However, my stabilizers arrived bone dry, so I recommend you check out our tuning guide for tips on how to lube them. The included stabilizers are PCB screw-in, which rattle much less than the usual plate-mount ones. One of the biggest upgrades on the K8 Pro versus its standard K8 sibling is the stabilizers. They do allow light to shine through due to the clear upper housings, which is perfect for this board’s south-facing RGB. Gateron G Pro Brown switches come pre-installed on this board, and they are nothing special aside from one feature that I will discuss later on. I know some people like high pitched boards, but be aware that the foam doesn’t change the sound profile too much from other K series boards. With all of the dampening material, you would think this board’s noise would be more muffled, but this is still a high pitched board. The foam sits between the plate and PCB while the silicone pad is under the PCB. Inside the K8 Pro are two layers of sound dampening material: silicone and foam. I used the K8 Pro for around 30 hours with the RGB on its brightest setting and it didn’t die on me, so I have no reason to doubt Keychron’s claims. You get 4000 mAh, which according to Keychron will last up to 100 hours with the RGB set to its lowest brightness. The battery on the K8 Pro is respectably sized.

I'm currently arranging to have a replacement sent my way, and will update this review with my experiences testing it. However, even after flashing a firmware fix the company sent me, my issues persisted. Keychron did tell me that because my unit is a prototype, it might have issues that consumer models won’t. The K8 Pro can connect to up to three devices at once via Bluetooth, but I had consistent connectivity problems that I’ll talk about more in the typing performance section. My review sample came with the aluminum frame, but I worry this might have interfered with the Bluetooth performance. The K8 Pro starts with a plastic frame, but you can opt for an aluminum one for $10 extra. The next track key isn’t on the same cluster as the previous and pause track keys because of this, which looks weird and might make pressing it without looking difficult.

The media control keys are also set to F7-F9, which makes the layout look awkward. For me, the backspace key looks like it says “backs pace” and the page-up one looks like it says “pgu p.” There’s font issues like this all over the keyboard, largely due to different letters having different sizes, although they’ll probably bother different people in different ways.

On top of the caps feeling weird, they also look weird if you look at the printing.

Keychron k8 87 review