Razer Kraken V3 Review – Great Price, Great Gaming Headset

It’s been a little while since I’ve checked out a gaming headset, and it looks like I’ve picked a good one to jump back in on. This is the Razer Kraken V3, a relatively budget headset that’s a good step above the models I’ve had in previously at this sort of price point. Let me show you around, give you the rundown on the quality, and show you what the mic sounds like!

This is a pretty standard Razer design – it reminds me of the old Razer Man’O’War headset, with the very round, quite wide earcups. This time though, the glossy Razer logo in the centre lights up with controllable RGB – because of course it does. The earcups have a mesh looking panel – but it’s actually a closed back design. The foam on the earcups is pretty thick and seems to strike a good balance between firm and supporting, and soft and comforting – although I’ll talk more about comfort in a second. The headband is adjustable as you’d expect, and the earcups do pivot in one axis, although sadly not horizontally which does mean they don’t sit perfectly on your head. They also can’t fold flat at all, although you could argue that’s one less thing to break so I’ll leave that one up to you.

On the left earcup is where you’ll find all the controls. You’ve got a very nice feeling scroll wheel for volume – sadly you can’t push this in to toggle mute – along with a mic mute switch that doesn’t give you any audio feedback when you press it, you just have to know that pushing it in turns the mic off. It’d be nice if it gave you a little tone or something, especially since this is a USB headset so all the processing is done onboard. On the front is the detachable boom arm mic with its MASSIVE wind sock. It’s nicely positionable so you can get it in a good place. Here’s what that sounds like.

From my testing with it, I can’t say that I’m absolutely blown away by this mic. It’s fine, decent enough in fact, but it’s still very clearly a headset mic. It isn’t what you’d call broadcast quality, although for this sort of price tag I’d say it’s pretty similar to everything else you’d find out there. It’s at least fairly clear, if a little tin-can sounding.

Of course we can’t miss out on the audio quality too – that is what surprised me the most. Obviously these aren’t the best sounding headphones in the world, and a good set of audiophile grade headphones will do a better job, but for a USB gaming headset, I’m really quite impressed. It’s clear, naturally a little bass heavy, but not a bad balance. They get plenty loud without distortion which is nice, and of course work rather well for gaming. Footsteps, majestic music or a screaming V8 all sound pretty good through these which is exactly what you’d want from this. If I’m being picky, I’d say this is missing the upper frequencies a little more than I’d like, although that does make for a less harsh listening experience especially around things like gunshots in games. 

The other major factor in deciding how good a gaming headset is, is comfort. If it gets uncomfortable after twenty minutes, it’s no good. While it’s important to note that comfort has a lot to do with your head shape and things like how hot your climate is and even how you sweat, I can say from my experience with these that they were great. Often when you get a headset out of the box it takes quite a while to ‘break it in’. To let the foam soften a little, to be a little more supple. I’m happy to say that it seems Razer has that down, because this felt great on the first day, and the second, and the third. For hours at a time, I’d happily sit listening to music writing scripts, or playing games, with no comfort problems. The only minor gripe is that because this is a closed back headphone, heat builds up pretty quickly in the ear cups, and the incredibly soft material on the inner face of the ear cup seals incredibly well, so it can get pretty sweaty in there. I did notice there was a bit of creaking from the faux leather on the side of the ear cups, which while not a big deal was something I thought I should mention. It’s also worth noting that because these are closed back headphones, and they seal rather well, they block outside noise incredibly well. Like, you won’t hear the postie knocking type well. This might be a bonus for you, or a drawback, but again I thought you should know.

It’s worth noting that in Razer’s Synapse software you get a collection of different settings, both for their THX Spatial labs features for digital surround sound, and normal equaliser settings. I already mentioned some of the mic settings – but there’s actually a few more in there too including noise reduction if you’re in a noisy environment. Naturally you can also change out the RGB settings if you want – although it’s worth noting that the second you plug these in the synapse installer pops up. I know that’s meant to be a convenience feature, but it’s always pretty disconcerting to have this launch a program without any user input. 

I’ve mentioned the price a few times, but I want to point out that at least at the time of filming, these are right around £60 – and Amazon price history shows they’ve been as low as £40 too – and for either of those prices, I find it hard to argue with the value. Like I mentioned at the start, I haven’t reviewed any headsets in a while so I’m not saying this is the absolute best option on the market – there very well may be a better option available and if you know of it let me know in the comments – but looking at the product on its own, I’m pretty happy to recommend it. With the right expectations – ie this isn’t an audiophile grade headset – and the right price, this is a pretty compelling option to me.