Naya Create review

This is a review that should have appeared at least two months ago, as I've had a Naya Create ergonomic keyboard on my desk since the end of June. However, for reasons that will become clear shortly, the journey between first opening the box and the publication of this review has been faltering and difficult. Had I issued my thoughts on the Create after a month of use—the typical period for reviewing an ergonomic keyboard—the final score and verdict would have been very different to what's on this page, and not in a positive way.

But let's start at the beginning. Naya is a small company, based in the Netherlands, that was founded around four years ago by a group of three friends. Setting out with a goal of making the Create, a bespoke keyboard for ergonomics and productivity, Naya's designs and plans resulted in a highly successful Kickstarter campaign.

Multiple batches of the Create have already been sold out and shipped, and along with the sheer amount of money raised via crowdfunding, it's clear that there are a lot of computer users around the world who very much want one. The obvious question to ask here is 'why?' and that's an easy one to answer.

The Naya Create is a fully split, columnar, low-profile keyboard with integrated tenting. While the first aspects are by no means original in design, the structure and implementation of the latter are certainly quite unique. Constructed from aluminium, with two robust hinges at either side of each half, the Create can be angled and arranged to fit most people's ergonomic needs.

It comes with Kailh linear switches pre-installed, though you can purchase Tactile or Clicky sets separately. However, you will need to fit them yourself (likewise with additional keycaps). Naya will ship even the basic Create package with a free travel case that's a little rough on the outside but very plush on the inside.

The truly unique selling point of the Naya Create is the hot-swappable modules. These magnetically attach to large ring sockets, and as well as expanding what the Create can operate and control, they also provide wireless connectivity in the form of Bluetooth. Naya offers four such modules: the Track, Touch, Tune, and Float. In order, these are essentially a trackball, touchpad, media wheel, and a 3D mouse.

In my review sample, Naya shipped all bar the Float, which is a bit of a shame because that device was the one that I was most interested in testing. Many CAD users and 3D modellers swear by 3D mice, and having dabbled in both over the years, I was hoping to see what Naya had designed.

You don't need to buy any of the modules, but the Create looks bare and rather odd without them, and although the keyboard ships with a reasonably long Y-split USB cable, it feels more natural to use it wirelessly—which requires two modules, of course, one for each half.

Focusing on the keyboard itself for now, I have to say that I have slightly mixed feelings about its overall design. It feels very robust and sleek, and it's incredibly low in profile. The sturdy hinges make it easy to tent the Create to suit your specific needs, although it's not possible to introduce any tilting, positive or negative.

As with all split, columnar keyboards, it takes a long time to retrain your brain for touch typing, partly because of the key arrangement and partly because of the use of 'thumb islands' for commonly used keys.

However, the position of the space bar (or rather, the long key, as you can remap every key to a different function) is poor, as it sits to the left of the three keys that form each island. If you have average or larger-than-average-sized hands, your thumb will naturally rest over the island keys and not the space bar, making it awkward to use.

In fact, I don't understand why the key exists in the first place, because the space bar is a commonly used key. In other words, it should be a key within an island. You can remap it, of course, but then you'll have to fight against your brain, which will naturally gravitate to using the long key as a space bar.

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The positioning of the Create's hinges places restrictions on how large the thumb islands can be, but none of the ergonomic keyboards with thumb keys I've tested have a long key for space.

I've also found the staggered heights of each key column to be a little awkward in use. Compared to the MoErgo Glove80 and ZSA Moonlander, which both have very little height variance in their key columns, the Naya Create took longer to adapt to and never truly felt 100% comfortable when used for extended periods.

When it comes to ergonomic keyboards, what's awkward for one person can be sheer delight for another, so this shouldn't be viewed as a negative mark against the Naya Create, but it would be remiss of me not to highlight what I didn't like about it as someone with extensive experience using different ergonomic boards.

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The same is true of the modules. For me, the Track (trackball unit) is the weakest of them all, as the ball isn't secured (and falls out very easily) and is too light, so rolling it about doesn't feel especially encouraging. There are four buttons around the edge, but they're identical in size and feel, and there are no means to judge which one you're pressing by feel alone.

Naya's Touch module is better, but ultimately, it's just a trackpad. Nothing wrong with that, of course, just don't expect it to be any super-special (e.g. with haptic feedback). Responses to multi-gesture inputs are generally fine, though occasionally it takes a little while to register a two or three-finger tap.

At a price of $170, the Tune control wheel might seem to be vastly overpriced, but for a long time, I felt it was worth every single cent. It's essentially just a large rotary encoder, with a small touchpad on top and a ring of LEDs just inside the furled metal edge. However, it's fitted with a dynamic haptic system that feels glorious in use. If Naya made one as a standalone product, I'd buy it in a flash.

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Well, perhaps not, because at the time of writing this review, my Tune sample no longer works properly. It did right up until Naya released its latest firmware for the module and a long-awaited version of NayaFlow (the software to remap and reconfigure everything) earlier this week.

Naya has got an awful lot right with the Create keyboard and optional modules, but up until the aforementioned firmware and software releases, it's been well off the mark with its app. On its site and Kickstarter page, the company promised that you would be able to completely reconfigure every key, control, and button in the Create and its modules.

For the latter, that's only just arrived, and if I had bought a full Create package at the start, I think I would have been very disappointed by how long it's taken to get to this point. As things currently stand, software is Naya's biggest problem.

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For example, in earlier versions of NayaFlow, updating the Create's firmware was confusing and slow. In the latest version, the app now gives clearer instructions and states that one must remove the modules and use the included Y-split USB cable to update the firmware of the Create.

However, that just doesn't work for my sample: the right half updates just fine, but the left half fails every time. It's only thanks to the excellent crowd on Naya's Discord channel that I managed to solve the problem, using a separate USB cable for each half. The same needed to be done for updating the modules' firmware, but while the Track and Touch went smoothly, the Tune updated to the latest firmware and promptly stopped functioning.

I'm confident that, with more help and time, I could resolve this issue—Naya has been very quick to help with anything I've asked of it—but there is only so much time one can spend on a product review. If I had bought a Naya Create, I'd certainly keep trying because when everything works as intended, the combination of the Create, Tune, and Touch is a great package, though it should be at $750.

All of which has created somewhat of a dilemma in terms of summarising my testing and review into the form of a final score and verdict. The Naya Create isn't a mass-produced ergonomic keyboard; it's arguably not even a finished product because so much of its functionality and usefulness is tied to software, which is clearly still in beta.

For example, module configuration in NayaFlow is currently limited to Windows and macOS; Linux users will have to wait a little longer.

The Create's overall design isn't going to suit everyone, and its price tag makes what is already a niche product even more narrow in appeal. Complex, bespoke ergonomic keyboards can be real game-changers for many computer users—vastly improving comfort, all while increasing productivity—but they're all somewhat of a gamble.

Choose the wrong one and you'll curse yourself for making the plunge.

If you're going to commit to the Naya Create, then just be prepared to commit not just a large chunk of your hard-earned money, but a considerable amount of time getting used to it all. And in waiting for the software drop that finally gets everything right.