Asus ROG Azoth Gaming Keyboard – Review

Asus ROG Azoth Gaming Keyboard A gorgeous enthusiast keeb from Asus, but it sure is 2023 expensive. ROG Azoth is the first DIY-style keyboard for gamers. I can count on my fingers the number of mainstream manufacturers that make proper enthusiast-grade keyboards. There is Mountain, which has made two excellent keyboards in the Everest Max and Everest 60, but they don’t necessarily classify as gaming-oriented and neither are they entirely mainstream. And then there is..err, well, that’s it.

There are plenty of mainstream companies that make keyboards, from Razer, Steelseries, Corsair, Logitech, etc, and while they have dabbled in some areas of making an enthusiast keyboard, no one has completely dove deep into that burgeoning market segment. Until Asus, that is.

The Asus ROG Azoth is the first DIY-style, enthusiast keyboard for gamers that ticks all the right boxes: it has hot-swappable 3-pin and 5-pin switch sockets, pre-lubed switches and stabilizers, gasket mount, three-layers of sound dampening, PBT keycaps, and what’s more, they have also thrown in a complete DIY kit in the box, which comes with a switch opener, keycap and switch pullers, high-grade lube, three additional switches, and more, all for a slightly pricey ask of $249.99.

After using the Azoth for over a week, I am pleasantly surprised by what Asus has managed to achieve. This is a product that has completely understood what it takes to make an enthusiast-grade keyboard and has delivered the goods with confidence. But that said, the Azoth falls short in some areas for those that have the know-how, or have built a keyboard before. And if you are in search of the ever elusive ‘thock’ from your keyboard, the Azoth will need some tuning.

Design and Features

The Asus ROG Azoth keyboard has a 75% form factor, which means that you will get a full row of Function keys, arrow keys, and even other important keys like Del, Pgup, PgDwn, and more. While 60% keyboards have garnered much attention from gamers for their compact size, 75% seems like it is on the uptake as well since it doesn’t compromise on functionality and yet still offers a relatively small form factor which allows room for larger mouse movements. In that aspect, the keyboard is well proportioned without feeling cramped.

One of the immediately striking features about the ROG Azoth is the 2” OLED display on the top right corner of the keyboard. The black-and-white display can show custom animations, audio visualization, keyboard status like battery level and connectivity, as well as system stats like GPU temperature, CPU frequency, etc.

The OLED display is honestly a game changer for me. I am someone who likes to keep an eye on my GPU temperature when playing games, which the display allows me to do at a quick glance. You can customize the display using the (frankly, horrendous) Asus Armory Crate software, and I do wish it allowed us to utilize the screen to show even more system monitoring statistics like fan speed, hard drive usage, etc. Currently, you can show stats for CPU and GPU usage, but for some reason, it is unable to display CPU temp and GPU temp together. You have to choose between CPU frequency and GPU temp, or vice versa, which is a bit of a disappointment. I hope Asus adds in more system monitoring options in the future.

The display also comes with a control knob that allows you to cycle between volume adjustment, multimedia functionality, brightness settings for the OLED screen and RGB, and selecting the lighting effect. You have to flick the control knob up or down to make any adjustments, which works fine but at times I found myself accidentally clicking it which would cause it to execute another function entirely instead of what I was trying to do. I would have much preferred a mouse wheel-like scroller instead as it would be far more intuitive to use.

In terms of build quality, the ROG Azoth is very much a premium product as its price tag would suggest. It features a metal top-plate with a silicon gasket mount, and three layers of sound dampening (including a Poron Foam in the middle) to eliminate key pinging, and any hollowness from the casing. The rest of the keyboard is encased in plastic, which for the price tag – and its aspiration to become an enthusiast keyboard – is slightly disappointing. Most high-end custom keyboards feature an all-metal casing, but I suppose Asus went with a plastic base to allow the keyboard’s wireless functionality to breathe a little better.

Despite that, the keyboard feels solid in the hands with no creaking or flexing of any kind. It’s also quite heavy at around 1.2kgs, and feels sufficiently sturdy incase of a mishap.

The keyboard uses the ROG NX mechanical switches, and they come pre-lubed from the factory. Asus offers three variants of switches with the keyboard: Red (linear), Brown (tactile), and Blue (clicky). Our review product came with the Red switches, which offers 1.8mm actuation point, and requires 55gf of total force to depress.

This is where Asus stumbles a bit with the ROG Azoth. While the Red NX switches feel like any other linear switch, the overall sound signature is slightly scratchy and whiny. The typing experience also feels rigid and stiff, as if there is a push back from the keyboard after a certain point. This is probably due to the excessive amount of sound dampeners on the keyboard which makes it less cushiony than I would prefer. An obvious solution to this would be to remove the last layer of padding, which wouldn’t affect the sound dampening whatsoever and would also make the keyboard feel a lot more comfortable to type on.

The stabilizers on the other hand are fantastic. They are well lubed and do not feel rattly at all. Asus have also included two mini-paddings on the stabilizer used for the Spacebar in order to further reduce any hollowness from a large key like that (nice touch!). However, despite all of that, the Spacebar makes a loud ‘thock’ sound when pressed, but it’s not of the pleasant kind. Again, the issue stems from the NX switch which contributes to the loud clanking sound. I swapped the switch for a hand-lubed Cherry MX Red switch, and the Spacebar produced a far pleasant sound which really balances the sound profile of the keyboard a whole lot better. In fact, I also hand-lubed one of the additional Red NX switch provided in the box, and that too sounds a whole lot better than the stock key.

