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Review cover Varmilo Minilo98 Pro Mechanical Keyboard GBAtemp review
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Product provided by Varmilo for the purpose of review.
A quiet keyboard that offers both a number pad and ISO layout options, we take a look at Varmilo’s versatile Minilo98 Pro.

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If there’s one comment I get whenever I post a keyboard review, it’s that people wish it had a number pad. It makes sense. With the vast majority of mechanical keyboards foregoing the extra keys to make for a more compact design, your options tend to be incredibly limited. But what if you want all the luxuries a modern mechanical keyboard has to offer, and also can’t go without those sweet 16 or so keys? And worse yet, what if you want a keyboard that can cater to your unnatural ISO needs? Let’s talk about the Minilo98 Pro.

The Basics

Taking the keyboard out of the box, we’re looking at an ISO layout 98% design. Let’s just break that down quickly. The majority of your custom mechanical keyboards on the market are ANSI layout, or more familiarly, US layout. This means you have a longer left shift key, and a long return key. There’s a few more things shuffled around, but those are the two big things. The ISO layout by comparison, more commonly seen in the UK and EU, has a shorter left shift key to allow for another key to go between it and the Z key, the the very recognisable tall return key. You’ll see a lot of variation between various ISO keycaps, with each featuring a unique assortment of characters useful to their respective languages, but at the very least the key positions will remain consistent.

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The 98% layout is something we’ve looked at before with NuPhy’s Halo series. This is basically the smallest keyboard layout you can find that still retains the number pad I know some people covet so much. To save some desk space the arrow keys are moved to the left, and the cluster of six keys that sit between the main alpha keys and the number pad has been removed. Insert, Delete, PgUp, and PgDn are relocated to being above the number pad, while Home and End are removed entirely. They aren’t really the most commonly used keys, so this is unlikely to be a huge loss for most people. If you do need them though, there are mapped by default to live on “Fn+,” and “Fn+.” respectively. This can be configured, but we’ll wrap back around to that later.

On the surface an ISO keyboard with a number pad might not sound all too exciting, but I just want to highlight how few options there are for people wanting both of these things with the regular luxuries of a modern mechanical keyboard. The only other brand I’m aware of with similar offerings are Keychron, and even then a lot of their range are currently out of stock. It’s great to see another player in this space, especially with a keyboard like this.

Premium Plastic?

The Minilo98 Pro features a plastic body with a gold metal frame wrapping around the keys. The sandy beige colour of the body ties in nicely with the included keycaps for a really nice overall aesthetic. The PBT keycaps are great to type on, with the characteristically smooth matte plastic feeling nice out of the box. Overall it’s a somewhat plain design, with the only branding from Varmilo being on a metal plate mounted to the under side of the keyboard, and a small lit logo on the front side. I’d describe it as a remarkably neutral style, with it not leaning in any particular direction to alienate a particular audience.

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For those who want it RGB lighting is here, though with the keycaps not being shine-through, the result is something of an underglow. I do think this kind of lighting can look good, but it does go against the keyboard’s more muted design for me, to the point where I’d really just prefer to leave it off. The lighting is notably south-facing though if you did look at this keyboard and feel like getting some more lighting-friendly keycaps for yourself. This does make sense, since you’d need south-facing LEDs to avoid issues with the Cherry profile keycaps it comes with. The trade-off is that if you do decide to get a shine-through design, most of these are designed for north-facing LEDs. This leads to the light that does get through the legends being dimmer than it should be; there’s really trade offs for both styles.

We also see support for both both wired and wireless connectivity, giving you the choice between an included 2.4GHz USB dongle and three Bluetooth profiles. You can swap between these easily using the Fn key and 1-4 on the number row. It’s a shame to see there being no place to store the USB dongle in the keyboard itself, but I am at least grateful for the Bluetooth connectivity. If you have a laptop with a slightly sunk in keyboard, the Minilo98 Pro’s rubber feet do a great job of just sitting on the laptop frame for a really nice portable mechanical keyboard experience. I’ve had a great time using it with my 16 inch laptop for work.

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Under the hood we’re looking at a hot-swappable board, with three switch configurations to choose from at checkout. The ones we have here are the Kailh Prestige Silents, but Kailh’s Prestige Voice and Prestige Light V2s are also available. Despite the name, I’m not sure I’d call the Prestige Silents necessarily silent. And I’m not entirely sure that’s a bad thing. This is my first experience with silent switches as a whole, and they are a little odd. You get something of a mushy bottom out to them, this to the best of my knowledge due to there being dampening materials within the switches themselves. With what I had heard before giving this a go, I wasn’t certain I’d really get on with them. Having said that though, the sound and feel really are something to enjoy. I would describe it as a muted thock, with the silent switches supported by a whole lot of foam, silicone, and padding, alongside a gasket mount, to help in dampening the larger sound profile. It’s a really good showing with a sound that, while not necessarily silent, isn’t necessarily obnoxious. This is a keyboard I could definitely get away with using in an office environment.

