I tested the adorable NuPhy Air75 V3 — and it fixes everything that was wrong with the V2

I can’t quite believe the NuPhy Air75 is on V3 already. I imagine this is how parents feel when, one day, they turn around and realize their child — once but a tiny babe — is now all grown up, with a bushy beard, gainful employment and crippling debt.

Nevertheless, here we are, with the Air75 V3 succeeding the (you guessed it) NuPhy Air75 V2 — a keyboard I also own and once reviewed. The V2 was a lovely keyboard, beset only by a couple of niggles that prevented me from bestowing upon it our highest Editor’s Choice award (although it still earned our second-place Recommended badge).

The V3 addresses any concerns I had with its forerunner, and is easily one of the best mechanical keyboards for typists, including those who also dabble in a spot of gaming on the weekend. Somehow, too, NuPhy has managed to improve on the V2’s looks — something I hadn’t even considered possible.

So should you buy it? Honestly, if you’re after a low-profile keyboard for primarily work but also a bit of play, I really can’t think of any reasons not to. Find out more in my full NuPhy Air75 V3 review.

NuPhy Air75 V3 review: Cheat sheet

• What is it? A 75% low-profile custom mechanical keyboard from NuPhy
• Who is it for? Typists, gamers and custom keyboard enthusiasts who want a low-profile deck for work and play
• What does it cost? $139, so it’s a little less affordable than its predecessor
• What’s good? Almost everything, except the hiked price, a weight increase and fewer switch choices than its predecessor
• What isn’t? As above, but vice versa

NuPhy Air75 V3 review: Specs

NuPhy Air75 V3 review: The ups

The NuPhy Air75 V3 is a supremely competent all-rounder. It’s ideal for productivity but fine for gaming, too. It’s a joy to type on with a refined, creamy sound profile, and boasts excellent battery life.

Adorable design

I’m not sure how NuPhy has done it, but it’s managed to improve on the Air75 V2’s looks. The V3 is just gorgeous to behold, especially in the black colorway. It’s classic NuPhy: sleek monochrome minimalism contrasted by a modicum of colorful pops and a smattering of cutesy design features.

New for the V3 model is a modular top-right key. By default this is a standard keycap, but you can swap it out for either a low or higher profile control dial. I never use control dials on my work keyboards — they’re typically useful for volume or brightness, which on a macOS-oriented keyboard like this are already assigned to Fn keys anyway — but hey, whether you like a dial or not, the Air75 V3 gives you options.

Crucial to both the feel and sound of the Air75 V3 (which I’ll discuss later) is its construction. I’m not saying the V2 was built poorly, but the V3 is a cut above, which you can feel when picking it up. The aluminum used for the V3’s top case feels thicker than the V2’s, and the deck simply feels fuller and more planted than any of the Air lineup so far. It’s weightier than the V2 (also a negative, as I’ll discuss later), but the tradeoff is a more premium, less hollow feel.

Naturally, the keycaps are doubleshot PBT, so they feel high quality and will stand up well to wear and tear over time.

Beautiful type-feel

I’ve tested many NuPhy keyboards, and there’s one constant: they’re all lovely to type on, even the gaming-oriented ones. Naturally, the Air75 V3 is no different. NuPhy’s low-profile nSA keycaps feel fantastic, although as ever I find them less enjoyable than the brand’s standard-profile mSA caps — my favorite keycap profile, period. Still, nSA is a supremely quick and comfortable profile.

The Air75 V3 uses a gasket-mounted PCB to provide a cushioned type feel over other firmer mount types. The Air75 V3’s mount is still relatively firm for a gasket mount, especially when compared to super springy gasket-mounted boards like the Keychron Q1 Pro.

However, there are about as many impact-absorbing layers in the Air75 V3 as it’s possible to cram into such a thin board. As a result, bottom-out feel is still very comfortable, and on par with other low-profile boards, including the Air75 V2 and Lofree Flow84. It’s certainly much comfier than the top-mounted NuPhy Air60 HE.

