‘Adorable, accomplished and affordable’: NuPhy’s latest mechanical keyboard just earned a perfect score from me

Another day, another beautiful NuPhy keyboard lands on my desk: this time, the NuPhy Node75. As per usual, I now need to contextualize the whole thing by telling you the keyboard’s purpose; its grand aims. Because NuPhy often has grand aims with its decks, and subsequently makes some of the best mechanical keyboards around.

“A keyboard’s grand aims?” I can hear my baby boomer parents scoffing with relish. Yes, I said “grand aims,” because while the uninitiated may see keyboards only as simple tools, we enthusiasts understand that they can be more.

NuPhy’s last three low-profile boards, for instance — the Nos75, Kick75 and Air75 V3 — have all been ambitious attempts to question, rethink and sometimes do-away with established keyboard restrictions, boundaries and dogma.

The Node75 isn’t quite as ambitious. It’s just a good keyboard for good money. A plainer version of the Kick that utilizes the progress made on those three boards above, with some cool new features NuPhy wanted to throw in. Anything wrong with that? Nope. And especially not at $99. Read my full NuPhy Node75 review to find out more, and whether you should buy it.

Note: NuPhy only sent me the low-profile variant of the Node75, so this review will focus on that.

NuPhy Node75 review: Cheat sheet

• What is it? A 75% mechanical keyboard that can be bought in low- and standard-profile setups
• Who is it for? Custom keyboard enthusiasts, modders, typists and gamers — the full shabang
• What does it cost? $99 at Amazon
• What’s good? The typing, build, sound, touch controls, customizability, and the price
• What’s not? Not a lot, although the gray colorway is kinda boring

NuPhy Node75 review: Specs

NuPhy Node75 review: The ups

The NuPhy Node75 is a wonderful keyboard, that’s lovely to type on, sounds great and is highly customizable. Its implementation of touch controls is much better than rivals and, best of all, it’s fairly affordable.

Surprisingly reasonable price

I’ll start with price. The NuPhy Node75’s price is very reasonable, with the board costing $99.95 for both the standard- and low-profile 75% variants and $109 for the 100%, regardless of switch choice. NuPhy markets the board as “for everyone,” and I think it’s always great to see brands undercutting themselves to provide more affordable options.

See, NuPhy usually charges a premium for its boards, which I think is justified. They’re always high quality keyboards and you get what you pay for. The Node75 is substantially cheaper than the brand’s low-profile flagship NuPhy Air75 V3 ($139) — a board with which the Node shares much of its componentry. In standard-profile guise (which I haven’t tested), the Node75 is comparable to the NuPhy Halo75 V2 ($129), but again, costs $30 less.

It’s a little pricier than the NuPhy Kick75 ($89) which is itself just surprisingly cheap. They’re slightly different products, though. You can buy the Node75 as either low- or standard-profile, but unlike the Kick75, you can’t swap between the two later (or at least not as easily, and not yet). The Kick75 is a bulkier keyboard, too, with louder styling, and is designed more for serious modding.

Externally, the Node75 is up against the Lofree Flow Lite ($109). The Lofree is a very similar board in terms of construction materials, styling, colorways and performance, but lacks some of the NuPhy’s cool features, not to mention its customizability.

Effortless, comfortable typing

In low-profile guise, the NuPhy Node75 comes with Gateron x NuPhy Nano switches, which are the same switches found in the Air75 V3. The red (linear) and brown (tactile) variants use Gateron’s LP3.0 architecture, which have a long travel distance of 3.5mm (similar to standard-profile), resulting in a much floatier feel than other low-profile switches. The silent Blush switches don’t travel quite as far, with 3.2mm, but I haven’t tried them yet to see how they feel.

Regardless, the linear Nano switches I tested feel great, with a moderate 45g activation force required, meaning they feel light but with enough resistance to prevent accidental keypresses.

The Node75 utilizes a gasket mounted PCB, which provides a cushioned feel and prevents hard bottom-outs. It isn’t a particularly soft gasket mount — nothing like the bouncy Keychron Q1 Pro ($219), but I’ve found it perfectly comfortable for long typing stints and gaming sessions.

Unsurprisingly, the Node75 uses NuPhy’s nSA keycaps — applied to all its low-profile boards. They’re fine, with a nice wide surface area and a moderately sharp chamfer to ensure you find and hit keys accurately.

All the features above contribute to an effortlessly comfortable quick board to type on. As you can see from the table of my type test results, I was quicker and more accurate than my averages. I wasn’t quite as quick on the Node75 as I was on the Lofree Flow Lite, but I wasn’t able to maintain my accuracy at higher speed on the latter in compensation.

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The standard-profile boards come with NuPhy’s red, brown or Blush Max switches. They use NuPhy’s mSA mid-height standard-profile keycaps. Again I haven’t tested the standard-profile variant, but I have used a lot of NuPhy boards — those mSA keycaps are the ones used in the Halo75 V2, and they’re easily my favorite standard-profile caps.

Muted, clacky sound

In low-profile guise, the NuPhy Node75 isn’t going to win any awards exclusively for its acoustics, primarily thanks to the uninspiring noise of those Nano switches. However, it still sounds pretty nice as LP boards go. It’s nicely damped and well-constructed, meaning no untoward sounds like on the hollow Air75 V2 or the heinously pingy Lofree Flow 2 ($149).

With the linear switches, the Node’s sound is a gentle, muted clack that’s very similar to the Air75 V3. And it’s nice! It’ll be ideal for office environments as it isn’t distracting, although if you have particularly sound-sensitive coworkers, there’s always the silent switch option.

I haven’t tested the standard-profile version, so can’t comment on its sound.

