SteelSeries Arctis Nova Elite Review: Gaming Overkill?

The base station has another neat trick; it can charge and house a second battery. I got almost 30 hours of use on a single charge, just short of SteelSeries’ quoted life, but as long as you’re near the base station, you essentially have infinite battery life. When the battery gets low, just swap the spare and the dead battery, and your headset will automatically turn back on and reconnect within a few seconds. The spare battery charges in less than two hours, and there’s a sneaky USB-C port on the left ear cup just in case you’re away from home for too long.

Finely Finished

Photograph: Brad Bourque

Fit and finish would be my other big reason to choose these over the Arctis Pro or BlackShark V3 Pro. The Arctis Elite are super sturdy, with an upgraded metal headband that feels really serious. While you could get them in black, you should instead opt for the sage and gold color. It’s instantly eye-catching and elegant, particularly among gaming headsets, which tend to be either dark and drab or excessively gamer-coded. Unfortunately, this feature-packed headset is also the heaviest I’ve tested yet at 380 grams, just about 10 grams heavier than the Razer. SteelSeries headbands are the most comfortable around, thanks to the “goggle band” suspension strap that helps spread the weight across the top of your head, but it can only do so much.

Meanwhile, the ear cups are made from faux leather that gets a little sweaty, especially over long gaming sessions. Razer has managed to crack the code on breathable ear cups and ANC, but the noise reduction in the SteelSeries is better as a result. The difference in comfort between these two will be a matter of preference, but I wouldn’t recommend either if you don’t have strong neck muscles.

If the price tag here gives you any pause at all, I think you should look at other options, including the excellent Nova Pro, which has a similar base station and app support. The $250-$350 gap between the Nova Elite and any other gaming headset is enough for a jump to a more powerful GPU, or to make a variety of smaller performance improvements across your system.

Ultimately, beyond the ability to connect more consoles, the upgrades are mostly meaningful for listening to music, and less impactful for gaming. For multi-console owners with deep pockets and an expansive music library, this is a feature-packed headset with no real competitors, but I know I’d have trouble finding room for them in my new PC budget.