Gateron Mink Switch Review

The Sunday has finally arrived when I am back in the saddle yet again. Even though it has only been a couple of weeks since the last true-to-form review post of mine, it certainly has felt like a long time since I sat down to shove a proper one of these together. Perhaps this is a function of me being so busy with classes and research over the past few weeks that I’ve hardly had time to think about much else besides those subjects, though more likely than not its due to this process of sitting down to write becoming such a part of my weekly routine. After having done this pretty regularly for the better part of two years now, it really does feel as if this is just what I’m supposed to do during the weekends, sandwiched in between laundry and grocery shopping. Hell, even on weekends in which I am bit stretched to get content together I get ever tempted at reviewing that jar of Cherry MX Blues on my shelf just for the hell of it. Maybe I’ll finally get around to it one special day when I’ve had a bad week and really feel the need to punch down on some clickjacket switches with prejudice.

**Figure 1:** Not quite the correct way, but at least the spirit is there.

As many of you may have seen, while this is my first weekend in awhile in which I’ve posted proper content, it is not the first time I’ve posted this week. A couple days ago for April Fool’s Day I posted a review of the new ‘Ultraclearine’ switches taking heavy satirical shots at both my writing style and some of the tropes that have come about over the sum total of my reviews thus far. While many of you were thankfully appreciative of and engaging with this content like many people in the keyboard community are with April Fool’s content, I feel the need to state out in the open that this was in fact intentionally done. The review was not an accident or a leaked draft. Seemingly unnecessary to the vast majority of you reading this today, I am including this in the introduction as an attempt to hopefully stave off the number of DMs I’m receiving letting me know that my photos for my review are not properly loading. In the spirit of me personally enjoying keyboard-related April Fool’s content, as well, here’s a small, compiled list of some of my favorite content, designs, and jokes that were shared from the community this year with all of the images below being hyperlinked to their original posting location.

**Figure 2:** Cherry’s new ‘bar stem’ switch with matching GMK keycaps.

**Figure 3:** The ‘NoRest’ wrist rest Geekhack IC render.

**Figure 4:** The ‘NoBoard’ 0% Keyboard Geekhack IC render.

**Figure 5:** GMK Why kitting render for Geekhack IC.

**Figure 6:** DCS Windbreaker kitting render for Geekhack IC.

Switch Background

As previously alluded to in other switch reviews from early 2022, the sum total of releases in switches this year seems to be favoring the larger, more well established switch manufacturing brands. Whereas previous years have seen the rise of ‘modern’ brands such as Tecsee and Durock/JWK, as well as more budget oriented brands such as KTT more recently, many of the more successful switches released in the first quarter of 2022 are coming from either Gateron or Kailh. While a brief run through of all of the Kailh switches produced in the first quarter of this year was done previously in the Kailh Christmas Tree Switch Review, I have yet to do such a compilation for that of Gateron switches and with good reason. With many of the switches in the Kailh review having yet to be delivered due to shipping and manufacturing delays related to the COVID-19 pandemic and worldwide material shortages of just about everything, the majority of my reviews this year have been focused on Gateron’s expansion of offerings and switch developments. As can be seen here from this latest review, it would appear that this pace isn’t exactly slowing up any time soon, either.

What is interesting about this development of Gateron’s full line of switches over the course of the past few months, aside its explosive growth relative to that of previous years of production, is that it doesn’t exactly appear to be following any sort of predictable pattern. Comparably smaller brands such as Tecsee, for example, have demonstrated loose patterns in releases in previous years, releasing dozens of switches with a new material, stem length, or mold scheme shortly after debuting it in a rather successful switch in one way or another. While not all Tecsee switches would take on these characteristics that were extremely popular in the debuting switch, its hard to not recognize the close timing of switches released with long-pole stems after their initial debut success. Much to the same degree with the very successful releases of the Azure Dragon and Vermillion Firebird switches in late 2021, which featured improved tolerances, a new set of top housing molds with inverted nameplates, and more consistent factory-applied lubrication, Gateron produced several more switches featuring these details in the months to follow. Taking one or more of the initially debuted characteristics from these switches, releases of the Gateron X, Chinajoy (CJ), Oil King, and Holy Panda X switches were all quite widely accepted and successful even with their heightened prices as a result of these improvements. However, in the time between the release of the Azure Dragon/Vermillion Firebird duo, not all Gateron switches have featured these improvements.

