Xtrfy M8 Review

Xtrfy has never been a brand that plays it safe when it comes to their mice. Rather than just copying whatever is the most popular shape on the market at any given time, the Swedish brand opts to go for original designs and follows its own path.

One of the most mentioned points of criticism when it came to their mice was the fact that they still had holes in them in order to reduce the weight, and Xtrfy have once again showed that they listen to the community with this M8. This is a no-holes design, coming in at just 55 grams, but that’s not all that’s unique to the M8. With a button height of just 4 millimeters, this mouse allows you to place your trigger fingers almost on your mousepad.

With top internals and community favorite switches, the M8 looks to be another impressive release, but we all know that the reality doesn’t always follow the theory. We’ve sent a mouse over to our reviewer to find out whether or not the M8 is worth checking out. Find out everything you need to know in our full Xtrfy M8 review!

At A Glance

Xtrfy M8

Used by 3 players (Apr, 2024)

• 1mpala
  
• boltz
  
• yosemite
  

Staff’s Choice

The Xtrfy M8 is a fantastic competitive gaming mouse. Dropping more gimmicky features like the movable battery and swappable shells, Xtrfy really shows that they know how to make a killer product that’s focused on the most serious gamers out there.

Lars

4.5 of 5

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Pros

• Rather safe shape
• Fantastic buttons
• Great scroll wheel
• Decent feet
• Flawless wireless performance

Cons

• Low button height doesn’t really translate to a different feeling in the hands with this mouse
• Coating could use some work

Specs

Sensor	PMW 3395
DPI	400, 800, 1200, 1600, 3200, 4000, 7200, 26000
Polling Rate	125 / 500 / 1000 Hz
Button Switches	Kailh GM 8.0
Button Force	82g
Connection	Wireless
Shape	Ambidextrous
Length	11.7cm
Height	3.7cm
Weight	55g
Width	5.7cm

First Impressions

The first thing I thought when I unboxed the M8 was ‘where does the cable go’? The mouse is wireless, but even wireless mice need to be charged at times, and that’s usually done at the front. With a button height of just 4mm that’s obviously not an option, so the charging port has been moved to the side of the mouse. It’s a bit of a quirky thing to see, but I’ll speak more about my experiences with this new design later on in the review.

Aside from the odd charging port placement, there’s nothing that eye catching about the M8, and I mean that in a good way. Xtrfy has finally gone ‘full performance’ with their mice and ditched the RGB elements as well as the holes, and that’s a design choice that I can only applaud. I am pretty neutral about holes in a mouse myself (I’m not bothered by them unless the finishing is absolutely horrible) but I do know that a lot of people don’t like the feeling of a mouse with holes, so it’s good to see that Xtrfy are now showing that they can also produce lightweight mice without having to go for the cheese grater method.

Something that’s striking about these mice are the colors. My review unit is the most subtle looking one out there, and it has these light blue accents that really make the mouse look unique and instantly identifiable. I’m not necessarily against it (it’s also a smart move from Xtrfy’s perspective to make their mice stand out) and it’s nice to see so many colorways being available for a mouse right from the start, but I think that a completely blacked out M8 would’ve looked absolutely sick so it’s a bit of shame that that’s not available for purchase.

Something that I’ll also note: Xtrfy says that the M8 is made out of 60% recycled plastic. That doesn’t have an influence on the performance (or at least it shouldn’t) so that won’t be factored into my verdict, but I do think that this is something worth giving credit for.

Packaging

Inside the box of the Xtrfy M8 you’ll get a quickstart guide with all of the necessary info in order to use the mouse, an Xtrfy sticker, a charging cable, the USB receiver, an extender dongle for the wireless receiver, and a pair of spare mouse feet.

If you read my mouse reviews with any sort of regularity you’ll know that I absolutely love it when brands include mouse feet with their performance products, so it’s nice to see them included here.

Shape, Coating, and Mouse Feet

As with all of Xtrfy’s mice, the M8 has a unique shape. The most defining feature is the button height: at the front, the buttons are only 4 millimeters removed from the surface, which is insanely low. The shape itself is extremely safe and neutral, with a centralized hump that has a very gradual curve at the back. There is an indentation in the middle, but it’s extremely minimal, and the lack of overhang on the top of the mouse makes for a product that feels very, very neutral.

Whether that’s a good thing or not depends on your preferences, but if we look at the success rates of mice that follow similar design ideas (the G Pro X Superlight, to name one) it’s hard to argue with this design style. I personally would have loved to see a little bit of an overhang towards the front end of the mouse to help with picking it up, but that’s just my subjective take on the shape. Just know that this is an extremely neutral shape. That makes it safe and usable by pretty much anyone (depending on your hand size, since this is a smaller mouse) but if you’re after a curvy mouse that sort of slides your hand into position then this ain’t it.