Like Keychron, NuPhy prides itself on not just being macOS-compatible, but macOS-biased by default. As such, you won’t need to remap any of the V3’s keys to jerry-rig macOS keys and shortcuts. All of the baked-in macOS Fn buttons are present on the top row straight out of the box. I work on macOS five days a week, so true macOS compatibility like this is a big deal for me.

Innovative LP switches

Switch-wise, the Air75 V3 uses Gateron’s low-profile 3.0 switches in either red linear, brown tactile or “Blush” linear silent guise. The choice is fairly limited and lackluster compared to the V2, which offered a choice of seven switches, but the 3.0s themselves are very interesting.

Despite being low-profile, the Gateron 3.0s travel 3.5mm before bottoming out — that’s stand-profile levels of travel. The result is a low-profile switch that behaves like a standard one, providing an airier and much more spacious feel than the Air75 V2 (living up to the spirit of the Air line, I guess). I still don’t think they’re as satisfying as the Kailh Phantom low-profile switches found in the Lofree Flow84 — hands down my favorite LP switches. That said, unless testing both back-to-back, you won’t be disappointed by the Gaterons.

More importantly, though, I adore that NuPhy is on a persistent quest to re-evaluate the definitions of keyboard profiles and question established industry norms — especially over the last year or so.

The NuPhy Nos75 questioned whether a low-profile board could act like a heavyweight custom deck. The NuPhy Kick75 asked why a keyboard had to stay fixed as either low- or standard-profile. The Air75 V3 wonders whether a low-profile board can feel like a standard-profile board without otherwise sacrificing any of its LP character.

I wish more manufacturers would adopt this mentality. It means NuPhy is constantly innovating, and that invariably produces interesting keyboards.

Creamy sound

Keyboard enthusiasts have a high bar when it comes to sound. The Air75 V2 sounded great versus all the cheap, crappy keyboards out there. However, it was lightweight to a fault, because you could hear it — with an unmistakably hollow characteristic to the acoustic profile. Compared to its chief rivals, the creamy Lofree Flow84 and Lofree Flow Lite 84, it sounded a little… unrefined.

The Air75 V3 remedies that altogether and sounds utterly gorgeous, with addictively creamy acoustics. I can’t help feeling NuPhy has sold the board slightly short by failing to offer more switch choices. But hey, it’s hot swappable. And besides, even with bog-standard red linears, the V3 sounds great, and much more refined than its forebear.

Effortlessly portable

Despite its increased weight, the Air75 V3 is still eminently portable. Measuring just 12.56 x 5.07 x 0.52 inches, I’ve found it easy to slip into my bag to and from work. While slightly heavier than the Air75 V2, the V3 is only a fraction of an inch longer, but slightly narrower and shorter than its predecessor.

Making a comeback is the MacBook-friendly design. The Air75 V2’s legs are designed to span the keyboard of a smaller MacBook, allowing you to use the keyboard even in compact spaces, such as when working on a train or plane.

You’ll struggle with larger machines, though, like my work-supplied 15-inch MacBook Pro. It takes a lot of fiddling to position the NuPhy just right over the keys without knocking the function or bottom row. And even when you do find the right spot (which I have as I type this), the tiniest of movements will knock the board out of place.

It'll game

The NuPhy Air75 V3 polls at 1,000Hz over 2.4G and wired connections, making it a viable deck for casual, non-competitive gaming. Make no mistake, this is a productivity-biased board, so I’d recommend it for those people needing primarily a keyboard for work, with some casual gaming in the evenings and on the weekend as a secondary consideration.

If you’re the other way round, and need a gaming board first and foremost that can act as a productivity board secondarily, you’ll want the Air75 V3’s magnetic sibling, the NuPhy Air60 HE. Its magnetic switches are a lot snappier than the Air75 V3’s mechanicals, and enable gaming features such as adjustable actuation and rapid trigger.

