by Coming from a relatively little-known manufacturer of gaming hardware, the Redragon Rudra belongs to a messy field of budget gaming keyboards where the average casual gamer won’t know where to start if they want to find gems among the many. Many contenders for your hard earned money.
Fortunately for them, I can come out and say it: the Rudra (also known as the Redragon K565 in some online stores) is much better than a sub-£50 keyboard has any right to be.
In fact, appearing in my test queue after a parade of £150-£250 premium keyboards from some of the most well-known gaming brands that have paraded across my desk, you’ll be hard-pressed to know where you fall behind. expensive rivals. It has robust and responsive switches that support well-designed interchangeable keys. It has programmable RGB backlighting to illuminate the typing and gaming experience. And it has a full 104-key layout with a ten key and a number pad in a compact yet convenient form factor.
But does it deserve a place among the best gaming keyboards? (opens in a new tab) available right now, or the best keyboards (opens in a new tab) general? I had to try it for several weeks to find out for myself.
Redragon Rudra Review: Design and Build
The Redragon Rudra looks striking as soon as you take it out of the box. It’s a gaming-focused mechanical keyboard, so you’d expect big chunky keys, but here they’re pretty much the size of a typewriter.
Also, the switches below are made more visible due to being translucent, while the keys on top are matte black. When you turn it on, RGB lighting illuminates the lettering on the keys and the translucent switches below, giving the entire board an added sense of elevation.
It’s a wired keyboard, with a rubber-coated cable rather than a cloth one, but as this is a sub-£50 proposition, that’s to be expected. The form factor is compact, even for the full-size 104-key option it had. There’s no construction or ‘padding’ around the front, side or rear of the Rudra, which means it should fit into smaller spaces than keyboards with a front palm rest or rear panel frame. The downside to this is that there’s nothing naturally placed to rest your wrist or thumb when typing, which risks fatigue in the long run.
The typesetting used on the keys is stylized and eye-catching, although my OCD isn’t a big fan of the fact that the TAB, CAPSLK, SHIFT and CTRL labels don’t align on the left side…
With lighting and software packed inside, the keyboard feels nicely weighted and heavy without being cumbersome to move.
Redragon Rudra Review: Features
The Redragon Rudra comes with RGB backlighting and programmable keys, like most gaming keyboards, where you can remap any key to virtually any function, as well as format macro commands. The backlight has 18 presets, ranging from a dark pulsed light dash to a dizzyingly fast swirl of colors, all based on your preferences and epilepsy trigger tolerances.
The case also comes with a handy keycap replacement kit and spare keys, which is a nice touch on a sub-£50 keyboard.
As stated before, the lack of a wrist rest or any structure in front of the bottom keys means you may need to invest in an external wrist rest if you’re susceptible to wrist problems or don’t like having to raise your hands while typing.
Redragon Rudra Review: Performance
For me, writing on the Redragon Rudra has been a pleasure. I freely admit that I’m one of those oldies who prefers a big, clunky mechanical brick that makes that satisfying click-click sound over a lightweight, unresponsive, low-profile membrane keyboard.
The keystroke action has a nice, firm but not too annoying resistance, there’s no wobble in the keys even when raised as high as here, and I found the accuracy to be better on this than some much more premium keyboards. expensive. I have tested recently.
The smaller overall form factor doesn’t seem to affect the typing experience much, though the keys here are a bit more cramped (especially between the main keyboard area, the ten key, and the numpad. Larger hands and fingers can be found without However, I feel a bit constrained here, as my hands are quite small.
For gaming use it acquitted itself well, reformatting is easy and the easy way to switch between backlight modes is a welcome change from some other manufacturers’ convoluted methods of customizing their respective light shows.
However, there’s a noticeable lack of sound dampening, which makes clearly typing a bit louder here than on more expensive keyboards with more advanced sound dampeners, so if you’re not a fan of loud noises, this soon it could become a nuisance.
Redragon Rudra Review: Price
The Rudra is under £50, with occasional deals even pushing it below £40, which has to be considered a fantastic price for a keyboard this good. It’s squarely in budget keyboard territory, but it’s performed similarly to some recent mid-tier or premium-priced keyboards I’ve tested recently.
Should you buy the Redragon Rudra?
The Redragon Rudra is a budget keyboard that comfortably beats its price. It might not have the same premium finish as some more expensive keyboards, or more advanced features like an ecosystem app for use with other Redragon gear, but it does have 18 different RGB backlight modes, rugged mechanical switches, and offers a relatively complicated environment. comfortable. writing experience, although larger hands may want something a little less compact. It also looks striking, especially in its red and black guise, with stylized lettering to top it off – literally. If you’re looking for a cheap keyboard that does it all, you can do a lot worse than the Redragon Rudra.
