It's Over 9,000! (Not Really)

A sneak peek at Razer’s breakthrough 8,000Hz polling rate technology

- Kenneth Ang & Hoots the Owl

Razer’s R&D team has been working on some really interesting stuff lately, and one of those projects was introduced to us by Lead Product Developer Ayush Sharma and Product Manager Ben Goh.

Their work-in-progress gaming mouse technology, which was demonstrated using this rather fancy machine you see here, allows them to introduce true 8,000Hz polling rates and ultra-low click latencies of 0.125ms in most, if not all their future top-end mice - that’s eight times better than the current industry best.

Oh, yes. For those who are about to Google “polling rate”, it basically refers to the frequency at which a device checks, or “polls” for inputs and positional changes, and it’s usually measured in hertz (Hz).

Now, this is really important in competitive gaming, especially in fast-paced shooters like Riot Games’ Valorant, where split-second responses might mean the difference between victory and defeat. Putting this into context, a mouse with a low polling rate might not pick up on the tiny adjustments you made to position your crosshair over an opponent’s head since it doesn’t report changes as often as one with a high polling rate. The result? You could end up missing the shot entirely, costing your team the round, or even the match.