**Figure 7:** (L-R, Top-Bot) Gateron Holy Panda X, Oil King, CJ, and Gateron X switches - all highly successful Gateron sales from late 2021 to early 2022.

Over the same span of time in which these highly successful switch designs were released, Gateron also has released and/or produced switches such as the Soldarks, Minis, and Mochis all in addition to continuing to sell their normal, OEM style offerings. Without any notable improvements or mold changes made to their OEM offerings in this time, these aforementioned switches in this paragraph all seem to occupy a different direction of Gateron’s releases which appear to be less dedicated at improvement or change. (This is of course with exception to the tactility the SolDark switches, which are notably different than that of prior Gateron releases due to a specific mold change in the stem.) In a very broad stroke, the Soldarks, Minis, and Mochis have thus all taken on slightly lower price points than that of the Gateron X, CJ, and Oil King switches and appear to be targeted more towards ‘budget friendly’ options than ‘premium’ ones. Even this dividing line gets fuzzy, though, when considering that there are switches on both sides of this line which have features that make them less like their side and more like the other. As mentioned already, the SolDark switches have a notedly different stem design which takes on much more of a premium, custom feel than the likes of the Mochis or Minis. Contrastingly, the Gateron CJ stems appear rather plain in design and feature very little uniqueness to them relative to that of other Gateron linears. Throwing an ever further curveball into all of this, Gateron X switches are not only intentionally designed to be more like that of the true “budget kings” in Gateron Yellows, but yet they still have entirely unique mold features that separate them from all switches listed thus far. Needless to say, this added complexity turned what was originally an easy dividing line into one hell of a confusing Venn diagram.

**Figure 8:** You know, something like this.

Yet here at the most recent and present iteration of Gateron made switches, we’re presented with the Gateron Minks. First released with little prior announcement in early February of 2022, these milky topped, pink-ish stemmed switches were first stocked by Mekibo (formerly TX Keyboards) at a price of $0.75 per switch with subsequent proxy vendors picking up sales of the Minks at $0.80 per switch shortly thereafter. Featuring the milky top over opaque, black bottom housing design seen most recently in Gateron X switches, the Gateron Minks appeared outwardly to be continuing the ‘new and improved’ offerings of Gateron given their similar price tag to the aforementioned “premium” switches listed above. However, the sales pages of both Mekibo and associated proxy vendors appear to point to the Minks being surprisingly similar to that of previous offerings from Gateron featuring non-inverted nameplate molds, housings made of ‘Gateron Ink’ material and identical 62g. bottoming out springs that are already present in Gateron Yellow switches. Regardless of the confusing overlap between between the recent “premium” and “budget” offerings from Gateron, in the first few months following their release the Gateron Minks seem to pick up a rather decent amount of attention from the community, being featured in several typing test videos as well as other content creator reviews in that short span of time. While currently out of stock on Mekibo’s sale page as of the exact instant in which this sentence is being written, the fact that these switches have been restocked at least once already appears to indicate that these will be offered for some undetermined length of time into the future.

Gateron Mink Switch Performance

Appearance

At the highest level, the Gateron Mink switches arrive in a milky top housing over opaque, black bottom housing featuring a lavender-ish, pink-ish colored stem that seems like one of those colors that males are incapable of properly naming or identifying. Falling in line outwardly with the schemes of the Gateron X and KS-3-X47 switches previously made by Gateron, these switches don’t have any unique identifying features which immediately separate them from other previous releases at this high of a level. As can be seen in the following paragraphs, it doesn’t appear that this changes at the more detail-oriented level for these switches, either.

**Figure 9:** Stylized Gateron Mink switch photograph.

Looking first at the top housings of the Minks, they come in the classic milky, translucent style color scheme which has been a large attractor of Gateron switches throughout their entire history. Often lauded for their improved sound qualities over that of other switches from Gateron such as that of the entirely opaque black KS3 switches or the transparent over opaque black housings of the KS8 switches, these appear no more or less similar to previous milky top housings on a mold detail level. Much like other previously released switches, the Mink top housings feature the ‘normal’ north to south facing nameplate design and a tight LED window with circular recess specifically designed for SMD diodes. Internally, the top housings come with a fairly bog-standard set of design features, with the only detail of note being that of the two, singular capital letter mold markings in the upper left- and right- hand corners underneath the nameplate region.

