Agile weight

The gaming mouse is defined by its weight above all else. The major manufacturers are competing to shave down or outright remove material to shed any weight deemed non-essential, as long as their mice are structurally sound.

It’s a meticulous process, resulting in rather odd-looking designs, like ‘honeycomb’ patterns. They’re laughably likened to a cheese grater.

The comparison is not entirely contrived, as loose bit of dirt are sure to gradually accumulate, falling through the cut-outs and clogging up the insides.

If you’re not looking to go to such weight-saving extremes, Corsair’s Katar Pro XT resembles a much more practical option, weighing in at just 73g, despite retaining a relatively normal outward appearance.

At 73g, this lightweight gaming mouse is great for extended sessions long into the night. Queue up for multiple ranked games in a row without your mouse-arm faltering.

Small, but capable

Part of the lightweight design is attributed to the compact form factor. We’d classify it as a ‘small’ mouse, 115.8mm in length, favouring claw and fingertip grip styles for twitcy, manoeuvrable plays.

It’s symmetrical, suitable for both left and right-handed users. Rubber grips make sure you’re always in control of the mouse, even if its light weight encourages fast flicks.

Flipping it over, a pair of sizable feet are situated on the top and bottom of the mouse, ensuring the unit glides smoothly and consistently over a gaming mouse mat.

Reliable switches

The switches feature a spring-loaded mechanism, minimising the gap in-between the mouse clicks to nearly nothing, so your tap-fire inputs are registered near-instantly.

They’re produced by Omron, known for their long-lasting durability. Guaranteed for 50 million clicks, so liberally spam the left button without worry of the mouse not registering your inputs.

Down to the DPI

An 18,000 DPI PixArt optical sensor is custom-made for the finest, granular control. Increase the DPI in singular increments to carefully hone in your optimal sensitivity.

Accurately track targets along the entire length of your mousepad using a lower DPI, or ramp it up in strategy games for the highest actions-per-minute possible.

Easily switch between DPI values on-the-fly without alt-tabbing and digging though software mid-game with three easily accessible pre-sets available at the touch of a button.

A cable to match

A lightweight gaming mouse can’t be held back by a underperforming, tangle-prone, bare rubber cable awkwardly dragging along your desk. The Corsair Katar Pro XT’s cable is braided in a paracord finish, so it won’t get in your way in even during the wildest of flicks.

Coming in clutch

On its side, the Corsair Katar Pro XT features the highly popular forward-and-back navigation buttons. Resting right against your thumb, they’re intuitive and easy to reach, making menial tasks like flicking though webpages snappy.

In-game, additional re-bindable buttons become even more advantageous. Competitive games are mechanically dense, demanding multiple actions to be performed simultaneously.

Your keyboard hand should be firmly planted on the go-to WASD cluster. Ideally, you’d never stray far from these, but other actions demand your attention.

That’s where mouse buttons come in clutch. Let’s take the melee action in most games, it’s usually adjacent to WASD. Meaning, going in for a swift melee strike in the midst of a high-intensity battle requires that you lift a finger away from the movement keys, reducing capabilities and limiting performance.

Instead, re-bind it to a mouse button. Suddenly, you’ve got access to both actions simultaneously for a higher skill ceiling.

Deep customisation

The custom iCue software ties the entire package together, especially if you’re already invested in the Corsair ecosystem with their other peripherals, like Corsair’s Void RGB wireless gaming headset, or their K70 LUX RGB gaming keyboard.

It’s more than just a simple interface to dial-in your DPI, powerful enough to fine-tune your entire set-up to your personal preference.

Customise nearly every individual aspect of the mouse. Including a robust macro programming suite, button re-mapping, even lift-off adjustments and surface calibration for optimal operation.

A deliberate touch

The RGB is tastefully done, providing practical functionality. Switching between DPI values, the backlighting changes colour to clearly inform you of the current profile.

It’s fully customisable, with optional lighting effects like ‘colour pulse’ and ‘rainbow wave’ cycling through your favourite colours.

Gaming performance

Loading up Valorant, we’ve lowered the DPI down to near unusable values, purely for demo purposes. It’s far too slugglish for in-game use. It just isn’t working for us. We can hardly track targets, lagging behind their movements desperately attempting to catch up, running out of space.

Thankfully, we configured our various DPI pre-sets earlier, so it’s a simple case of switching the dedicated toggle on top of the mouse to flick over to a faster DPI in a flash. The backlight on the mouse changes colour to confirm we’ve changed over successfully, and we’re back to landing shot after shot.

Lightweight gaming mouse

Corsair’s Katar Pro XT represents the ideal 2021 gaming mouse. It’s lightweight, the current go-to design philosophy, without resorting to extreme measures and instead proving all-round functionality and deep customisation.

Check it out, over at Ebuyer: Corsair Katar Pro XT Ulta-Light Gaming Mouse

And, check out our coverage of Corsair’s HS60 haptic gaming headset while you’re at it.