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Games Hardware

Are Split Spacebars the Next Big Gaming Keyboard Trend? (pcgamer.com) 58

Posted by BeauHD from the more-keys-more-options dept.
"There are countless upgrades you could make to your gaming setup," writes PC Gamer's Jacob Ridley. "A wireless this, a bigger that, a faster thing. But how do you know what's going to be a genuine upgrade worth investing in? Personally, I think it might be split spacebars." His argument centers on the fact that spacebars take up a "greedy" amount of keyboard space -- space that could instead be divided into multiple keys for different actions, such as voice chat or melee attacks. From the report: While it's often very easy to reprogram your spacebar to do a different action via your keyboard's software, it's a lot harder to reprogram your brain to hit any other key when you try to jump in game. Spacebar makes you jump. Everyone knows that; it's practically etched onto your brain if you're a long-time mouse and keyboard player. So, why does a split spacebar help with that? It comes down to this: once you know which side of a spacebar you tend to thwack with your thumb, you can program the other side to do whatever you want. I hit the right-side of my spacebar every time when I'm typing. Therefore, when I started using a Wooting 60HE v2 with a split spacebar, I set the left-side to be the delete key; the keyboard lacking a dedicated delete key for its 60% size.

Though for gaming, the split spacebar offers much more varied purpose. People do strange things with the WASD keys that I won't litigate here, but I'm pretty sure most gamers use their left thumb to strike the spacebar for gaming. Right? Right. If you fall into this category, you have the option of using the right-side spacebar for things like a chunky melee key, or, my personal favorite, an in-game voice chat key.
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Are Split Spacebars the Next Big Gaming Keyboard Trend? More

Are Split Spacebars the Next Big Gaming Keyboard Trend?

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  • I immediately looked at the topic, and went: "Duh". Seems like an obvious thing.
    • Haven't I already seen split keyboards already that separate the keyboard into two sections? There are two spacebars in those models. Now none of the ones I have seen are created for gaming. The main selling point of those keyboards were ergonomics.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by jhoegl ( 638955 )
        Yes, these have been around for over 20 years.
        They are trying hard not to report on the DLSS5 cluster that is going on right now with nVidia.

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by EvilSS ( 557649 )
        Yes but do those keyboards send separate scan codes for the split spacebar, or allow remapping one of them?

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by wed128 ( 722152 )
          Some of them do allow them to be remapped arbitrarily (especially keyboards that support the QMK aftermarket firmware...)

      • Haven't I already seen split keyboards already that separate the keyboard into two sections? There are two spacebars in those models. Now none of the ones I have seen are created for gaming. The main selling point of those keyboards were ergonomics.

        From what I recall, there were only single spacebars in the center of a keyboard, while the rest of the keys were split longitudinally.

    • It is obvious, and gaming keypads have been around for ages.

      They talk about wasted keyboard space on a singular function and the solution is make it two buttons and continue using the thumb for one single function, seriously..

      Gaming keypads with analog sticks free up so much more functionality. Analog movement is superior in modern 3d games to clunky up down left right as if we're still playing mega man or something. Even if the game doesn't support analog movement the stick still moves four buttons to you

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by rahmrh ( 939610 )

      Compaq (HP/HPE Intel Desktop/Server predecessor) had that in the late 1990's. It was called Compaq EasyErase/EraseEaze(I think) as one side was default used as a backspace and/or delete key. It was a dumb design especially since they defaulted it to on and initially did not have a label on the back of they keyboard telling you the key sequence to switch it into its different modes. The design died sometime later. It might have been a good idea at some level, but delivering it defaulted on using eithe

    • You can use either hand for a space bar, and there is a reason for that. Maxmizing key inputs does not maximize ergonomics or performance.

      That said, I had a one hand half keyboard that used space bar as a left/right half shift for the keyboard. It was pretty usable, but you did give up some performance and comfort.

  • wot (Score:5, Funny)

    by ZERO1ZERO ( 948669 ) on Tuesday March 17, 2026 @01:14PM (#66046124)
    if i've my left hand on wasd, thumb on the left of space, and my right hand is on my mouse. How on earth do i hit the right side of my space bar without you know, moving either hand. , In which case i have about 90 other keys I could use instead. What's that you say ? oh right yeah , ..unzips...

