A worthy replacement for Magic Mouse and even a trackpad. I’ve been using this wireless mouse on my Mac for five years now and am absolutely satisfied.

It’s sincerely difficult to understand why Apple considers the included Magic Mouse an ergonomic product. You probably use the Magic Trackpad yourself because it comes with your MacBook.

The original Apple mouse is small, cuts into your hand, and hurts your hands. It’s especially not suitable for games, but that’s important to me.

We launched an obituary for Magic Mouse back in 2022. But the 13-year-old accessory for 8,000 rubles in the white version and 11,000 rubles in the black version is still with us, and the other day the mouse was updated and transferred to USB-C.

When I started looking for a replacement, I decided to do the same as with the iPhone and Mac. I began to look for the best manufacturer, a model that was balanced in everything, reliable and preferably at a “real” price tag, albeit above average, but still adequate. But The most important thing is to replace Quick Gestures on the Mac trackpad.

And such a model was found. I use Logitech G502 Lightspeed Wireless since 2019. Still clicks and I’m pleased with it for many reasons.

First mouse to last for two years

When I decided to give up wired mice, I was ready to pay a decent amount (more on that later) just for a reliable option that wouldn’t fall apart in a year.

By that time, I had gained enough sad experience with sticking, turning wheels and inadequate acceleration. I’ve replaced about five mice of different categories over 7 years and am just tired of trash.

For reliable solutions, you need to go to sports, and not to manufacturers’ advertising websites. I started looking at the tops of mice that used the services of professional players and found some interesting options.

You may be surprised, but the top-end mouse that most athletes use looks like this:

I almost thought about this, but didn’t buy it. This is the most popular mouse among eSports athletes Logitech G Pro X Superlight. The official price is $140, on the Market it starts at an average of 10,000 rubles.

But I bought this one

In 2019, the best was almost the same model – Logitech G Pro.

If it is reliable, light and responsive, then not bad. But at that time, more than 12,000 rubles, I still wanted to find an option with wooden buttons and other interesting features.

The search continued and somehow I came across a monstrous and more “pop” Logitech flagship, which immediately appealed to me.

I liked the Logitech G502 Lightspeed Wireless because it has:

• Best sensor (so far) HERO 25K
• Lightweight
• Weight can be adjusted,
• The design is more catchy,
• There are 8 additional buttons
• Two wheel scroll modes
• For the same money.

I settled on it because I could get it for almost half the price.

It cost more than 12,000 rubles. I got a better deal

The mouse was lucky in its purchase; two factors came together.

In 2019, I had just returned from China and at that time I was already a confident TaoBao user. For those who don’t know, this is AliExpress for China.

Then I was already in Moscow, my friend from Shanghai was going to fly in for a visit, who then told you about the situation with covid in the country.

On TaoBao, Logitech G502 Lightspeed Wireless, instead of 12,000 rubles on the Market, cost only 668.5 yuan, at that time it was about 6,000 rubles. I sent the link to my friend, and a couple of days later she received the box and brought it to Russia.

Even now you won’t find new ones in Russia for this money.

A good price and a friend’s arrival on time played a big role in the purchase. For this reason, I appreciate the gadget more, but even at full price I would be happy with it. It turned out to be mega-universal.

Buttons have completely replaced the touchbar. This is almost impossible on regular mice.

We go deep into the implications in the Logitech G HUB app, which is one of the best features.

Here, in addition to destination functions such as backlight, sensor sensitivity and operating time adjustment, all this can be configured according to several profiles with automatic launch in the desired programs and games individually.

All 8 additional buttons have an application installed to simulate the trackpad and most private MacBook keys.

The strength of the trackpad on a Mac is that it supports a dozen different actions for switching between different desks, viewing open windows, bringing up the launcher, and so on.

The buttons name the most popular functions that are usually only available on the touchpad: Mission Control, Launchpad, switching desktops (Control + arrows), which cannot be done on a regular mouse.

And even more, two more keys have been preserved to assign them to switch between tabs in the browser (Command + Option + arrows), which I use all the time.

The operating time can be changed, the wheel can spin freely (optional)

The grip is as comfortable as possible, my hand has never gotten tired. The ability to turn the steering wheel left and right is a mega feature and is not set for the service life, as was the case in other cases.

The compartment for additional cargo at the bottom is hidden behind a magnetic-mechanical cover. I took all the weight off

The coolest thing is that profiles can be customized by switching for free in different programs. After there is a button to start the game, desktops changed, weapons began switching, and in Final Cut advertising was activated, cutting was done, and effects were opened.

There is another button, but it is already mechanical and cannot be reprogrammed. Responsible for changing the wheel scroll mode.

Instead of phase transferring it into free time. Convenient when you need to flip through large documents. There is, however, a drawback: the system still recognizes movement in phases, so it’s not a great option for every day.

Another advantage I would like to note is that the mouse runs on a built-in battery and not on batteries. If it runs out, you can connect it to the computer with any wire, and it will work.

More on the topic of charging. The backlight is fully controlled in the application; you can separately change the color, brightness and glow pattern of the logo and side diodes in the state of charge. The program instantly adjusts the expected operating time based on the settings and thereby allows you to prioritize the appearance and autonomy of these countries.

On average, I achieved that with a small glow and a slow, non-peripheral attention, you can get 49 hours of work out of 60 maximum values ​​​​without backlighting.

Yes, another charge status will finally be done if the setting is selected. But my mouse has not been working in this document for months.

True, not everything is perfect here. There are still some disadvantages.

Almost all the shortcomings are related to the annual release

We bought it in 2019 and didn’t bother with the intricacies then.

For literally the first two years I didn’t touch the programmable buttons under the system shortcuts. In the application, it was necessary to figure out how to create “macros”, how changing profiles works, and how to attach programs to them. Once I figured it out, it was worth it, but the settings menu needs to be made simpler.

The application itself works perfectly until it stops opening and hangs in eternal readiness. This happened several times, the last time happened when I was writing an article. Rebooting didn’t help, I had to go into the system files and blindly click on shortcuts. Surprisingly it worked.

The mouse only works via radio via an adapter; there is no Bluetooth connection. The fear of losing the adapter and being denied access is always there. And the convenient presence of a magnetic cover on the daytime mouse doesn’t particularly help; it’s annoying to slap it back and forth after each use.

The cramped shape and closed input and output ports make the mouse poorly compatible with modern computers, cables and power supplies.

Charging port on the built-in cable on the side of the mouse via Micro-USB, and on the other side via USB-A. The radio is also via USB-A. There are no words, only emotions.

The Micro-USB port inside the mouse is of a special trapezoidal shape; not all wires will fit there. The mount on the included cable is loose and does not fit well on the mouse.

It quickly became dirty due to a bunch of designer edges, cuts and inclusions throughout the entire area. Cleaning is inconvenient and requires special tools.

I recommend any mouse with a dozen buttons

My option, of course, is inflated by the budget, although it is convenient.

If you want something similar for Mac that completely replaces the trackpad functionality but for less money, just check out a mouse that has a lot of buttons. And so that you can definitely put any key combinations on them.

I am pleased with the Logitech G502 Lightspeed Wireless. It has already served longer than all the others, has never failed, was always ready to work and, most importantly, completely replaced the trackpad with its hidden features.

What other mouse can do this? Definitely not the Magic Mouse. This time is not to switch to USB-C, but to go to rest, to the hall of fame.

📸 All photos in the article: