Artisan Keycaps – Are They Worth the Money and Where to Buy Them?
The best part about building your own custom keyboard is the ability to fully customize your product. You can choose your own keyboard case, the type of cable you prefer, the best mechanical switches you can get your hands on, and of course the keycaps.
When it comes to keycaps though, the situation is not as simple as you would think. There are A LOT of keycap sets and you need to find the one that matches your keyboard the best.
Besides that, if you are building a custom board there is an unspoken rule – you need the crown jewel for your keycap set. What we are referencing here are artisan keycaps that add that extra bit of style to fully personalize your keyboard.
Image Source: Drop
These artisan keycaps are quite expensive but are very unique in terms of aesthetics since they can be molded to look like anything you would like.
Are Artisan Keycaps Worth the Money?
The main thing to understand about artisan keycaps is that these are purely aesthetic pieces that add value only in terms of how cool your keyboard looks.
They will not make the switches feel better, or the keyboard less rattly – there is absolutely no practicality to an artisan keycap.
Image Source: Etsy
In reality because of the complex designs, often the keys will actually become harder to press so these special items can be even considered counterproductive.
But would anybody interested in artisan keycaps care about all of these issues? Most likely not. The whole point of artisan keycaps is to add a bit of personality to your board beyond just what most people do.
Image Source: MK
The artisan keycaps are expensive and only increase the visual value of your board, but for many, that is exactly what they want.
Where to Buy Artisan Keycaps?
Artisan keycaps are mostly manually manufactured therefore you will most likely not find them in your regular retail stores.
To get your hands on some of the best artisan keycaps you will need to frequent places like Etsy, Mechanicalkeyboards.com, Drop, JellyKey and of course Aliexpress. We would recommend you check out Etsy first when looking for artisan keycaps since that is literally the marketplace for hand-made gamer items like these!
Image Source: Etsy