Logitech G325 Lightspeed review: Punching way above its weight
The best cheap gaming headsets can deliver excellent in-game audio without breaking the bank, and the Logitech G325 Lightspeed is one such set of cans. Sporting a lovely, colorful design, the headset is extremely comfortable to wear for long periods of time. You get 24 hours of battery life, too, so it’s perfect for marathon gaming sessions. Thanks to multi-platform compatibility, it works with a range of consoles, including both PlayStation and Xbox.
For the most part, the in-game audio is superb. The treble and upper ranges are sharp and vibrant, giving you a competitive advantage in FPS and RPG titles. However, the sub-bass feels underwhelming, and the lack of a proper boom mic is less than ideal.
Logitech G325 Lightspeed review: Specs
|
Specs |
Logitech G325 Lightspeed |
|---|---|
|
Price |
|
|
Colors |
Lilac, Black, White |
|
Platforms |
PC, macOS, PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch 2, Nintendo Switch |
|
Connectivity |
Bluetooth 5.2, 2.4GHz dongle, USB-C wired |
|
Battery |
Rechargeable |
|
Battery life (rated) |
24 hours |
|
Frequency response |
20-20,000Hz |
|
Drivers |
32mm |
|
Multipoint connectivity |
No |
|
Paired devices max |
1 |
|
Microphone |
Built-in, omnidirectional |
|
Weight |
7.47oz |
Logitech G325 Lightspeed review: Cheat sheet
- What is it? A budget gaming headset compatible with practically every console and smart device
- Who is it for? For casual gamers on a budget
- How much does it cost? The Logitech G325 Lightspeed is available for $79 / £69
- What do we like? The extremely comfortable design, excellent in-game audio, multi-platform compatibility and long battery life
- What don’t we like? The creaking headband, slightly underwhelming sub-bass and absence of a proper microphone
Logitech G325 Lightspeed review: The ups
From its extremely comfortable ear cushions and headband to its in-game audio performance and multi-platform compatibility, the Logitech G325 Lightspeed is a formidable budget gaming headset.
Extremely comfortable
There are many areas the Logitech G325 Lightspeed excels, and it gets full points from me in the comfort department. If you’re on a budget, it’s the most comfortable headset you can buy. It weighs just 7.47oz, so it’s lighter than the likes of the Turtle Beach Stealth 500 (8.28oz, $79), the Cherry XTRFY H3 (11.46oz, $99) and the Cooler Master CH351 (14.24oz, $89).
The G325 Lightspeed’s low weight means that not only can you easily carry it while traveling, but it’s extremely comfortable to wear for long periods of time, as you don’t feel weighed down. The lightness is further bolstered by the breathable knit fabric plush headband, which feels soft to touch and relieves pressure on the top of your head. Its ear cushions are made of dual-layer memory foam, which feel breathable, and I didn’t notice any sweat pooling up or my ears heating up during extended playtime.
I’m not a fan of leatherette earcups, as they tend to get quite hot — something I experienced with the Turtle Beach Stealth 500. I much prefer memory foam ones, like the ones found on the G325 Lightspeed, so I have no complaints about the headset’s comfort. I wore it for an eight-hour-long gaming session and barely felt the G325 Lightspeed on my head and around my ears.
Girlypop or emo?
Another thing I really appreciate about the Logitech G325 Lightspeed’s design is that the headset comes in three different colors. You can pick it up in black, white or lilac. Logitech sent me the lilac model for testing, and I’d be lying if I said I didn’t love it. My go-to headset is the Razer BlackShark V3 Pro ($249), which sports an all-black design. It looks great, but all-black designs can feel boring after a while — not the G325 Lightspeed though. The lilac model also features accents of orange, seen on the volume up and down buttons as well as the cables emerging from the headband and making their way into the earcups — it’s so much fun.
Competitively priced
Before we move on to the Logitech G325 Lightspeed’s performance, I want to mention one very important buying factor: the headset’s price. The G325 Lightspeed is a budget, entry-level headset, and it retails for $79 at Amazon U.S. / £69 at Logitech U.K. It’s a fantastic set of cans to get if you’re a casual gamer who doesn’t want to spend hundreds on a competent headset.
I’ve tested my fair share of budget gaming headsets, and if there’s one cheap set of cans I had to keep, it would be the G325 Lightspeed. In contrast with the Turtle Beach Stealth 500, the G325 Lightspeed never gave me any connectivity issues. Compared to the Cooler Master CH351, I never felt uncomfortable wearing the headset. And unlike the Cherry XTRFY H3, you don’t need to worry about the G325 Lightspeed not being compatible with Xbox (though that headset does win in a few more areas, such as mic performance).