**Figure 10:** Gateron Mink top housing external design featuring traditional Gateron nameplate and narrow, circularly indented LED slot.

**Figure 11:** Gateron Mink top housing internal design featuring mold markings in upper corners underneath nameplate region.

Moving next to the stems of these switches, it is worth noting that they are supposedly manufactured using the ‘Gateron Pro’ stem molds according to the Mekibo sales page. With that in mind, the outwardly apparent details of the stem appear to corroborate this sales claim. The Mink stems feature non-tapered slider rails, an ever so slightly tapered central pole, and a pair of medium sized ejector mold markings above the legs of the stem similar to that of other Pro linear switches. An additional feature worth noting here, which was first documented in my Holy Panda X Switch Review, is that of the double, adjacent notches in the stem of the Minks. Completely identical as to how it was described in the HPX review, there appears to be a random distribution of N/E and N/W stem notch combinations present in my received batch with no notable performance differences between them. A final detail to note here which will be discussed further on in the article is that the Mink stems did not come prelubed from the factory.

**Figure 12:** Gateron Mink stem showing mold ejector circles, non-tapered slider rails, and lightly tapered central poles.

**Figure 13:** Gateron Mink stem housing notches in both N/W (left) and N/E (right) configurations.

Finally arriving at the bottom housings of these switches, they yet again bare no uniquely identifying details nor features which would separate them from previous Gateron releases. Both internally and externally, the molds for these bottom housings appear exactly identical to that of the Gateron Oil King switches from both a feature and feature-location perspective. Internally, there are two pairs of differently sized mold ejector circles as well as a slightly protruding semicircular bump at the bottom of the slider rails ostensibly to help dampen the bottoming out of the stems. Externally, the bottom housings feature PCB mounting pins, a pair of single, capital letter mold markings in the far left- and right- hand sides of the LED pin-out regions, as well as the large, horizontal ‘GATERON’ anticounterfeit stamp between the leaf pins. Purportedly, these housings are also made out of the same thermoplastic as that of Gateron Ink switches, which makes them even further similar to that of the Oil King switches.

**Figure 14:** Gateron Mink bottom housing internal design showing padded bottoming out region, mold ejector circles, and ejector marks around upper rim.

**Figure 15:** Gateron Mink bottom housing external design showing pair of single letter mold markings in LED pin-out region, PCB mount pins, and GATERON anticounterfeit mark.

Push Feel

As a modern, Gateron-made linear switch, the Gateron Minks certainly pull no punches with respect to their good and bad aspects as linears. On the good side of things, even when coming factory unlubed they are rather smooth and don’t appear to have any overarching scratch in any of the switches that I’ve tried across the batch that I received. While they certainly don’t feel smooth in the same way that a switch would feel if it were factory lubed or lubed by hand, I don’t think anyone would pick up these switches and initially describe them as scratchy. As well, the bottoming out onto the Ink-like thermoplastic material is certainly muted, thick, and firm in a similar fashion as to what many people have come to appreciate in the Oil King switches. On the not so good side of things, the housing collisions of the Minks are certainly more unbalanced than that of many of the recent Gateron switch releases, with the topping out feeling a bit thin, sharp, and ‘poppy’ compared to that of the relatively solid bottoming out of the switch. While this isn’t altogether unexpected from this material top housing nor Gateron switches as a whole, it certainly does give off a bit of a cheap, non-premium aesthetic to the switch when comparing them to similarly priced Gateron switches that are concurrently being sold.

While I always review, compare, and score the stock performances of switches rather than that of the aftermarket modified versions, every now and then I feel compelled to test out the switches in their modified format in order to see how much they might improve on the issues that I see with them. To that end, the Gateron Mink switches do rather decently improve on some of the metrics noted above in the previous paragraph after a decent amount of applied aftermarket lubrication. While I don’t particularly think the thickness nor branding of lube used is critical to the Mink’s improvement, putting them more in line with other premium, factory-lubricated linears required more effort and lube than one might initially suspect. This is especially true if the aim of one’s aftermarket lubrication in the Minks is to improve some of the housing collisions and overall ‘thinness’ of the top housings, which took on a significantly greater amount than attempting to simply improve the smoothness of the switches.

