Every mechanical keyboard enthusiast worth their salt knows that all the choice in the hobby boils down to their personal preference. Broadly, you could categorize key switches as linear, tactile, and clicky based on the feedback they offer when pressed. All the switches flooding the market in myriad hues are merely offering you and me flavors of these three experiences, with variation in materials, colors, spring weight, and sound signature, among other things. However, there has to be at least one switch that just works for every user, no matter their application or requirement — a great starting point, you could say.

If you go by what manufacturers seem to push, clicky switches found in most bottom-of-the-barrel budget mechanical keebs would be the default starter switch. Honestly, I started there as well. However, they didn’t work for me, and after months of surfing Reddit, I switched to tactiles, hated them, then went to linear key switches and loved them. However, I began to crave some flair and variety in my everyday digital existence, spent clattering away at the keys, and so I went back to tactiles. I’ve come full circle, and now seem to understand why everyone seems to harp on the superiority of this family of switches to the point of elitism.

Everyone starts out with what prebuilts serve

A humble beginning

Just like with PCs, where you’ll seldom find a newbie assembling from a stack of parts from scratch, the mechanical keyboard market is split between pre-assembled keyboards for beginners and custom kits with options in the PCB, plate, case, and other components for experienced builders. There’s a reason even experienced tech YouTubers have struggled to finish custom keeb builds after diving into the deep end. While compatibility and standardization, or the lack thereof, play a big role, preference rears its ugly head as well.

I started with a clicky keyboard from an Indian brand called Zebronics because it was all that was shipping during the pandemic, and I needed hands-on time to understand what Taeha Types was going on about. It shipped with Outemu Blue switches so loud that the entire house and my neighbors could tell when I was at work. For my sanity alone, I quickly realized that there’s no point torturing my fingers and ears on a clicky board when I can move on to linear switches. At this point, I’d also realized my keyboard wasn’t hot-swappable, and I’d need an entirely new keyboard. Still penny-pinching, I bought the CIY Tester68 and slapped on everyone’s default favorite linear switch — some version of the Gateron Yellow. So far, what I did was because of preference, and born out of necessity.

This was a barebones hotswap keyboard, so I wasn’t tied to my choice indefinitely, and that felt comforting. I tried a few tactile switches intermittently, but kept returning to linears, going so far as to spring-swap and hand-lube Akko Jelly Black switches I typed on for nearly a year. The Gateron Yellows taught me that with light springs come mistypes, and stem wobble on cheap switches. Replacing the stock ~50g springs on the Akko with 68g Geon springs made a world of ‌difference to the overall consistent feel on the board.

Tactile switches are a touchy subject

The community stands polarized

While I used heavy linear switches, I did rotate between boards, sometimes using silent options like Gazzew Bobagums, Cherry MX Black switches, and a smattering of tactiles for variety. As much as I hate to admit it, the linears felt boring, and there was no feedback until I bottomed out every keypress. Clickies felt better in that regard, but I didn’t want to wake the neighborhood. At local community meets, I tried several tactile switches, including franken-switches and modified options, and some stood out.

However, I still couldn’t fathom why veterans in the community swore by tactiles. I always chalked it up to personal choice because tactile switches seemed to come in several flavors. The old-but-gold favorite, Cherry MX Browns, that lent this segment its colloquial name, “brown switches”, had a tactile bump so minor, it felt ticklish. At speed, Browns felt like slightly scratchy linear switches, but at the other end of the spectrum were heavy tactiles like the Kailh Box Royals, known as such because they had a tactile shelf instead of a bump, and not heavy springs. Switches like this felt like they’d bottomed out when I’d merely hit the tactile bump until it suddenly gave way when pressed down some more.

Acclaimed switch reviewer Thermingoat likens the Cherry switch to driving over a speed bump, and the Box Royal to driving off a cliff. In practice, the downward pressure needed to overcome the tactile bump on these switches was also comparable to the heavy linears I was accustomed to.

Amidst this chaos and the craving for switches that felt different under my fingers, I used a tactile switch, the Gateron EF Grayish, for several months because other keyboards I preferred were in various states of disrepair. Relying on the tactility for an extended period revealed it is far superior in several ways that go beyond user preferences.

Tactiles are indeed the superior switch

An acquired taste

Credit: Source: Theremingoat

Yes, I know I’m getting into the weeds here. However, tactile switches trained my mind to depend on the sensation from my fingers instead of the sound from my keyboard or the PC’s response to a registered keypress. The difference in the user experience boils down to a few milliseconds of response time, but there’s a significant upside. I can now tune out the sound of my keyboard like any other distraction. It might defeat the purpose of some builds painstakingly tuned for acoustic perfection, but this realization also meant I could use silent tactile switches far more efficiently than silent linears where the registered input was the only feedback each keypress got, until bottom out.

Feedback at the actuation point instead of the bottom of each keystroke also has the potential to make me a faster typist if I train myself to lift off as soon as I feel the tactile bump. I suspect this is already changing my typing at a subconscious level because I already associate sound with actuation from years of using linears, and tactile switches make a sound upon actuation instead, and again when they reach the end of the keystroke. Using the first sound as an acknowledgment of input should suffice.

While leaning towards those ticklish, near-linear tactile switches or those with an enormous bump is indeed down to user choice, there’s a distinct typewriter-like satisfaction in using these, as opposed to linear switches. They are the perfect middle ground between the feedback you get with a noisy switch packing a click-bar and the barren efficiency of a long-pole linear. The difference is so subtle and sensory, yet profound once the realization dawns.

You still have choices, and time to embrace the tactile life

In five years of my mechanical keyboard adventures, I’ve built boards from scratch many times with soldered switches like my first keyboard, this time because I’m confident in my selection. However, I now default to tactile switches. Yes, you may not like them immediately on your very first keyboard, but all I ask is that you give them some time and pay close attention to how your typing habits adapt to the change. For me, those pointers were evidence enough that tactile was my endgame switch.