Elgato Wave Neo review

The Wave Neo is a looker. It's got a minimalist design with a matte white finish and a subtle Elgato logo on the base. It's also surprisingly compact, making it easy to fit on even the most cluttered desks.

The included desktop stand is sturdy and is taller than many condenser microphones for gaming. It’s thanks to a riser extension which brings the mic closer to your mouth. The pop filter is a nice touch, too, helping to reduce plosives and keep your recordings clean. It’s mounted on a single rotating screw which lets you move the mic in a full circle. The Sennheiser in comparison has a very limited radius for moving.

Overall, the Wave Neo is a well-designed mic that looks and feels great. It's not the most flashy mic on the market, but it's got an understated elegance that's sure to please the gamer and the spreadsheet scientist.

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The Wave Neo's sound quality is impressive for the price. It captures vocals with clarity and warmth, and there's a surprising amount of detail and depth. It's not going to replace a high-end studio mic, but it's more than capable of producing professional-sounding recordings for podcasts, streaming, and voiceovers.
The cardioid polar pattern does a good job of rejecting background noise, so you don't have to worry about your keyboard clicks or dog barks ruining your recordings. And if you do need to mute the mic quickly, there's a touch mute button on top that's easy to access. I wish there was a gain toggle on the mic to have more control while connected to a console.
Compared to the Sennheiser Profile USB microphone the Elgato sounds a bit warm and loses out on the vocal subtleties. It’s not a deal breaker but you can decide which one you like the best from this reel we made comparing both the microphones.

The Wave Neo is all about simplicity. It's a true plug-and-play mic, so you can just plug it into your computer and start recording. There's no need to install any drivers or software.

But if you do want more control over your audio, Elgato's Wave Link software is a free download. It lets you mix multiple audio sources, add effects, and create separate monitor mixes for yourself and your audience. It's a powerful tool that's surprisingly easy to use. We tried it with a MacBook, Windows PC and the PS5. We do miss the Sennheisser’s on-device knobs for controls while moving between devices but once locked onto a PC, we didn’t miss anything.

The Elgato Wave Link software also lets you add voice effects, adjust the sound profile with the EQ curve and adjust gain. The freedom of granular control from the software is truly a blessing for gaming content creators. The software also works with minimum impact on the system memory so you can run it on potato PCs as well.

The Wave Neo also has a built-in headphone jack with zero-latency monitoring, so you can hear yourself in real-time without any annoying delays. And if you're a Stream Deck user, you can even control the mic's volume and mute functions directly from Elgato’s Stream Deck.

The Elgato Wave Neo is a great choice for those seeking a simple, affordable, high-quality USB microphone. It excels in delivering impressive flexibility through software support and also has plug-and-play convenience if you don’t want to bother with anything.

It’s pretty looking for game streaming and setups however, users desiring more physical controls might prefer alternatives like the Sennheiser Profile USB Mic.