It feels like every Black Friday, I've got my eye on gaming controllers. That's because stick drift seems to be hitting me worse and worse every year. If you're anything like me, you can avoid stick drift almost entirely and get a cute wireless controller with a charging stand, all for less than $50 right now.
- We're curating the best Black Friday PC gaming deals
Our Nick gave the 8BitDo Ultimate 2 Wireless an 82% earlier this year, and that's partly because of how wide the feature set is on this controller. TMR sticks offer superior efficiency, but also make it almost immune to stick drift. The Hall effect triggers also help its shelf life, and those triggers can swap between a long press and a linear switch with a single flick of the back of the controller. This makes it great for spamming fire in shooters or controlling speed in racing games.
The rather classy-looking charging stand keeps it topped up in between gaming sessions, and the 2.4 GHz wireless mode connects to your rig at a polling rate of 1,000 Hz. That's not the highest we've seen, but it beats out classic controllers like those offered by Sony and Microsoft.
It also offers gyro controls, which are a niche but welcome addition to a pad that's pretty impressive in many regards. It tops this all off by being super precise thanks to its impressive sticks and triggers. That charging stand, like a few other 8BitDo offerings, makes it feel like not only a controller but a neat ornament on a desk.
Our Nick felt conflicted on the build quality in his time with the controller, finding the D-pad to be subpar, and he also didn't like the material in the thumbsticks as they're a bit too hard. This brings the controller down somewhat, but it's still a solid controller, which Nick calls "close to being the perfect game pad for every PC gamer."
We did find this controller to feel a little small in the hands, thanks to its Switch Pro Controller style aesthetic and build. If you have particularly large hands and need a controller to match them, the Ultimate 2 Wireless may feel a little compact in your digits. Luckily, the GameSir G7 Pro offers almost all of the same specs, and a bigger, more Xbox-like feel for $60 at Best Buy, and gets our recommendation as well.
No matter which one you go for, this Black Friday has some killer deals on controllers that won't come down with the stick drift sickness.
👉Check out Amazon's gaming controller deals👈
1. Best overall:
GameSir G7 Pro
2. Best budget:
GameSir Nova Lite
3. Best high end:
Razer Wolverine V3 Pro 8K PC
4. Best wired:
Scuf Valor Pro
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