    • I came here to ask the same thing, my right hand is on the mouse.

    • How do you hit 'b' right now? It's a common key used in many games. The split spacebar would have part of it under it and would be trivial to reach with the average thumb while still being able to reach the ~ key in the top left as well.

      Or you have Trump hands in which case I'm sorry for making fun of your disability.

      • I don't hit b. nothing bound to it. No wait, not strictly true I have a 'comedy' chat bind on 'b' that i hit usually by moving my left hand I don't use it while I'm using my left hand on wasd. I DO use ALT though. And i removed the win key as it's too annoying to accidentaly hit. so my thumb presses both alt and space as required.
    • From some of the pics, it looks like it might split three ways Space-NewKey-Space.

    • Check out the ARCSurfer keyboard.
      It's an ARC Raiders themed left hand keyboard with a minimal keyset. Of course, it's just a keyboard, so you can use it for anything.
      there are three buttons under your thumb and two more on a row above that you can access. So, that's 5 thumb accessible keys.
      An open source circuit python config for the control board and you can config the keys to whatever you need.

      https://www.printables.com/mod... [printables.com]

      It's quite functional for most shooter type games and takes up minimal desk spac

  • Ergodox layouts solved this a while back. Most people map one of the long 2U keys on the thumb cluster to space. I've had one mapped to space and the one right next to it mapped to backspace since my earliest Ergodox layout:

    https://battlepenguin.com/tech... [battlepenguin.com]

    Although, it did take a long while to get use to. Ortholinear are not easy to rewrite your brain for. But it was totally worth it. Just check out the cool layout/builds you can do with Ergodox!

    https://battlepenguin.com/tech... [battlepenguin.com]

    https://battlepeng [battlepenguin.com]

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Misagon ( 1135 )

      Keyoard nerd nit-picks:

      * The ErgoDox layout is a copy of the Kinesis contoured layout, flattened, with extra keys.
      * And it is not ortholinear, merely column-oriented as opposed to row-oriented.

  • Split space bar is better than a standard one but it is only a poor start to separated thumb clusters which provide somewhere from 6 to 9 easily reachable keys per thumb.

    Check out e.g. K80CS layout [deskthority.net]. That is a custom build and there are many similar (and from my point of view slightly worse) custom keyboards in the community. People mostly do not want to build their own keyboard. They can get a usable commercial alternative which is not too bad. There are more of them, e.g. Kinesis Advantage 360 [kinesis-ergo.com].

    A split ke

  • Gamepad (Score:3)

    by Himmy32 ( 650060 ) on Tuesday March 17, 2026 @01:39PM (#66046192)
    At that point, why not use something purposefully designed like a gamepad. Maybe if this trend continues, Logitech will bring back the G13 [pcmag.com]
    • Because I can't aim with a gamepad.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Himmy32 ( 650060 )
        Something like the G13 / Razer Tartarus / Azeron takes the place of the keyboard as part of the mouse / keyboard combo. So the general pattern of aiming with the mouse would be unchanged.
        • I've thought about those, specifically to get that analog stick, but I'd want to try one for a while before I spent $100+ on it. I'm particularly nervous about games not liking multiple inputs. That doesn't seem to be a common issue now, but it's burned into my mind.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Himmy32 ( 650060 )

            I'm particularly nervous about games not liking multiple inputs.

            Been a while since I used my G13, but the software programmed the device so that the keys were just standard keyboard or mouse button inputs. And the stick could be analog game controller style or 8-direction d-pad mapped to key presses. I think some of the modern competitors only do D-pad style, so then everything is just standard keyboard presses. And if using Steam with anything game controller like, Steam can do controller profiles for mapping inputs as well.

            • Well, the only reason I'd get one is to have analog movement in shooters, but I've seen games that won't accept keyboard input if there's a gamepad/joystick and vice versa. That, and whether or not I'd find it comfortable, are why I haven't gotten one.

              It's largely because of Rebel Galaxy Outlaw. A game that looked like it had been built with my alley in mind. I ended up returning it right away as it wouldn't accept simultaneous input from my joystick and keyboard. I throttle and strafe with my keyboa

  • Like the Microsoft Natural keyboard from the '90s?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by TWX ( 665546 )

      Was going to say, there were split-spacebar keyboards back in the day, I worked with lot of Compaq Presarios [ayekat.ch] with that arrangement.