Multi-platform compatibility
If you own multiple consoles and smart devices and don’t want to buy separate headsets for each, the Logitech G325 Lightspeed should be right up your street. This headset is compatible with a plethora of consoles and devices, namely PC, macOS, PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X and S, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch 2, Nintendo Switch, Android and iOS.
The G325 Lightspeed features Bluetooth 5.2 to seamlessly connect to your phone or Nintendo Switch, and comes with a 2.4GHz Lightspeed USB-A dongle, which you can plug into the back of your PS5 (like I did) or your PC. You can also use it wired, thanks to the USB-C port on the left earcup, so you can plug it into your Xbox controller.
Many cheap headsets aren’t compatible with both Xbox and PlayStation, as you often need to choose the model at checkout, such as with the Turtle Beach Stealth 500, so this is a win for Logitech in my books.
Excellent in-game audio
The Logitech G325 Lightspeed is a formidable gaming headset when it comes to in-game audio quality. The headset features 32mm drivers that cover a frequency response range of 20Hz to 20,000Hz. This is fairly standard for a gaming headset, and it means that it can relay a wide array of sound frequencies, from soft footsteps up in the treble to loud explosions in the 20Hz sub bass range.
As I mentioned earlier, you can use the G325 Lightspeed wired or wirelessly. To test it, I plugged the 2.4GHz Lightspeed dongle into the back of my PS5 Slim, which was simple enough as the headset has a plug-and-play interface, and I had a stable connection throughout my testing — no connectivity issues to report here. I played a few games, namely Neva, Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, and Control. Throughout all three titles, the G325 Lightspeed did a fantastic job of reproducing the in-game soundscapes.
Neva
Neva is a 2D side-scrolling game that doesn’t feature much spoken dialogue, and the only time the protagonist, Alba, speaks is when she’s calling out for her cub, Neva. The emotional storyline banks entirely on the music and artistic graphics, so this game proved to be a great test for the headset. Needless to say, the G325 Lightspeed was up to the challenge.
The mid-range is where the G325 Lightspeed shines. I love how the headset captured the subtle shifts in Alba’s tone and voice when she’s calling out for her cub. In the first chapter, Summer, her voice sounded playful and high-pitched but never shrill, while in the later chapters, the headset excelled at delivering the desperation in her strained shouts. Even when Alba was mumbling at the beginning of the Winter chapter, I could hear her loud and clear, and could even hear the trembling in her voice, brought upon by the snow and cold.
Neva features a lovely soundtrack that can feel fun and emotional at different points of the game. The G325 Lightspeed made the violins and shimmering synth sound crisp and characterful. During combat sequences against the enemies, known as the Corruption, the G325 Lightspeed did a good job of balancing the bloated roars against the fast-paced soundtrack, and it never felt muddied or as though the soundscape had lost its cleanliness. Alba’s footsteps were still discernible and clear too, even when the soundtrack was loud.
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33’s reactive turn-based combat system is super fun, and while visual cues help you parry, audio cues are the secret to winning battles as each enemy has a distinct tell sound before an attack. These are often high-pitched, second-long sounds, which can be easily missed.
Because the G325 Lightspeed doesn’t have a bloated low-end, I found that these pings cut through the orchestral soundtrack with precision, and I could clearly hear them every time, regardless of the music playing in the background. To test out if it was my eyes helping me execute perfect parries or my ears, I closed my eyes and relied entirely on the headset to help me parry. Granted, I’ve played this game for over 150 hours, so I’m very familiar with the enemies I’m up against, but even so, the G325 Lightspeed gave me a competitive edge, and even with my eyes closed, I didn’t miss many parries.
This game also features one of the best gaming soundtracks of all time, with operatic, orchestral tracks soundtracking your battles and adventures. The G325 Lightspeed makes music sound crisp and pleasant, with violin harmonies feeling loud and clear, and Alice Duport-Percier’s ethereal vocals having plenty of warmth to them.
Respectable battery life
The cherry on top of the cake is the Logitech G325 Lightspeed’s battery life. Logitech claims the headset can last over 24 hours between charges, and this proved to be true in my testing. I only needed to charge the headset after 25 hours or so. This will, of course, depend on the usage conditions. I mostly played with the volume set to 40% or 50%, and the higher the volume, the quicker the battery will drain.
I will caveat this point by saying that the Turtle Beach Stealth 500 can last for up to 40 hours, the Cooler Master CH351 can last for 30 hours, and the Cherry XTRFY H3 has a battery life of a whopping 100 hours. In comparison, the G325 Lightspeed’s battery life is short-lived. However, since this is a budget headset aimed at casual gamers who are playing at home, I don’t think it’s a massive drawback. Of course, if you’re on the move and play a lot on your Switch while traveling, for instance, I’d recommend either the Turtle Beach or the Cherry headset mentioned above.