Customising the Experience

Though I am content with how it sounds out of the box, it is worth mentioning that this isn’t a keyboard that’s particularly easy to open up. If you did want to customise the sound a little more to your liking, you’d be faced with a whole heap of pain and struggle. You see this keyboard doesn’t make use of screws to hold it together. Instead the plastic sides are mounted to the bottom with clips that need to be pried apart. It’s not an easy process, and I’ll be open in saying I didn’t try it myself in not wanting to damage the keyboard. This difficulty in opening the keyboard wouldn’t hinder your ability to swap out the switches or keycaps, but any work going deeper than that would be relatively frustrating. Thankfully the same can’t be said for the software side of things.

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The Minilo98 Pro supports QMK and VIA, which is pretty much a gold standard for software customisation. These are open tools, with VIA in particular being simple to use via its web app. You plug the keyboard in, load a json file provided by Varmilo, and you’re able to edit every mapping the keyboard has to offer. If you’re not somebody who actually uses a number pad, you can instead decide to use this real estate for macros or for enabling multiple function layers. With everything being saved directly to the keyboard and not requiring any software running in the background, it’s easy to make a change and use the keyboard from machine to machine.

Expensive for a Plastic Keyboard?

I really have enjoyed using Varmilo’s Minilo98 Pro, but with any keyboard the big question really is whether it’s worth what they’re charging for it. The £136 (£122 for those wanting ANSI layout) asking price at face value does seem quite high, especially for a keyboard with a plastic body. In reality though, if you need both an ISO layout and a number pad, this is a competitive offering. Especially so if you need a less common ISO keycap set to go with it. The best comparison I could find was Keychron’s V5 Max at £99, and even then you’re limited to just Gateron’s Jupiter Red and Banana switches, and UK, Nordic, and DE ISO. Varmilo did a good job here, and assuming you’re happy with not opening the keyboard up, I really don’t have much of a reason to avoid recommending it.

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If you are interested in checking out the keyboard for yourself, Varmilo have provided a discount code to net you a small saving of 5%. We don’t get any kind of kickback from this, so you’re free to use or not use it as you see fit. I will note that this is a fairly common thing for Varmilo to do, so if you come back to this later and find the code doesn’t work, you might yet be able to net a little off by looking for a more recently posted review.

Verdict

What We Liked ...
  • Very nice overall aesthetic
  • Keycaps feel great to type on
  • Silent switches paired with various foams and layers make for a nice muted sound profile
  • RGB lighting
  • Good wireless connectivity options
  • Hotswappable switches
  • Remappable with QMK and VIA
  • A lot of keycap options for ISO users
  • Has a number pad!!!
What We Didn't Like ...
  • Plastic body might put some off at this price
  • Difficult to open up if you wanted to customise beyond keycaps and switches
8
out of 10

Overall

Varmilo have a really nice keyboard here. Sure you can say it's a little expensive for something with a plastic body, but you do get something of a complete package here. The option for an ISO layout on a keyboard with a number pad is something of a rarity in itself, and I'm glad to say this is one worth checking out if you happen to fall into both of those camps.
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Ericzander
You had me at "number pad."

Way too many keyboards these days don't have one. I was just thinking about getting a new keyboard earlier today. I don't think I can justify this one at this price point but... Maybe.
 
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Scarlet
Ericzander said:
You had me at "number pad."

Way too many keyboards these days don't have one. I was just thinking about getting a new keyboard earlier today. I don't think I can justify this one at this price point but... Maybe.
Click to expand...
Keychron are a decent alternative that’s slightly cheaper, but keyboards with a numpad do seem to come at something of a premium more than not.
 
ZeroT21
People nowadays collect these keyboards like rare collectibles. Maybe I'm just old and don't get the trend :rolleyes:
 
Scarlet
ZeroT21 said:
People nowadays collect these keyboards like rare collectibles. Maybe I'm just old and don't get the trend :rolleyes:
Click to expand...
For most people getting one keyboard and sticking with it is generally the plan.

Between programming for a living and writing here for a hobby though, I spend most of my day using one. I just love that renewed joy for typing I get when moving between the different models I own.
 
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