Lightweight yet premium build

The NuPhy Node75 uses a full-plastic design, except for the screws and smaller components, obviously. That doesn’t mean it feels cheap, though. No surprises, given this is a NuPhy, but the Node75 is extremely well put together. The ABS case feels premium and has very little flex. The keycaps, meanwhile, are double-shot PBT, which will stand up well to long term use.

The benefit of the plastic design is lightness. The standard-profile variant weighs 1.82lbs, while the low-profile version weighs just 1.45lbs (that’s lighter than the Air75 V3). I’ve had no issues taking the LP board to and from work in my bag. Naturally, though, the standard-profile is noticeably taller, meaning a little tricker to carry around.

Adding to the Node75’s portability are its feet. These are flip-out and adjustable in height, which is obviously good for obtaining a comfortable writing position. But importantly, just like the Air75 V2 and V3, the feet are also designed to sit perfectly over a MacBook keyboard. This allows you to use the board with your laptop in a confined space, such as a plane or train seat.

I’ve had no issues using the Node75 over my 15-inch MacBook Pro keyboard, although I wouldn’t want to use the standard-profile board, whose height would likely obscure my macOS Dock.

Excellent touch bar integration

Touch bars are usually something I’d prefer keyboard manufacturers to leave out of their decks. And that’s normally because manufacturers place them in stupid places. The Lofree Flow 2 and HHKB Studio ($329), for example, have their touch bars on the side or front of the case, which results in the user constantly knocking them. I normally just disable the touch bars completely.

Thankfully, the NuPhy Node75 has its customizable touch bar on the top front right of the case, just above the Fn row. This means you’ll barely ever knock it, giving you all the pros of a touch bar (which basically amounts to changing volume or brightness) without the cons.

If that weren’t enough, you can also customize the touch bar using the NuPhi.io companion software, which I’ll get into in more detail below. By default, it’s assigned to volume controls with sliding across changing volume, and double/triple tap assigned to mute/skip songs. But you can assign other commands as you please.

My only gripe with the touch bar is that the tap controls aren’t very sensitive. Double tap seems to work about 75% of the time, but triple tap only works about 10% of the time on my unit.

Highly customizable

The NuPhy Node75 is a very customizable keyboard. It’s hot-swappable, which means you can change switches without de- and re-soldering to the PCB. The standard-profile version will accept any 3- or 5-pin north-facing mechanical switches, while the low-profile variant accepts 3-pin north-facing LP switches, the choice of which is a little more limited. Still, hot-swap = good!

The top and bottom cases are held together with easy-access screws, so you should be able to open the board up easily to customize the innards or apply a tape mod.

On the firmware side, there’s NuPhy.io, NuPhy’s proprietary companion web-app for tweaking the board’s firmware. Sure, we’re talking proprietary firmware here instead of QMK open source firmware, which means you can’t use the open source VIA web app. And the internet often likes to complain about that. But the VIA web app kinda sucks — it’s so basic. You wouldn’t be able to customize that touch bar using VIA, so remember that before bemoaning proprietary firmware/software.

I have a general rule: if a manufacturer has none of its own software, or its software is crap, QMK/VIA all the way. If a manufacturer’s proprietary software is good: proprietary all the way.

NuPhy.io is solid. I’m used to using it to customize NuPhy’s Hall Effect boards like the NuPhy Air60 HE ($139) and NuPhy Field75 HE ($169) — where it allows you to change settings that VIA couldn’t dream of: actuation levels, SOCD resolutions, etc. On the Node75, it’s best used for simply remapping keys, setting bindings and fine tuning RGB.

Multi-talented

To round off the pros, the NuPhy Node75 is a multi-talented keyboard. While it’s great for work, it’s also well-suited to gaming. It isn’t an elite 8K polling board like the Air60 HE, but the Node75 polls at 1KHz, which is the benchmark required for all but esports gaming. 1KHz polling means you’re less likely to suffer missed inputs during fast-paced gameplay.

The Node75’s switches definitely aren’t the fastest nor the most responsive, and that kinda figures given this is a productivity-biased board. But I got by just fine playing faster titles like Counter Strike 2 and Iszono, as well as slower-paced games like Cities Skylines 2 and Crusader Kings 3.

NuPhy Node75 review: The downs

Honestly, I have very little bad to say about the NuPhy Node75. It’s an extremely difficult keyboard to fault given its price. It’s a little bland-looking, I guess, but only in the colorway I tested.

Relatively bland gray colorway

I’m clutching at straws here really, as I don’t have much to say against this little keyboard (it’s really difficult to split hairs over such an excellent $99 keyboard from a premium brand).

I guess my only gripe with my tester is its rather bland styling. I’ve tested a lot of NuPhy keyboards, and they’re always beautiful; styled with a compelling blend of minimalism and cutesy charm. The gray NuPhy Node75 just feels a little… boring.

Now, the other classic NuPhy design cues are there: the cheerful rounded typeface, bright RGB and sleek, virtually monochromatic palette. The gray just sorta washes the fun out.

Happily, that’s only my opinion! And you might love the gray. What’s more, the board also comes in a gorgeous pink colorway, or a retro beige. You can see that NuPhy was directly targeting the Lofree Flow Lite here, as the colorways are very similar.

NuPhy Node75 review: Verdict

Did I just award a mechanical keyboard five stars? Yep. See, there’s nothing really wrong with the NuPhy Node75. It’s adorable, accomplished and affordable. What more could you ask for? It’s a wonderful little keyboard to type on, with satisfying switches, a comfy gasket mount and NuPhy’s excellent keycaps. It sounds pretty good, is very customizable and features a well-implemented touch bar. Neat!

Best of all, it’s affordable. If you’ve been put off by the higher prices of other NuPhy keyboards, the Node75 is an excellent way for you to get involved. When the only bad thing I have to say about a keyboard is that I don’t like one of the colors, you know it’s good.