Keychron C3 Pro Review | PCMag

Mechanical keyboards have become status symbols for PC enthusiasts (many exceed $100 or even $200), but you don’t have to pay a premium to enjoy the superior typing experience that they offer. Budget models priced below $50 have the essential benefits that mechanical keyboards offer, even though many—including the Editors’ Choice-winning Keychron C1—are light on features. A new offering from this boutique vendor, the Keychron C3 Pro ($36.99), offers all the basics plus a few considerable upgrades, like LED backlighting and cable management, at an even cheaper price. Slightly lackluster build quality is its only major drawback; given the hyper-aggressive price, it’s an excellent budget buy and another Keychron Editors’ Choice winner for mechanical-keyboard newbies.

A Budget Standout

The Keychron C3 Pro is a 75% mechanical keyboard in an ABS plastic frame. We’ve tested a lot of plastic-bodied keyboards, and the C3 Pro’s frame is notable at least for the plastic having a slight grain to it.

Measuring 1.6 by 17.1 by 5.1 inches (HWD), the keyboard doesn’t take a ton of room on a desktop. It weighs about 2 pounds, significantly heavier than the C1’s 1.5 pounds. The heft mostly comes from the steel top plate, which does little in the end to provide rigidity, as the keyboard has a fair amount of flex to it. The plastic construction also doesn’t help the sound profile. Key presses have a slight tinny sound to them, likely from the steel plate vibrating on the plastic frame.

(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)

As you’d expect from its low price, the C3 Pro is a wired keyboard. It uses a removable USB-C cable to connect to your PC or Mac. (Holding the Function key and pressing the Caps Lock key will swap the keyboard from Windows mode to Mac mode.) Much like the Montech MKey, the C3 Pro features channels under the frame to better orient the included USB-C cable to lead out of the left or right side of the housing. Under the keyboard’s frame, you’ll also find two angled feet that allow the keyboard three different angles of articulation, if you prefer an angled board for a more comfortable typing experience.

The USB-C cable is 5 feet long, standard for most wired keyboards. It’s rubber-wrapped, which feels a little cheap, but we wouldn’t expect the C3 Pro to offer a more durable nylon-braided cord, which premium keyboards often have. The removable nature of the cable is an added benefit, facilitating ease of transport if you frequently need to swap between PCs in different locations. 

Along with the USB cable, you’ll also find a combination keycap/key-switch puller in the box. It’s another welcome addition that we wouldn’t expect at this price. A word of warning, though: The C3 Pro does not have hot-swapping capabilities. The inclusion of a switch-pulling device can lead to some confusion, but attempting to remove a switch from the C3 Pro using it could damage the switch and PCB.

(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)

Since you won’t have the ability to swap key switches on the fly (an unrealistic ask, really, for a under-$40 keyboard), it’s important to understand your switch options. The C3 Pro comes in two switch varieties: Keychron Red or Brown. Both ship pre-lubricated. We tested the version of the keyboard with Red switches, and they felt smooth, offering a very slight tactile response when pressed. If you’re unfamiliar with Keychron switches, the closest analogue would be Cherry MX Reds, one of the most common mechanical switches.

The aesthetics of the keyboard are fairly plain, with red-and-black key caps and red backlighting offering a minimal spot of color. We’d like to see some additional color options to match the lighting on the Roccat Magma Mini, which has far superior interior RGB. However, we prefer the C3’s per-key lighting approach, even if it’s not RGB, as opposed to the zone-delimited backlighting of the Magma. The C3’s box includes a set of black spacebar, Escape, and Enter keys to swap out if you want to make an all-black keyboard. 

(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)

Each keycap features a shine-through design, which allows the LEDs from the PCB to light up the labels on each key for better visibility in low-light conditions. Even some premium keyboards overlook this feature, which is nice to have during long sessions on a computer at night.

The C3 Pro has some lighting effects that you can access without a software utility. Holding down the Function key and pressing the Pause/Break key (labeled PB) will cycle through a number of effects. Light pipes across the left and right edges of the frame to allow some light to shine through, no matter which effect is selected.

The Monkeytype test gave my average typing score at 58 words per minute using the C3 Pro, which is not too far from my personal typing average, and would likely be higher with more time and practice. Accuracy took a hit at first, landing at a 96% average, but it increased as I became more accustomed to the keyboard.

Fine-Tuning Your Experience With VIA

Like many Keychron keyboards before it, the C3 Pro opts for VIA as the software utility for customization. VIA is an open-source keyboard configurator for QMK-based keyboards that you access through a website, with no additional installs needed. Using VIA allows you to remap all the keys on the keyboard, apply lighting effects, assign custom macros, and even load custom keyboard profiles.

(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)

At the time of writing, the C3 Pro was still awaiting review for VIA support, but a workaround exists in the meantime. On the Keychron website, you’ll find instructions to download a JSON file and drop it into VIA to get full access to the utility. This workaround goes against the plug-and-play nature of VIA, and might be confusing for the less-savvy owner, so we hope full support arrives soon.

That said, you won’t need to access VIA much, unless you want to reassign keys or program macros. Although you can change lighting effects on the keyboard itself, as described above, this feature doesn’t appear to be active on VIA. Once the keyboard gets full support, this feature will likely be added, as with other VIA keyboards we’ve looked at in the past.

Verdict: An Easy Entry Point to the Mechanical World

The C3 Pro is missing a lot of the features we usually see in high-end mechanical keyboards, but like with the Keychron C1, it means you don’t have to break the bank to experience the base level of the mechanical-keyboard experience. It’s hard to ignore the value: This keyboard boasts single-color per-key backlighting, evolving VIA support, and some extra keycaps for around half the price of its closest competition. Even factoring in the slightly flexy construction, it’s an excellent alternative to the Keychron C1 and a superb buy.