As such, if you want the ROG Azoth to sound absolutely perfect, you will need to swap out the switches for any pre-lubed third party ones available online. A set of 35 switches from Gateron, Kalih, Akko, etc should cost around $15-$30, and they would be far more suited on the keyboard than what Asus bundles it with. I swapped out the NX switches with Mountain’s pre-lubed Yellow linear switches, and it offered a better typing experience as well as a nicer sound profile.

And while you are at it, I would also recommend changing the keycaps. It’s not entirely necessary to do so, as the keycaps on the ROG Azoth are rather nice. It’s backed with double-shot PBT, which should reduce shining and greasing over time, and it has a nice two-tone black and gray colorway which really makes the RGB on the keyboard pop. It also has a pleasant grippy texture which helps during sweaty gaming sessions as your fingers are less likely to slip when you are trying to quickly execute in-game commands.

The reason I suggested changing the keycaps is simply because of the height profile. They are mid-height, which Asus says is similar to Cherry profile keycaps, but I found myself making a ton of mistakes as opposed to my daily driver, the Mountain Everest Max, which uses standard Cherry keycaps. I also found them to be slightly exhausting to type on, an issue I did not face when I swapped out the keycaps from the Everest Max.

Of course, purchasing an additional set of switches and keycaps adds to the expense (you could easily be looking at $100-$150 worth of additional investment), so these upgrades are only recommended for those that are into building custom keyboards and want the perfect feel and sound from their keyboard. For an average gamer who may not necessarily care about all of that, the ROG Azoth will be more than sufficient, and in fact, it will be nothing short of a revelation when compared to any other gaming keyboard.

However, if the ROG Azoth does get your curiosity tingling and you want to dive deep into building your own keyboard, Asus very generously offers a helping hand by providing a complete DIY kit in the box. The kit includes three additional Red NX switches, a switch opener, a lube workstation, keycap and switch puller, a brush, and a small bottle of Krytox GPL-205-GDO lubricant. The Krytox, especially, is a fantastic touch as it is renowned in the keyboard community for its quality and performance. It shows that Asus has made efforts to understand the market really well, and instead of formulating their own lube, they rightfully went for the market leader in the category to make things a little easier. The Krytox bottle is rather small though, and you only get a small dollop of lube in it, but it should be enough to lubricate an entire set of switches.

Software and Performance

Unlike most custom keyboards, the Asus ROG Azoth doesn’t support third-party softwares like QMK/VIA, and unfortunately, because of that we are stuck with the Asus Armory Crate app. From taking around 30 minutes to install, unnecessarily installing numerous modules and SDKs on your PC, and generally being extremely slow to load, the Armory Crate is far from a pleasant experience. There have been plenty of times when the software would load, show me the dashboard, but refuse to load the sub-sections that would allow me to customize the keyboard. It’s a mess and honestly, Asus needs to replace it with something better very soon.

But let’s say the software does load, and doesn’t crash or hang up in the process, there are plenty of options to tinker around with for the ROG Azoth. You have per-key customization where you can assign various keyboard and multimedia shortcuts to any key you prefer, select from a range of lighting effects or create your own, customize the control knob and the OLED screen, and glance at the battery level and power saving features.

Thankfully, the ROG Azoth has on-board memory, so you don’t necessarily need the Armory Crate software once you are set. If you are not into customizing it at all, you can skip installing the app entirely as most of the settings can be performed from the keyboard itself.

In terms of performance, the ROG Azoth features tri-mode connectivity where you can connect the keyboard via USB, 2.4Ghz wireless, and Bluetooth. The keyboard uses ROG SpeedNova wireless technology, and it works remarkably well in delivering a lag-free experience, and this is despite having a router and various other wireless devices near it. I also could not notice a difference in speed or performance between wired and wireless.

If you choose to go wireless, the battery life is pretty solid as well. We managed to receive around 200 hours+ of battery life with the OLED and RGB at 50% brightness, however Asus does claim as much as 2,000 hours of up time over 2.4Ghz wireless but with both the RGB and OLED turned off. I am not sure if anyone would want to use the keyboard like that, but it could come useful in a pinch.

I also like the fact that you can disable any modes you don’t want. I did have it showing off a host of system info, but I’ve got it currently set as a multimedia control only, so just with the volume adjustment and track play/pause/skip functionality. That means I don’t have to cycle back around to get to the mode I’m after. I’ve also got the OLED set to display the track info and EQ, though sometimes Armoury Crate craps out and either flips it back to the image of Princess Leia (no, not that one) I loaded to test out its custom image/gif chops many firmware updates ago.

The ROG Azoth is absolutely the best gaming keyboard Asus has ever released, and the best enthusiast keyboard I’ve ever seen from a proper established brand that doesn’t focus on the segment. The utility of the Everest 60 and its detachable numpad still gets my personal vote, but this is a very close second in terms of its day-to-day use. And it’s certainly going to be my new office board… though only if I can swing it with Asus to leave the expensive Azoth with us. Because the real sticking point is that price.

I’d never spend ~$300 on a gaming keyboard, so I don’t really know how I can recommend that you do. I love it as a keeb in its own right, but unless that’s mere pocket money in your world, the cost of the ROG Azoth is beyond prohibitive.

The ROG Azoth is easily Asus’ best ever gaming keyboard, and one of the best enthusiast boards I’ve used. But it’s over $100 more than the Mountain Everest 60’s full numpad package, and that’s at the very limits of what I could conscience spending on a peripheral.