The gamepad trees are bearing their joystick-equipped fruits early this year, with many manufacturers already launching their latest and greatest for 2025, covering a wide spread of different devices and price points. While we’ve just seen some incredible value offerings from GameSir, there’s space within the budget bracket to innovate and over-deliver as much as anywhere else. That’s where PXN are aiming the P5, a multiplatform wireless gaming controller that’s available for less than £30. With the features it totes, it’s ridiculous value for money.
The PXN P5 offers a trio of connection options: a wireless 2.4GHz dongle, Bluetooth or wired. That means it’s all set to work with your PC and Nintendo Switch, as well as mobile or smart TVs – something that’s becoming increasingly useful with the arrival of streaming services like Luna and GeForce Now. In fact, this is an ideal extra controller just to hop into the latest games on Apple TV arcade.
The headline feature set for a controller at this price makes a mockery of the other manufacturers out there, especially Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo’s standard offerings. It offers Hall Effect sticks with a 1000Hz polling rate, meaning better response time and faster reactions, while also cutting down on the risk of stick drift. It has a 256-level Hall Effect trigger, with trigger lockouts, 25 hour battery life, an air-mouse mode, and is equipped with a gyroscope for motion controls and back buttons. How have they done all of this?
Well, the money you’re saving can be felt the moment you pick it up. The P5 is extremely light, even though the black plastic of the main body feels solid and well-made. You can tell that it’s cheaper, but it doesn’t give you the ick like third party controllers used to. The Hall Effect analogue sticks have a decent level of tautness, and they feel great in use, making the most of the accurate response in Overwatch 2. In the heat of the moment, you could easily forget that this is a value controller.
The face buttons feel surprisingly good as well, with traditional membrane buttons that have the right level of activation. The D-pad is a weaker element, with the up direction on our review unit feeling a little less pliant than the other directions, but it proved absolutely fine in use. I’d probably be looking elsewhere if you’re a beat ‘em up fan that uses the D-pad heavily, but for most people it does the job.
The cost-cutting becomes more obvious when you put your fingers on the triggers and shoulder buttons. The plastic used here feels cheaper than elsewhere, and there’s definitely an acclimatisation period to getting used to them.
They haven’t skimped on the tech behind the triggers though, which, like the analogue sticks, boast Hall Effect technology, so not only are they more precise through their range of movement, but they should last longer than their traditional brethren. Of course, there’s other elements to a trigger’s durability, and the spring providing tension is the traditional breaking point. The PXN P5 also boasts trigger lockouts, which make playing FPS games much more immediate, and improve your activation time – vital if you’re into competitive gaming.
On the rear of the controller you’ll find a bunch of inputs and switches, first of which are the four back buttons. These are well placed beneath your middle fingers, though that depends on whether you play with four fingers across the triggers and shoulder buttons for a claw grip.
I found that shifting my hands up meant I had to stretch more with my ring fingers to activate the back buttons, as they are quite small, though that, in turn, makes them harder to activate accidentally. I do like the way that the central two buttons are angled, as this made them easier to use, and you won’t catch them when using the two that sit within the controller’s grips.
On the rear, there’s also a switch for moving between the wireless dongle, Bluetooth, or to move across to the Nintendo Switch mode. Unlike the recent GameSir Super Nova, it’s chunky and very easy to use.
There’s two options when it comes to programming the PXN P5, and first amongst them is programming the controller using the PXN button on the front of the unit. Holding this down with a combination of buttons will let you alter a multitude of settings, including switching through deadzone settings as well as button mapping, but you’ll probably have to reach for the instructions to remind yourself each time.
Besides that, there’s the PXN Nexus app which is available for Android and iOS. This gives you a clear and comprehensive way to update your controller, and alter all of its settings to within an inch of its life, including setting up macros on the back buttons. You can add multiple steps here, loop them, or add interval times between button activations, and it’s a great addition to an already impressive package.
The key competitors here are fundamentally all more expensive than the PXN P5, though the Gamesir Super Nova’s extra £15 buys a far more premium experience, and a charging stand. Meanwhile, for another few pounds, the GameSir Cyclone 2 throws in a bevy of microswitches, and you also gain a 3.5mm headphone socket, if that’s important to your setup.
