Glorious Model O3 Wireless review

I first got my hands on the Glorious Model O3 Wireless sitting on the floor in the halls of Gamescom as a slapdash 15-minute product demo. I was a little frustrated that I only got a few minutes with it because it's not often you have a product that tries to genuinely innovate in a way that might actually make sense.

That's the initial impression I got from this mouse: it's trying to innovate in a way that could actually be useful. And now, after spending some more time with it and actually using it for gaming, I'm happy to say it's done so pretty successfully.

The selling point here is its 'InfinitePlay' hot swappable battery system. Much like the SteelSeries Arctis Nova Pro Wireless headset, the Glorious Model O3 Wireless gaming mouse can boast a kind of faux-infinite battery life, because you can swap out its 200 mAh battery with another that's kept fully charged, then rinse and repeat, swapping between the two whenever one gets low.

You slot an external battery into the rear end of the mouse, then when you see the battery LED on the hub drop to red and the mouse's RGB flash red, signalling battery is less than 30%, you swap it out for the one that's been charging in the hub.

Serious thought has been put into how to make such a system easy and efficient. The hub that charges the second, unused battery also doubles as the 2.4 GHz connection point. Plus you get a small internal battery in the mouse itself (the 'Guardian Battery') that acts as a backup, keeping the mouse alive while you swap between the two external ones.

Initially I thought that this Guardian battery was a little bit redundant, because surely instead you could just have the low battery warnings shine out a little earlier, ultimately giving you the same amount of notice to swap out to the new one. But I've since realised that's not really the point.

The point is that your mouse doesn't disconnect while swapping out your batteries, which means you're less likely to run into any strange issues; it just gives you a little more piece of mind. Personally, I don't think I'd feel too concerned about my PC picking up my mouse again when it turns back on with a new battery, even while in-game, but every little helps I suppose.

I've found myself pleasantly surprised by just how nice it feels knowing I don't have to worry about my battery dying or having to plug the mouse in to charge. Swapping the batteries over is incredibly easy and convenient, and makes for a genuine quality-of-life improvement over having to plug my mouse in with a cable (yuck, right?). If, for whatever reason, you decide to plug the mouse in then that charges the battery that's inside it, too.

It doesn't feel like too much of an imposition having to have the little hub on my desk. That's in part because in addition to charging the second battery and having a port for the 2.4 GHz dongle, the hub also has LEDs that show the charge for your two batteries, and LEDs showing you what your mouse's DPI and polling rates are set to. It also has a button that you can configure in the app, but by default changes your DPI or polling (with short-press and long-press, respectively).

So yes, I've found the charging hub setup to be very convenient and not gimmicky at all. But none of that would matter if it wasn't also a mouse that feels good to use. Thankfully, for the most part, it is.

That's especially important because I'm not dealing with a cheap mouse here. It's set to retail for $160, which pits it against the likes of the Razer DeathAdder V4 Pro and Logitech G Pro X Superlight 2 or Superlight 2 Dex. These are top-end mice, so the Glorious Model O3 Wireless has some stiff competition.

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While the mouse design is great and while it's felt very good to use in practice, there's a big caveat that I found the wireless connection to be a bit underwhelming in my testing. I didn't notice any tracking problems in practice while gaming, but MouseTester shows the Model O3 Wireless doesn't have the most consistent tracking, as you can see (the dots are more erratic over wireless)

This isn't a problem with the sensor itself, because when I plug the mouse in, I end up with the following graph. The dots are closer together here, meaning more consistent tracking.

It's a problem caused by the wireless connection. And I found this to be the case whether the dongle is plugged into the hub or directly into the PC. Moving the dongle around closer or further away didn't help, either; it seems it's just how the wireless connection is for this mouse and dongle combo.

It's also not something that's common to every wireless mouse: I tested the G Pro Superlight X over its wireless connection and it had much more consistent tracking. Like I said, I didn't notice any tracking issues in practice while gaming, and this is far from the worst graph you can see, but it's not ideal.

On the comfort and design front, it most definitely delivers. That's because for this third generation of the mouse, the company has kept a similar shape to the Glorious Model O 2 (albeit not identical, as it's less of a flared design), but it's filled in all those holes. It's funny, actually, because the original Glorious Model O had big hexagonal holes, the second version had smaller round ones, and this one has none. Only took you a few years to catch up to Logitech on that one, huh? I kid, I kid.