Something that felt a bit less impactful to me than I perhaps first expected was the button height. I am someone who prefers to have his trigger fingers closer to the mousepad as opposed to further away from it, so I’m a big fan of the fact that this mouse allows you to basically place your fingers on the mousepad itself, but I found that my grip didn’t allow for that to happen unless I went full palm. I use a slightly tilted claw grip (and I have 18.5×10 cm hands, for reference) and for me the button height felt a little inconsequential. The buttons do make this mouse feel even safer when it comes to the shape, though. Basically the entire front portion of the mouse is made out of button, so you’re free to place your fingers anywhere you want to place them, making it so that you can use a wide variety of grip styles comfortably.

With this being the first Xtrfy mouse that I’ve tried that doesn’t have holes in it, I paid particular attention to the coating, and there’s room for improvement there if you ask me. The mouse feels very much like bare plastic, and it’s somewhat slippery when using it with completely dry hands. With this mouse being so devoid of curvature and thus lacking ‘anchor points’ for your fingers, I felt the mouse slip away from me a couple of times when warming up. That issue went away after a bit of playing since my hands don’t stay bone dry for long when I’m gaming though. This might not affect you at all (depending your grip style) but there are better performing coatings out there.

On the bottom of the mouse we see two large feet (along with a cutout to help you remove said feet; that’s always appreciated) that glide well right from the start. They are rather thin, so if you’re using a soft mousepad and you apply a lot of pressure on your mouse this might cause some issues, but other than that these glide smoothly and without any problems on all pads. There’s also an optional sensor ring skate in the packaging.

Recommended Grip Types

Thanks to its extremely neutral shape, the Xtrfy M8 can be used by pretty much all grip types. It’s a small sized mouse though, so obviously this won’t fit your hands if you’re a large-handed palm gripper for example, but this really is a shape that can and will work for anyone. provided you don’t want a palm-filling experience with a back hump. You won’t get that here due to the centralized hump and very gradual curve at the back.

Buttons and Scroll Wheel

The Xtrfy M8 uses the community darlings for switches: Kailh GM 8.0. I am not the most rabid fan of these switches (in the sense that I don’t see them as a requirement for a mouse to be called ‘good’; I do like the switches) but they of course gained that status for a reason: these are crispy, very tactile feeling switches that actuate with a confident sounding click.

Despite the fact that the buttons on the M8 are pretty much perfectly implemented (there’s no sideways travel and pretty much no pre- or post travel; these are among the best feeling buttons I’ve ever seen a mouse in that regard) they do feel a bit heavy. That’s not a problem for me personally since I like heavier buttons on my mice, but it does feel a bit ‘off’ to have clicks this heavy (around 80 grams of force is required to actuate these, which is higher than the average of 77 grams across 35 tested mice) on a mouse this small and nimble. I can’t say that I ever misfired or whatever due to these switches, but if I’m allowed to be a bit nitpicky I would say that they can be loosened up a little.

What is impressive to see (and feel) is that the buttons feel very uniform across the board. No matter if I’m clicking them at the very front or towards the back: there isn’t a large difference between the force required to actuate them, and that’s an impressive feat. It’s something that I was specifically looking out for given the emphasis on the buttons with this mouse, and Xtrfy has definitely delivered.

The side buttons feel rock solid. They actuate with a clear click and very little pre- or post travel and, perhaps most importantly, they feel consistent to use. There are no ‘pivot issues’ here whereby the buttons can travel inside the shell if you press them towards the edges.

Rounding all of this off we see a scroll wheel that feels pretty much perfect: there’s a medium amount of tactility between steps, and the textured and rubberized wheel is quiet when using it and easy to press.

All in all, Xtrfy have done a tremendous job with the buttons and the scroll wheel on the M8. Despite my subjective remark about the click tensioning being on the high side, the clicks belong in the top tiers of mice, and the same can be said about the mouse wheel.

Build Quality and Cable

This is Xtrfy’s first completely solid mouse, and with it coming in at a very light weight of 55 grams it’s built really well. The bottom plate flexes a bit when applying a lot of pressure to it (this part of the mouse never experiences that kind of pressure when using it normally though, so that’s of absolutely no concern) but other than that the M8 is completely solid. It’s also completely quiet when tapping or shaking the mouse.

Having had some issues with creaking and shell flexing in the past with Xtrfy mice (most notably on the MZ1) I paid close attention to how the mouse felt when using it, but I have to give credit where credit is due: my copy is completely flawless when it comes to the build quality.