Sound

While I often start out the ‘Sound’ section description with meta-level fourth wall breaks pointing to the near meme level of repetition I’ve gotten out of the phrase “the sound matches that of the push feeling”, I hate to say I’m adding another one to the tally here. Maybe I’ll even get around to getting a shirt made with the phrase, too. With that in mind, the Gateron Mink switches sound smooth throughout the stroke with a decently muted bottoming out and plasticky, nearly pointed topping out. Breaking each of those component apart, the switches sound ‘smooth’ in that there is no noise from scratch nor is there any noticeably spring nor leaf ping across any of the switches that I tried, as well as at any of the actuation speeds that I tried. The bottoming outs, as described already, are rather muted and firm though on the same level as things such as Oil Kings or Gateron Inks, and not so much that of KS3 style Gateron switches which feature a much more bass-centric nylon sound. The topping out of the Minks, unfortunately, is their weakest point regardless of the longstanding community fondness for milky housings. Compared to both the bottom housings as well as other switches entirely, the topping out has a bit of a mid to high pitched, slightly plasticky tone that is rather flat instead of sharp like that typically associated sound that thin polycarbonate housings produce. While not exactly the most grating nor irritating of a sound, it certainly does make the switches sound a bit ‘cheaper’ and more flimsy, even if that is not necessarily directly matched to their push feeling.

Wobble

Regarding the stem wobble in the Gateron Minks, it is unfortunately rather far from the excellence on this metric that recent Gateron switches have had. While this is perhaps slightly less surprising when considering that the Minks do not feature the same inverted Gateron nameplate housings which have become indicative of improved tolerances and less stem wobble, the wobble in the Minks is still flat out poor on an absolute scale. With a moderate, potentially problematic amount of stem wobble in both directions that is slightly greater in magnitude in the N/S direction, I would imagine users particularly picky with respect to stem wobble or using taller profile caps will not like the wobble on these switches. Additionally, there is a pretty wild swing in terms of consistency in stem wobble across the batch of switches I’ve received, with many switches being significantly better than, and a tiny bit worse than this sort of average metric which I’ve chosen to describe here.

Measurements

If you’re into this level of detail about your switches, you should know that I have a switch measurement sheet that logs all of this data, as well as many other cool features, that can be found under the ‘Archive’ tab at the top of this page or by clicking on the card above. This sheet typically gets updated weekly on mail days, and has been a subtle project I’ve been developing for some time now!

Break In

Break In Notes

17,000 Actuations

- Perhaps showing a distinct oversight in the design of the break in chart, while the smoothness of the stroke of the Minks didn’t necessarily improve after 17,000 actuations versus that of the stock switch, what did improve was some of the roughness in the topping out. Even after just this little bit of break in time (~1 hour) the topping out noticeably mellows out and deepens both in terms of push feeling and overall sound.

- Surprisingly, the stem wobble in either direction for any of the switches tested was not able to be blindly separated from that of stock switches after having actuated them for this length of time. In previous reviews of other switches, stems have tended to become more wobbly after any amount of dedicated break in time.

34,000 Actuations

- The same note mentioned above in the 17,000-actuation section further applies here to the switches that were actuated for twice as long with respect to a comparison to them in their stock form. Comparing the 17,000 and 34,000 actuation switches against each other, there doesn’t appear to be as much of a noticeable improvement in the feeling and sound in the top housings as opposed to comparing either of them to the stock Gateron Minks.

- At 34,000 actuations, slight increases in stem wobble, and especially that in the E/W direction become apparent in the Mink switches relative to that of their stock form.

51,000 Actuations

- At 51,000 actuations, the strange improvement to the topping out of the switches gets even a tiny bit better though only with respect to sound rather than the push feeling. At this point, a pretty noticeable amount of the ‘cheap’ tones noted in the review above are substantially reduced, leaving the switches with a sound more in line with that of the mental expectation of milky Gateron housings.

