. Want the DPI adjustment on the forward/back buttons? It’s just a setting away.
Read: Best Gaming Laptop 2018 Reviews
The scroll wheel is divisive, in that it actually has two separate modes that you can swap between on the fly: rigid, and free. In free mode, the wheel is unlocked and will continuously spin as soon as you give it a flick. Press a button down, and the wheel goes into rigid mode, which to be honest was a little too rigid for my tastes.
What we have here then is a bit of a Goldilocks scenario, where one bowl is too hot, the other is too cold, and unfortunately for owners of the G502, there’s no bowl that’s just the right temperature in between.
Related: If you prefer a wireless mouse, check out our Logitech G602 Wireless Gaming Mouse review.
Speaking of DPI, probably my favorite feature on the entire mouse was the “DPI Shift” button, which allows you to carefully adjust which two DPI settings you have on stock, and switch between them in an instant. This means that if you’re playing an FPS and like your auto rifle to have 2400 DPI but need things a bit calmer at 200 DPI during a sniping session, you only need to hold down that button to get all the control you need right in the heat of battle.
Read: Best Gaming Monitor 2018
The included software has all the bells and whistles you could hope for, including the option to customize your DPI profile, change how bright the onboard LEDs shine, and custom map your buttons to any configuration that fits your playstyle best.
Adjustable weights in mice are certainly nothing new, and have been around in one form or another since PC gaming was in its infancy. What separates the G502 from the rest of the pack in this regard is its ability to carefully select how the weight is actually displaced around the body of the mouse itself. Like a little heft at the front, but prefer to keep it light in the back? Simply swap in two of the weights in the front half of the bracket, and leave the rest empty.
This kind of selective customization makes for a great gaming experience on the whole, as we’ll get into in the next section.
Overall Feel
Something about the way the G502 feels just makes you want to game more. The solid, responsive nature of it immediately gives you the sensation that no matter who you go up against in your next multiplayer battle, you’ll be able to blast them out of the sky thanks to your on-the-fly sensitivity switches, razor-like accuracy, and screaming fast polling rate.
In several days of testing I can say with confidence that not only did my scores increase in several high-adrenaline games like Counter Strike: GO and League of Legends, but that I also suffered from less hand-fatigue over longer online sessions. This amounted to being able to keep my head above water on the leaderboards for longer, allowing me to climb the ranks with relative ease where it was once an arduous climb uphill against the tide of finger strain and early onset carpal tunnel syndrome.
Verdict
The G502 continues Logitech’s legacy of stalwart dedication to quality, and refines a product with several innovations the people needed, and a few more they didn’t even know they wanted until they got their hands on them.
At $69.99 the G502 falls right in the middle of the spectrum of gaming mice, and as long as your hands aren’t too large and you don’t mind a temperamental scroll wheel, it’s a solid addition to any serious gamer’s lineup of PC peripherals.
