Razer Kishi (Android Controller) Review

It goes without saying, but long gone are the days when the phone is your pocket is just a phone. Now your phone is also your camera, your dinner menu, your travel guide and your bank teller. But what about a game console? Can a smartphone be that too?

The Razer Kishi game controller certainly makes a strong case for this, with a design that, once attached, transforms your phone into something resembling a Nintendo Switch.

This design is well thought out. When you first take it from the box, the Kishi is a compact bundle, with the two halves of the controller clipped together. Open it up and you find a USB-C or Lightning connector inside, depending on whether you have bought an Android-friendly Kishi, or one for the iPhone. You pull these two halves apart and slot your smartphone in between so that there is a controller on either side of the display.

For our tests we used a Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra, one of the most powerful phones in the WhistleOut labs, and also one of the largest. At 167mm long and 76mm wide, the S20 Ultra stretches the Kishi to its limits. If you have a big phone, you’ll want to check the specs before making a purchase.

Playing with the Kishi is as comfortable as it is familiar. The design of the pad is more similar to an Xbox controller than the Switch. The way the left and right thumbsticks sit at different heights, for example. The Kishi has the same number of buttons as a console controller too, with bumpers and triggers on the left and right, four face buttons, a D-pad and two tiny keys for ‘Home’ and ‘Options’.

All in all, the controller feels good, if a tad plasticky. A few of the smaller buttons click a little when you press them, which doesn’t impact gameplay at all, but lacks a really premium feeling finish. Thankfully the thumbsticks and face buttons feel better, and move with a good amount of resistance.

Important to this design is the USB connector inside the controller. Unlike most smartphone game controllers, the Kishi doesn’t use a Bluetooth connection, but directly connects to your phone via USB-C so that there is only minimal controller latency. This means that when you pull the trigger, you can expect your gun to fire at about the same time.

The Kishi doesn’t require any power to work, but it does have a USB-C port on the right side that offers pass-through charging for your phone. And if you like the Kishi as much as I do, you’ll find this to be an essential feature.

Games for days

After unpacking the Kishi and connecting it to the phone, I realised that I wasn’t sure which games to play first. Razer has a Kishi app which lists several dozen games, and is a great place to start, but with the Google Play Store housing over two million apps, I knew there must be many, many more.

The trick was figuring out which games worked, and which ones didn’t. Big name titles like Call of Duty Mobile and PUBG aren’t compatible with the Kishi controller, but Fortnite is (though you have to download it directly from Epic Games). 

The Kishi app collects games that it recognises as being supported, even if the game isn’t a part of the list of games recommended by Razer. Other games will be categorised as ‘Untested’ though some of these work. 

Beyond regular Android apps, you can also use the Kishi to control a number of game emulators that are available to download through the Play Store. I had a chance to test out PPSSPP, an excellent PlayStation Portable emulator. Now, I’ll add that while there is nothing wrong with using emulators, downloading old games is against the law. What I will say is that the Kishi worked exceptionally well.

The Stream Dream

At the beginning of this review I asked whether a smartphone could be a game console. Sure, playing mobile games is fun, but what about the real thing? It turns out that this is entirely possible too.

Xbox One, PS4, and PC gamers all have great options to play the games they own on their phones, and, for me, this is where the Kishi really shines. All of these platforms have companion apps that can stream your games to your phone. Streaming games is basically like playing an interactive video stream. It’s far more complicated than this, but that’s the simplest way to explain it. The console streams a video to an app on your phone, and the app sends back your input from the controller. Back and forth, it simulates the experience of playing any game you have installed on your console.

Microsoft offers the best solution with its Xbox app for Android. So long as both phone and Xbox are on a solid WiFi network, the experience is pretty seamless. PlayStation owners will find that the official PS4 Remote Play app doesn’t support Kishi, but a great 3rd-party app called PSPlay fills this gap. PC gamers should look for an app called Moonlight on the Play Store.

Razer Kishi - Final Thoughts

The Razer Kishi is a great Android controller and probably your best option if you want to up your mobile gaming experience. The controller is well designed and great to use. If Santa left this under the tree for me this Christmas, I’d be a very happy boy.

Though ultimately it might be a bit more expensive than you’re willing to pay for something like this. Bluetooth gaming controllers are available for less, but you will suffer from the aforementioned input latency. This can be measured in milliseconds, but it can be annoying depending on the speed of the games you like to play. The Kishi doesn’t have this problem at all.

On the subject of money, the Kishi for Android comes in an Xbox variant, which replaces the standard ‘Home’ button with a button featuring the Xbox logo. It also comes with a free trial of Xbox Game Pass Ultimate, but is functionally identical. If it were me, I’d save my money and stick with the vanilla option.

I’ve talked a lot about games to play in this review, and in a way this isn’t Razer’s concern. It has made a great game controller and it’s up to you to find games to play. That said, we wish the Kishi app was a bit more robust, perhaps offering a way to run a filtered search of the Play Store to help identify even more compatible games.

Joseph Hanlon

Editorial Director | X | LinkedIn

Joe Hanlon has been immersed in mobile phones, plans and the internet for over a decade, having written for publications like CNET, Techradar, Gizmodo and Lifehacker. He steers the editorial ship and makes sure that we are always serving up the most useful guides and recommendations. If you ever bump into Joe on the street, don't be afraid to ask for a phone recommendation. It's embarrassing how much he enjoys talking about this stuff. He also loves listening to podcasts, so feel free to email Joe with recommendations.

Read full bio