The Logitech G PowerPlay charging mouse pad was my baby, but I'm a little disappointed after seeing the second version just announced
When I was first bestowed a Logitech G PowerPlay mouse pad I was sceptical, but I very soon realised its ability to keep my mouse charged without me having to lift a finger was a significant quality-of-life boost. PowerPlay never really caught on, though, and that's probably thanks to its ginormous price tag ($120 MSRP). So you can probably imagine how excited I was when I heard a second version is in the works, and it's set to be cheaper.
Not only that, but it's here soon. The Logitech PowerPlay 2 mouse pad will be available for purchase on March 11, 2025, and has «built-in compatibility with over 10 mice and counting». These mice are:
The PowerPlay 2 will cost less at $99 than the first version, and it'll be slimmer at 3.5 mm (vs the original's 4 mm) with a wider charging area.
It's not all sunshine, though, because in many ways this iteration seems more like a sidegrade than an upgrade. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Let's have a look at what exactly PowerPlay is and why I liked mine so much, and then I can let you know why this announcement tastes just a little bittersweet.
The idea is you take a compatible Logitech mouse, slap a lil battery puck in the bottom, and place it on top of the PowerPlay pad to keep it charged while you game. The PowerPlay pad itself is a base that sits underneath a supplied mouse pad, and it creates a «low-frequency electromagnetic field» that is «captured» by the charging puck inside your mouse to keep it charged just by having it sit on top of the pad.
One of the things I loved about the original is that the pads it came with are essentially Logitech's G240 (soft) pad and a slimmer version of its G440 (hard) pad, which were two of my favourite mouse pads to use anyway. Together, they covered both speed and control gameplay scenarios perfectly—for Counter-Strike I'd use the soft pad and for games like Quake which require constant tracking I'd use the hard pad. I still reckon these are some of the two best mouse pads around for the
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