8Bitdo Ultimate Wireless Pro Controller (Switch, Windows, & Steam Deck)

I have a lot of controllers... and I'm on a mission of reviewing every controller I own. Today, we'll review my first 8BitDo Ultimate - The Bluetooth version. The main reason I bought this controller was as an option to replace a Switch Pro Controller. I bought it a little bit after the GuliKit KingKong 2 Pro and it was between those for which I would use for Switch... ultimately the KingKong 2 ended up being used for Switch (at least until it lost my trust... I probably won't review that controller since it's no longer available, but long story short it went haywire on me while playing, twice) and I adopted this as my new main PC controller after the right bumper went bad on my Elite 2. I even bought the buttons from 8BitDo in order to convert it to Xbox layout ABXY. Features: Face buttons are standard membrane. dpad is old school feeling membrane with center pivot. Profile switch and home buttons are tactile. Triggers are hall effect and have good resistance to me (subjective). Special Features: The standout features that attracted me to this controller were.... - Hall Effect Joysticks - Multiple Game Profiles - Mappable Back Buttons - Wakes switch (was the first 8BitDo to do so!) In general, all of these features work as advertised, though compared to some other options, I would say the mappable back buttons are not as capable as other controller options today. 8BitDo software kind of has a macro builder where you build your macro, rather than other options that let you just record the inputs. This makes it such that there's no way to create macros which rely on buttons being held while others are being pressed, one button must end before the next begins. This unfortunately limited it's functionality for me in games like FFXIV, in which the trigger buttons must be held down to execute skills. By the time I switched to this controller though I was no longer raiding, so that limitation didn't end up being a deal breaker for me and it was still better than needing to buy a third party application to make macros at all, so I'll give it a pass. Shake to wake with Switch is a bit hilarious, but it works. QC / Durability Concerns: I haven't had any issues with this controller at all. There is wear from the plastic to plastic rub of the joystick with the controller face, but otherwise it generally looks fine. Maybe get black if you are concerned with grime and don't clean your controllers often. Functionality: In general, I have nothing to complain about as far as functionality. Everything works solidly, though the resolution of the hall effect sticks is certainly lower than the resolution of the Xbox Elite 2. You can tell this when you do operations such as changing the time of day in Genshin Impact - you can easily get it to register minute by minute with the Elite 2, but usually the 8BitDo Ultimate skips a few minutes when you rotate it. My my case, this does not affect game play, but perhaps if you need the ultimate level of precision this controller may not be suitable for you. A staple of my controller reviews... the Tetris dpad test. I play games on Tetris at as fast of a pace as I can (I'm roughly a 1 minute sprinter in modern Tetris games) and see how many false hard drops I get. Generally, 8BitDo controllers do well in this test for me, but I seem to be more prone to make accidental hard drops on this controller than I do on the Pro 2. In general though, this controller would fall somewhere below Xbox Elite 2 with cross dpad installed, other options with tactile / clicky dpads, and the 8BitDo Pro 2 (my current go to)... probably a little worse than the IINE Candy Pop controller I recently reviewed, but certainly not embarrassing like the Switch Pro controller. In Conclusion: For the price of this controller I think you get a lot from it, but if you are looking for a PC controller today I'd probably go with another option. If you are looking for a Switch Pro alternative though, I think this is still a pretty good option. It's very responsive on Switch and I still use a limited edition variant of this controller on Switch today. For PC though, I think there are better options for not a lot more of your hard earned money. Still though if this is your only option, I can recommend it as a solid reliable option. If PC is your intent though and you won't play on Switch ever, you can save $10 by getting the 2.4G version of the controller and you'll have the Xbox layout by default. Back when I bought this one, that variant didn't have hall effect joysticks, but now it does so you don't really lose any functionality except Switch connectivity.