Sensor and Everyday Performance

PixArt’s 3395 optical sensor that’s used as the brains of the M8 is one of the latest and greatest sensors out there, and this one (predictably) performs flawlessly. It’s also implemented perfectly, so this mouse will perform exactly like you’d expect a gaming mouse in 2022 (and beyond) to perform. Xtrfy’s wireless implementation has been proven to be pretty much perfect in the past, and it’s the same here. I experienced no dropouts, no issues with the mouse going to sleep (or not waking up) at annoying moments, and the latency is on par with what you’d expect these days.

As an added bonus, the 3395 has Motion Sync, which matches the polling events of your mouse with your sensor data, leading to a theoretically smoother tracking experience in exchange for around 1ms or latency at 1000Hz. I personally don’t really use Motion Sync as I don’t feel the difference when gaming, but it’s a cool feature for those that do like to use it anyway.

You might know that Xtrfy’s mice are driverless; this means that there’s no optional software to be found and that all configurating needs to be done on the mouse itself. That’s bad news for people who like to program all sorts of macros, but good news for people who just want to game without having to download programs. There’s a big variety of DPI values to choose from, and you can also change the polling rate and debounce time by using the slider on the bottom of the mouse along with a button and an indicator LED. Using button combinations, you can also change the LOD, toggle motion sync, and check the battery level. For 9/10 gamers there’s more than enough customizability present here, so don’t let the lack of software scare you away.

The battery inside of the M8 is up to par, but nothing more than that. It has around 75 hours of battery life, which is more than enough to last for several really intense gaming sessions, but I would encourage you to top it off every now and then. It only takes an hour or two to more or less fully charge the mouse, and despite the fact that Xtrfy says that you can play ‘unhindered’ with the EZcord Pro (which is their name for their charging cable) cable I don’t share that opinion. In today’s world of wireless gaming mice, it can feel slightly limiting to play with a cable even if it’s a very good one that’s coming out of the front, but playing with one that’s hanging out the back on the right side feels a bit too odd for me personally. I don’t ever have issues with the batteries running out on my wireless mice though (I tend to just charge them every couple of days if I think of it) so for me personally this odd placement of the charging port is not an issue at all, though your mileage may vary.

Lastly, I’ll say that it’s refreshing to see that Xtrfy have dropped some of the more gimmicky aspects of their other mice. There are no exchangeable buttons here, and no way to move the battery to change the weight balance. It’s not that I am against companies that try to innovate, but I always wanted to see what a completely performance-focused mouse from Xtrfy would look like, and this is it. Very impressing indeed.

Xtrfy M8 Alternatives

If you’re looking for a mouse that has the same super low button height then you’re out of luck as far as I know, but if you want the same-ish experience you could look towards the Logitech G Pro X Superlight or the Logitech G Pro Wireless. Those have a similar ultra safe shape, though those mice are larger and longer feeling than the M8. It can be tempting to think of the M8 as a ‘Superlight Mini’ but to me it feels a bit more bunched up (more like an apple as opposed to a potato, which is what the GPX is commonly lovingly compared to) than the Superlight so it doesn’t completely feel like a shrunken down GPX.

Xtrfy M8 Review – Conclusion

The Xtrfy M8 is a fantastic competitive gaming mouse. Dropping more gimmicky features like the movable battery and swappable shells, Xtrfy really shows that they know how to make a killer product that’s focused on the most serious gamers out there. It’s not that there was anything wrong with their previous offerings; I love the M42 and M4, and I applaud the daring approach they’ve taken with the MZ1, but it’s nice to see Xtrfy’s engineers pulling out all the stops and focusing on what ultimately matters most to tryhard gamers: performance.

The ultra low button height of 4 millimeters doesn’t do anything for me personally since my grip doesn’t place my finger that low, but those large and consistent buttons, along with the safe shape, does make for a mouse that can be used by pretty much any grip type and hand size out there. Some will say that it’s too safe and bland, and indeed if you’re looking for a curvy, more locked in approach to a mouse this won’t be it for you, but it’s always handy to know that you’re 99% likely to get along with a mouse before purchasing it.

The shape isn’t exactly what makes this mouse so good though. There are plenty of fantastic shapes out there. What makes this mouse good is the fact that the buttons are pretty much perfect, the scroll wheel feels great, the feet are very decent, and the whole thing is built like an absolute tank with no creaking or flexing, all while coming in at a mere 55 grams. Top that off with the inclusion of a 3395 sensor, flawless wireless performance, and that aforementioned safe shape and you’ve got a mouse that’s extremely respectable.

The shape might be too neutral and safe for some, and the coating could definitely use some work, but other than that this is Xtrfy’s best work yet if you ask me.

4.5 of 5

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Lars

Reviews, Community, FPS

Former semi-pro gamer turned writer, product reviewer, and community manager.