However, the Air75 V3 does feature some handy gaming features, which can be activated in the NuPhy.io companion software web app. These include customizable SOCD resolutions (these decide outcomes when two keys are pressed simultaneously) and key toggles.

Plenty of customization

And that brings me neatly onto the Air75 V3’s firmware. Unlike the Air75 V2, the V3 doesn’t run open source QMK firmware, meaning it isn’t remappable using the VIA web app.

QMK and VIA are beloved of the Reddit-dwelling mechanical keyboards community, and will likely instead see this as a huge con, and bemoan my appraisal (to put it politely). But let’s just be honest with ourselves here: the VIA app sucks, and is fairly limited in its scope. It lets you remap key bindings and assign macros, sure, but that’s about it.

NuPhy.io is a much more attractive proposition a) than it used to be; and b) than VIA. You can do everything in NuPhy.io that you can do in VIA, plus more, such as setting SOCD resolutions, all in a more user-friendly interface.

Sure, NuPhy.io is proprietary, but I don’t care as long as it works. And the NuPhy boards I’ve used running QMK (including the Air75 V2) haven’t worked. The V2 was janky as all hell. The V3, by comparison, is not.

In terms of hardware customization, the Air75 V3 is naturally hot-swappable and can be taken apart from the top, allowing you to adjust gasket mounting. The top and bottom case doesn’t come apart completely, though, so this may not be the best board for in-depth modding — if that’s what you want, I’d recommend the NuPhy Kick75 instead.

Strong battery life

Just like its predecessor, the Air75 V3 features a 4,000mAh battery. Unlike its predecessor, it manages a claimed 1,200 hours of use (RGB off). I’ve been using the keyboard for several days while writing this, with reactive RGB at full brightness, and it’s only dropped a few percent. I’ve no doubt that you can expect several weeks’ use from a single charge.

NuPhy Air75 V3 review: The downs

The NuPhy Air75 V3’s flaws are very, very minor, but are worth considering. It’s pricier than its predecessor, heavier too, and lacks the V2’s switch variation (at checkout anyway).

A little pricier

It isn’t much of an increase, but at $139, the Air75 V3 is $20 pricier than the V2 ($119). It’s also $40 more than the Chilkey ND75 LP, NuPhy Kick75 and Lofree Flow Lite84 (all $99), and $46 more than the Keychron K13 Max ($94).

The Air75 V3 does a lot to justify the extra $20 over the V2, including better acoustics and build quality. But if you’re on a strict sub-$100 budget, all those boards above are great choices, and make it hard to defend the Air75 V3’s high comparative price.

A little heavier

Again, it isn’t much of an increase, but at 1.6lbs, the Air75 V3 is around four ounces heavier than the V2, and the difference is noticeable. When packing my bag ahead of commuting, I need to save as much weight as possible, making lighter keyboards like the V2 (1.3lbs) and Keychron K13 Max (1.3lbs) better choices.

Limited switch choice

As I mentioned above, while the Gateron LP 3.0 switches themselves are interesting, the variations are pretty unadventurous. There’s a standard red linear variant, a standard brown tactile variant and a silent linear variant. Three choices… is this a Keychron board?!

The NuPhy Air75 V2 was offered with seven switch choices, including the standard Gateron red/brown/blue variants. I’d have loved to see some interesting switches on the V3, like the V2’s Moss early-bump tactiles.

NuPhy Air75 V3 review: Verdict

The NuPhy Air75 V3 may not be perfect, but it’s a sizable evolution from its predecessor. NuPhy has managed to stick to the spirit of the Air lineup while improving the sound and feel of the keyboard, in part helped by the innovative new LP switches. Typing performance is as good as ever, it’ll game if you need it to and battery life is phenomenal. The Air75 V3 is highly customizable, and with the move from QMK/VIA back to proprietary firmware, the V3 model is less glitchy than the V2.

All of this comes with only modest gains to weight and price, while the innovative new switches result in restricted choice at checkout. But those are prices I’m happy to pay, because the Air75 V3 is a very easy keyboard to love.