The SteelSeries Arctis Nova Gaming Headset Family: Three Years Later

Did any of the hi-res promises come true?

The Arctis Nova Pro Wireless is built on a solid audio foundation, though the marketing is all over the place. Photo taken by the author.

Danish company SteelSeries takes their time with their gaming headset lineup, preferring careful iteration over regular yearly releases. Rather than throw out stuff that worked in the past, a lot of their tech comes forward. I think that’s great.

This design process helped usher in the modern era of “premium headset combined with a breakout DAC box with console connections” years ago with the Siberia 800, alongside the early stuff from Astro.

That same little Siberia control box returned for 2018’s Arctis Pro Wireless, then got a slight upgrade for 2022’s Arctis Nova. All three boxes offer a similar set of features, but with additional modern refinements heaped on top each time. Their best feature is a little battery charger built into the side that lets you hot swap between two batteries, with one always charged and ready to go.

I love this engineering side of the company. I think it’s totally okay to bring over past innovations that still make sense for current customers. I don’t love the way that they also try to build new marketing hype around each release, often attached to the industry’s favorite marketing tool: hi-res audio.