The mouse is actually about the same weight as the Superlight, too—okay, a few grams heavier, but with all the new battery gubbins on the go we can't complain too much about that. Glorious claims 66 g for it, by my scales weighed it at 67 g. Whatever the case, it's plenty light and definitely within the 'lightweight gaming mouse' bracket.

It's certainly not the lightest on the market by 2025's standards, though. The DeathAdder V4 Pro, for instance, weighs just 56 g. That's only 2 g heavier than the wired version of this Model O3, which weighs 54 g.

Still, actually using the mouse vindicates its design, at least as far as my hands are concerned. I've been putting it through its paces in CS2, Arena Breakout: Infinite, and Overwatch 2 over the last few days, and it's taken me very little time to become at ease with the Glorious Model O 3 Wireless under my fingertips.

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I didn't immediately gel with the shape compared to the Logitech G Pro X Superlight that I'm used to or the Corsair Sabre V2 that I've been using recently. In particular, the front portion of the mouse feels a little longer than what I was used to, I think because the curve on the mouse starts further back which means my hand lies a little further back. Whatever the reason, I noticed my fingers were sitting a little further back on the mouse buttons than I was used to.

But that took less than a day for me to get used to, and since then I've been loving my time with the mouse. Everything feels solid and premium under my fingers, and despite my initial worries to the contrary, the matte surface actually doesn't slip 'n' slide at all, even during longer gaming sessions. As someone who uses a hybrid palm-claw grip, the mouse feels very comfy to use, and while it's not the lightest mouse on the market these days, 66/67 g still feels great today.

Everything feels well made, from the matte shell to the sturdy scroll wheel, battery release mechanism, and everything in between. The only slight niggle I've noticed is the LMB ringing a little hollow when clicked hard on occasion. But that's only when I smack my finger down like a lunatic; normal clicks are fine.

The mouse also has dual Bluetooth and 2.4 GHz connectivity, although it can be a little finnicky to set up. I put it in Bluetooth pairing via a 5-second press of the power button from turned off, then connected to another device, but before it would let me switch back to 2.4 GHz or even turn the mouse of at all, I had to plug the mouse in via cable and then unplug. Once I'd done that, though, I could swap between my Bluetooth and 2.4 GHz with a quick press of the underside power button.

The Glorious Core software is decent, too, especially compared to some competitor apps for peripherals. I'd prefer a web app, but as far as installable apps go, it's lightweight and easy to use, allowing you to select different profiles for preset DPI/polling/keybinds/lighting.

Yes, it has RGB lighting. The new full-bodied design is certainly an interesting one. The rear end of the mouse is separated from the mouse buttons by a sunken strip that lights up and splays out along the edges of the mouse. I'm not a big fan of RGB at the best of times, but the lighting and its effects on this mouse come across as especially tacky to my eyes, so I've kept it disabled. That's better for the battery life, anyway, giving it up to about 71 hours including the Guardian Battery at 1,000 Hz polling without RGB enabled.

Not that you need to maximise that battery life with how easy it is to swap around those batteries. And that's the whole deal, really, isn't it? If you're a pro player and want the best wireless performance you might be better with something like a Superlight or a DeathAdder V4 Pro, but if you want good wireless performance and a quality design that's comfy to use, plus a genuinely innovative and useful faux-infinite charging system, then the Glorious Model O 3 wireless is where it's at.

For high-end competitive gaming, I don't know whether I'd forego a more stable wireless connection. But for everyday competitive gaming and certainly casual gaming, the convenience of the hot swappable battery system makes the mouse worth serious consideration. Ultimately, whether it's worth it will depend on how much you value never having to worry about charging your mouse or having it die on you.

Best gaming mouse 2025

1. Best wireless:
Razer DeathAdder V4 Pro

2. Best wired:
Logitech G502 X

3. Best budget wireless:
Logitech G305 Lightspeed

4. Best budget wired:
Glorious Model O Eternal

5. Best lightweight:
Turtle Beach Burst II Air

6. Best MMO:
Corsair Scimitar Elite Wireless SE

7. Best compact:
Razer Cobra Pro

8. Best ambidextrous:
Logitech G Pro

9. Best ergonomic:
Keychron M5

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