Aside from the keyboard, having a great mouse can make a huge difference to your set-up. However, not everyone is a professional gamer, and not everyone can even tell the difference between different sensitivities. Most of all, not everyone needs to be spending upwards of $100—in some cases even more—on a mouse.
If you're just casual gaming, and mostly using your pointing device for school work or other productivity duties, comfort may be more important than accuracy. For this purpose, most mice will do, even cheap ones. But how cheap can you go?
You'd be surprised. Given that the gaming market is rife with devices that are more than often overpriced, there are plenty of decent options that are cheaper than what would normally be considered "cheap." There are plenty of cheap mice on our guide to the best gaming mouse options for 2018.
Take for example a the Doinshop New Fashion Professional Colorful Backlight mouse (yes, that's what it's actually called). It has a 4000 dpi optical sensor, with six buttons and a clickable scroll-wheel. The DPI is also adjustable between 1200, 2500, 3200, and 4000. On Amazon, it has a decent amount of reviews and a 3.5 star rating. Oh—it also has RGB lighting. How much does all that cost?$4.60.
But what if you went just a bit higher? Could you get an even better mouse?
The cheapest gaming mouse
All the features of pricier options
Cheap!
Three DPI levels (2000 max)
Six buttons
Comes in four colored options
None!
While it's technically not the cheapest mouse available, the Tecknet Professional Ergonomic Optical Wired Computer Gaming Mouse (crazy name), has pretty much every option you could want from a mouse for just $8.
The biggest sign that this mouse is well liked by many is its rating on Amazon: 1507 reviews as of this writing with a 4-star rating. Most people say this is possibly the best mouse they've ever tried.
The mouse is based on a comfortable design, and the reviews agree with this. Tecknet offers the mouse as an ambidextrous device, and also provides the mouse in four different color combinations.
The Tecknet mouse has six buttons along with the ability to switch between three DPI settings. You can adjust between 1000, 1600, and 2000 DPI. Sensor duties are provided by an optical sensor, and Tecknet guarantees the mouse to work on a variety of surfaces, including anodized aluminum and even a magazine.
There are a total of six buttons but you won't be able to program them with macros. You can however assign them to different functions within Windows or within a game.
If wired isn't for you, Tecknet also sells a wireless version of the Ultimate Professional Optical Computer Wireless Gaming Mouse with a small USB dongle. Both mice have identical specifications, except the wireless version has eight buttons instead of six.
Both mice come with a lit design on the surface but it's not RGB and only remains blue. While this can annoy some, the lights rest squarely under your palm when you're using it, so if you don't like blue, you won't have to look at it too much.
If you're looking for a cheap gaming mouse that just works, the two Tecknet mice are great options.