Logitech G325 Lightspeed review: The downs
Alas, the Logitech G325 Lightspeed isn’t perfect, as there’s a creaking sound when you move your head sometimes, and the lack of a proper microphone leaves a lot to be desired.
Creaking while moving
The Logitech G325 Lightspeed is an extremely comfortable headset, as I elaborated on earlier. However, in my testing, I noticed a creaking sound when I moved my head to either the left or the right, and it felt like the creaking was coming from the headband. I didn’t experience this very often, but there were a couple of instances.
This could be because of the headset’s plasticky build, which is disappointing. I also had this issue with the Turtle Beach Stealth 500 when I tested it, which is also quite a cheap-feeling headset. Although the G325 Lightspeed’s creaking didn’t bother me too much, I’d recommend spending the extra $20 on the Cherry XTRFY H3 if you think the creaking will get on your nerves.
(Slightly) underwhelming sub-bass
When I was testing the Logitech G325 Lightspeed, I was replaying Control in preparation for the then imminent release of Control: Resonant. A horror, sci-fi role-playing game, Control features many different sounds, many of which have been implemented to scare the player. While I enjoyed playing the game through the G325 Lightspeed, I’d be lying if I said the headset performed excellently here.
For the most part, it did really well. Action sounds, like my weapon firing, were loud and clear, as was dialog, with the voice inside Jesse’s head having a distinct, softer tone than the pointed words coming out of her mouth. But I immediately noticed that the G325 Lightspeed struggled with the sub-bass and lower frequencies.
The Hiss, your primary enemies in the game, are terrifying to listen to as they make chilling, alien-like sounds. When several of them were coming towards me and chanting in harmony, the low-end drone felt more like a buzz, and I couldn’t feel the environmental pressure that makes the Hiss so unnerving. The overall soundscape ends up feeling thin and hollow, and in a horror game where the environment is supposed to instill a bone-shaking fear in you, that’s no good.
Similarly, in Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, while the soundtrack sounds pleasant, the headset fails to capture the epic scale, as the orchestral thrum that usually gives me goosebumps sounds dialed back. For a more rounded gaming experience, I’d recommend the Cherry XTRFY H3, whose 53mm drivers have more surface area for better sub-bass.
No proper microphone
Last but not least, the Logitech G325 Lightspeed doesn’t feature a boom mic that can be retracted or detached, as seen on the likes of the Turtle Beach Stealth 500 and the Cherry XTRFY H3. Instead, the G325 Lightspeed features a built-in omnidirectional mic, and Logitech says that this “beamforming microphone is designed so your voice can be heard clearly.”
As you can hear in the clip above, the G325 Lightspeed’s mic can be described as merely okay. My voice sounds a little thin, and the vocal timbre feels flat and hollow. It lacks the warmth and richness of a dedicated boom mic, like the one you’ll find on the Cherry XTRFY H3, which is better, in my opinion.
It’s also important to note that the mic has a frequency response range of 100Hz to 7,000Hz, so it has a tendency to remove the bottom end of your voice, which can make deep voices sound more high-pitched than usual.
Omnidirectional mics pick up sounds from all around, and not just the sounds coming from your mouth, as unidirectional mics do. This can be disadvantageous, but the G325 Lightspeed features AI-powered noise reduction, which helps reduce some ambient noise. I tested this by playing an episode of House M.D. on my phone in the background, and while the headset does a decent job of highlighting my voice, there is some muddiness where it sounds like my voice and the characters’ voices are bleeding into one another.
Logitech G325 Lightspeed review: Verdict
As budget gaming headsets go, the Logitech G325 Lightspeed is one of the best you can buy today. It doesn’t give you a lot to complain about, especially in the design and comfort departments. I found the headset super comfortable to wear for up to eight hours, and the long 24-hour battery life meant that I didn’t need to worry about running out of charge mid-session.
When it comes to in-game audio quality, the G325 Lightspeed is fantastic, making footsteps sound loud and clear even when loud music is playing in the background. High-pitched sounds are never shrill or piercing through the headset. However, if you want better sub-bass for a more immersive experience, I’d recommend the Cherry XTRFY H3. The G325 Lightspeed doesn’t feature a boom mic either, and its built-in mic is just okay.
If you don’t mind these drawbacks, the G325 Lightspeed is still an outstanding choice for casual gamers on a budget. For less than $80, it certainly punches above its weight.
Source link