- Beyond this slight improvement in topping out sound at 51,000 actuations, there really isn’t anything different about these versus that of the switches actuated out to 34,000 cycles.

Comparison Notes to Other Notable Linear Switches

Note – These are not aimed at being comprehensive comparisons between all factors of these switches as this would simply be too long for this writeup. These are little notes of interest I generated when comparing these switches to the Gateron Minks side by side.

If you would like to learn more about these switches, I’ve already completed reviews or scorecards for some of them. If the names below are highlighted in a grey color, click them to be taken to my other content or reviews on them!

Gateron Oil King

- In terms of overall loudness, which is almost entirely driven here by the topping out, the Minks are noticeably louder than the Oil Kings in their stock form. After actuating them past 34,000 actuations though, the difference in overall volume between the two switches drops rather substantially.

- In terms of stem wobble, the Oil Kings are better in both the N/S and E/W directions than even the best Gateron Mink switches.

- Even though the Oil Kings are factory lubricated whereas the Minks are not, surprisingly the stock smoothness between these two switches isn’t as far apart as one might imagine. While the Oil Kings are definitely “smoother”, it isn’t as if they feel hand-lubed compared to that of the Minks.

C3 Equalz Tangerine V2 (62g)

- While both switches are similar to each other in terms of their overall volume, the Tangerine V2s definitely have a bit more of a ‘sharpness’ to their high-pitched tones that the Minks simply do not have.

- In terms of stem wobble, the Tangerine V2s have less N/S and E/W direction stem wobble than the Gateron Mink switches.

- In terms of stock smoothness, the Tangerine V2 switches definitely feel less resistant and more ‘frictionless’ than that of the Gateron Minks, even though the Minks themselves are not scratchy switches in the slightest.

KTT Strawberry

- Regarding the (lack of) stem wobble of the KTT Strawberry switches, it’s almost entirely unfair to compare them to the Minks as they simply blow them out of the water in both N/S and E/W directions.

- While the KTT Strawberries are perhaps a slight bit more dampened than the Minks, the bottoming out of these two switches is the most similar between that of any of the other comparisons made here.

- With respect to the sound of the switches, the KTT Strawberries are not only significantly quieter than that of the Minks, but also have a much deeper, bass-heavy sound at bottoming out.

Novelkeys Cream

- In terms of sound, the Novelkeys Cream switches are, as many of you have instantaneously assumed, noticeably more scratchy sounding than that of the Minks. With respect to their pitch, though, the Novelkeys Creams have a slightly higher pitched and sharper tone to them than the Minks both at bottoming out and topping out.

- In terms of stem wobble, the Novelkeys Cream switches are better than the Minks in both the N/S and E/W directions, though the E/W directional difference is pretty small relative to that of the comparisons made elsewhere in this list.

- Novelkeys Cream switches begin to approach and nearly match the smoothness of stock Gateron Mink switches after a pretty substantial length of time breaking them in.

Momoka Frog V3

- While the Momoka Frog V3 switches are substantially smoother in their stock form than that of the Gateron Mink switches, they feel slightly more ‘gummy’ throughout the stroke as a result of the factory lube application.

- The stem wobble on the Momoka Frog V3 switches, and especially in the E/W direction is better than that of the Gateron Mink switches.

- The bottoming out of the Frog V3 switches is not only thinner than that of the Minks, but has a much more sharp feeling due to the stem impact upon bottoming out.

WS Aurora Pink (Unlubed)

- While the Aurora Pink switches are a bit louder than the Gateron Minks at high activation speeds, the sound of the Aurora Pinks is a bit more ‘thick’ and solid sounding. This is certainly a strange juxtapose relative to what I would expect.

- In terms of overall smoothness, while these are both smooth in their stock form there is just a tiny bit more of a scratch like character present in the Aurora Pinks than the Minks.

- Much like with the Momoka Frog V3 switches, the bottoming out of the Aurora Pink switches is noticeably more sharp than that of the bottoming out of the Gateron Mink switches.

Scores and Statistics

Note – These scores are not necessarily completely indicative of the nuanced review above. If you’ve skipped straight to this section, I can only recommend that you at least glance at the other sections above in order to get a stronger idea of my opinion about these switches.