8BitDo Retro Mechanical Keyboard is like a nostalgia overload — and offers a damn good typing experience, too

8BitDo Retro Mechanical Keyboard on a wooden floor.

I’m a sucker for the old days. I do my best to keep my rose-tinted glasses off as much as possible, but give me a vinyl deck over an MP3 any day, a GameBoy cartridge over a digital download every time. As a result, the 8BitDo Retro Mechanical Keyboard is pressing all the right buttons for me.

Not only is it a very good mechanical keyboard in its own right, with many of the modern conveniences you’d expect of a keyboard in 2024, but it aesthetically harks back to some classic gaming systems that will appeal to many people of a certain vintage. If you’re a gamer who turns their nose up at the modern obsession with RGB-everything  — or just on the market for a well-priced keyboard with a bit of personality, the 8BitDo Retro Mechanical Keyboard should be high on your list. It joins the ranks of our top picks among the best mechanical keyboards for Mac.