      As a lefty it sucked because if the keyboard was set up for that left-side to do something like backspace on a public kiosk computer it wasn't readily changed to be usable.

      For someone's own personal computer fine, do what you want. But don't expect it to become an industry standard anymore than say, Dvorak layout is.

  • There's an interesting space for a left-hand PC gaming peripheral. Keyboards are OK, but don't have any analog controls, and your most articulate digit(thumb) does the least while your pinky is heavily burdened. The ones I've seen are just half a keyboard made slightly more ergonomic.

    I have used a Stream Controller in my left in combination with a mouse. But it's awkward to hold one handed, and it takes a lot of button remapping if the game even supports simultaneous inputs. There was also Microsoft's "Stra

  • No (Score:2)

    by Bahbus ( 1180627 )

    you have the option of using the right-side spacebar for things like a chunky melee key, or, my personal favorite, an in-game voice chat key.

    That would be very uncomfortable and very unnecessary. You don't get to take away 40% of a keyboard and then complain about the lack of keys and customization. Most of the authors suggestions would best go on extra buttons on a gaming mouse anyway.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by TWX ( 665546 )

      The design of the mouse in general needs a rethink. When mice contained an actual ball in a 3/4" or so diameter it was necessary for a particular shape in order to facilitate that ball having somewhere to go, and that somewhere ended up being under the joints where the fingers meet the palm. This was not the most efficient place to put movement detection since that part of the hand doesn't move as much as the fingertips do.

      A modern mouse would work better if it had wells for the four fingers, and each fin

      • Ergonomics is subjective. Different people grip their mouse differently. I use a claw grip, so having so much mouse body is less important. Some fully palm the mouse, and so they need the body of the mouse. Others like the sideways ergo mice, or trackballs (conventional or thumb type).

        I don't move my mouse using only my arm and wrist. I primarily use all of my fingers, keeping my arm stationary and my wrist making only minute movement left/right. As such I have much finer control over its movement. If I swi

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

        I think weight is important. I see gaming mice often have adjustable weight, and although I don't do twitch gaming I do find that the right weight and amount of friction helps with my arthritis. I mean it helps control the mouse accurately, not that it reduces stiffness or pain.

    • Are you talking about the keyboard in the article? This Wooting somethingorother? The itty-bitty-doesn't-have-all-the-keysey one?

      I don't understand it. Not even function keys? Not for me, I like a full keyboard.

  • The first thing I thought off (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Was a segregated bar, humans on one side of the room, aliens on the other, and of course no droids allowed in at all...

  • Left hand: mouse.
    Right hand: actual directional cursor keys, ins/home/pgup/pndn/end/del, ctrl, shift, \, backspace, AND THE ENTIRE NUMERIC KEYPAD.

    wasd? ewww. Seriously?

    • You're moving your right hand a significant distance.

      The QWERTY keyboard is left-handed, the mouse is right-handed: So, WASD is a natural setup and the maximum number of keys can be tapped without moving the wrist.

      The problem then, is the instant-change keys, such as weapon selection: For that, I use a pointing device (mouse, joystick) with more buttons. Since many games don't require diagonal changes to in-game position, a mouse is the common choice.

    • I never saw the sense of WASD. How do you find it without looking? 8456 is where it's at, baby!
    • You must hate searching for a new keyboard, often the results now are for tenkeyless crap.
  • I don't need that, and don't think it would help me. Maybe if you have a tiny keyboard (the one in question looks stupid small)? My hands are fairly large, but I still don't want to stretch my thumb that far.

    My Z20 is the right size for a keyboard (in my never-humble opinion), and my thumb comfortably reaches the middle. But I don't want that middle to be a different button. I have a ton of other keys within reach.

  • Some people will see a benefit and get an expensive keyboard with a split space bar. Good for them. Everyone else will continue using the absolutely massive number of keyboards following the standard format.

  • I still use the arrow keys, you insensitive clod!

  • whyevenbotherwiththespacebar.itdoesn'tmakesenseinmoderngamingtoevenhaveaspacebar.it'snotlikeyouuseitforanything.
  • This is not a new idea. They're called Ergonomic keyboard: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] Microsoft had one called the natural keyboard that came out in 1994.

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