Steel Series Nimbus Cloud review: more potential than polish | Tech Radar

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I tried the Steel Series Nimbus Cloud and feel like it’s just trying to do too much

Steel Series' dual-mode controller is a neat concept that doesn’t live up to its promise

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The Steel Series Nimbus Cloud is an excellent idea that’s been poorly executed and ultimately falls well short of its asking price. This combo mobile grip and Bluetooth controller is plagued by missed inputs, mushy triggers, and flaky compatibility that ruin what is otherwise a clever choice for multi-platform gamers.

-No companion app for customization or button remapping

No companion app for customization or button remapping

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The Steel Series Nimbus Cloud positions itself as the “world's first true dual-mode cloud controller”. It starts out as a generic-looking Bluetooth gamepad before doing its best Autobot impersonation and extending out to become a mobile grip that connects to your phone via USB-C, too.

It’s a clever idea and it’s backed up by an impressive spec sheet that ticks all the usual premium controller boxes. Hall Effect thumbsticks and triggers, mechanical face buttons, programmable rear buttons, and compatibility with Mac, PC, i OS, and Android.

That all sounds great, but after a week of using the Nimbus Cloud, it sadly lived up to its name. Cumulonimbus clouds are the type that bring heavy rain and thunderstorms, and my parade has been well and truly rained on.

When it works, it’s not a bad controller and falls neatly in line with the likes of the stock Xbox Wireless Controller. However, for a

Build quality is fine, but it’s generic rather than carrying any kind of premium vibe. The triggers use Hall Effect sensors, which is good, but they feel mushy and throttle control in racing games proved a frustrating experience. The mechanical face buttons are crisp, but over both Bluetooth and USB-C I encountered missed inputs when pressing them more than once.

My i Phone 17 Pro fit, but it was far from a secure hold and it required the removal of the rubber inserts, leaving the phone resting and rubbing against bare plastic. Steel Series lists Mac as a compatible platform, but my testing on a Mac Book Air was a mess, with inverted sticks, wrongly mapped inputs, and Steam not playing nice either.

If this were a cheaper option or first attempt from a challenger brand then I’d find it easier to focus on the decent core elements and look past the finer details. However, at $149.99, you're paying over the odds for an under par experience, regardless of which mode you’re running it in.

Steel Series Nimbus Cloud: Price and availability

Available from Steel Series and some third-party retailers

The Steel Series Nimbus Cloud is a relatively new addition to the range, launching in the back half of 2025 at

For comparison, the Backbone Pro mobile grip and Razer Wolverine V3 Pro PC controller will both set you back around the same on their own. But you could grab both the Game Sir G8+ for mobile and 8 Bit Do Ultimate 2 for PC and have a little budget to spare.

It is worth shopping around, too, because the price seems to vary dramatically. Apple lists the Nimbus Cloud £20 higher in the UK than Steel Series on its own website. And I’ve seen the price drop as low as £64 while writing this piece.

i Phone 15+, Android, i Pad, Apple TV, Mac, PC, Chromebook, Smart TV

i Phone 15+, Android, i Pad, Apple TV, Mac, PC, Chromebook, Smart TV

Cleverly extends from a compact PC controller to a full-width mobile controller grip

Pick up the Steel Series Nimbus Cloud in its collapsed form, and, apart from a curious split down the middle, you'd be forgiven for thinking it's a fairly standard Bluetooth gamepad. It has the familiar Xbox-style stick layout, ABXY face buttons, bumpers, triggers, a d-pad, and view/menu buttons.

There's no center button like an Xbox guide button, though there is a Home button that directs you to your device's home screen or, on i OS, Apple's Games app. It’s all pretty standard stuff.

Build quality is alright rather than impressive. I wasn’t blown away by how it felt in my hands but equally there wasn’t any area of particular concern. It's surprisingly light at just over 250g, which is welcome for a mobile controller with a battery, but that lightness comes with a hollow feeling that doesn't scream premium.

Nothing rattles or creaks, but it's no better than a stock Xbox controller and lacks the little premium touches like rubberized or textured grips that you’d expect for $150. Steel Series says the battery is good for 20 hours of play over Bluetooth and that seems about right based on my testing. There’s passthrough USB-C charging too, but no 3.5mm audio output.

The magic trick is when it engages Transformer mode (an unofficial name I’m giving it). Pull the two halves apart and the Nimbus Cloud unfurls into a telescopic mobile grip, revealing a USB-C connector on the upper right side that plugs directly into your phone.

The mechanism involves multiple overlapping sections that extend, and credit where it's due, it's a very clever bit of mechanical design. It just seems to keep going with more and more phone deck appearing from nowhere. It’s satisfying in a fidget-toy sort of way and while using it in PC controller mode I caught myself idly expanding and collapsing it a few times during cutscenes.

Phone compatibility is a mixed bag and unlike other dedicated mobile grips it’s not simply a matter of case on vs case off. I tested with both an i Phone 17 Pro and a POCO X5 Pro. The POCO has a slim, nearly flat profile and fit physically with the stock set of rubber inserts.

By design your phone is seated in the upper half of the grip rather than centrally, though, which leaves it feeling somewhat exposed and prone to knocks. The i Phone 17 Pro was almost a non-starter as with either size of the included rubber inserts the camera bump was too thick to fit neatly.

Even after removing the inserts entirely, which leaves the phone resting against bare hard plastic, it didn't fit in a way I’d consider usable long term. Beyond worries about it getting scratched to bits, I was concerned about the amount of stress going through the USB-C connector. There's noticeable movement and wobble with the phone inserted, it never feels square, and one bad bump feels like it could snap the connector off inside your phone's port.

The rear of the Steel Series Nimbus Cloud has two programmable buttons that sit in a natural resting position for your middle fingers. I’d call them a hybrid between a paddle and a button and it’s a design that works well ergonomically, requiring just the right amount of force to activate while avoiding accidental clicks.

However, the lack of any official companion app means you can only bind or remap these through i OS's built-in Game Controller settings. On Android, I couldn't remap them at all.

For a controller at this price from a brand with the resources of Steel Series, the absence of a dedicated app for customization is difficult to understand. Competitors like Razer, Game Sir, and Backbone all offer robust software companions, and some of those are half the price.

Hall Effect sticks and mechanical face buttons feel great

Connectivity and compatibility is a real mixed bag across platforms

Whether in controller or grip trim, the Hall Effect thumbsticks are the Steel Series Nimbus Cloud's strongest performing feature.

They're quite firm with a relatively fast spring-back and slightly shorter travel than some competitors I've tested. That means they're precise enough for shooters and responsive enough for general gaming, though the smaller range of movement might take some adjustment. Unlike some competitors, there’s no option to swap or adjust the sticks and Steel Series has played it reasonably safe with a shortish stick height and traditional caps.

The triggers also use Hall Effect sensors, but they’re muddy and I didn’t feel like they consistently recreated their physical movement in game. It's hard to explain, but where good thumbsticks let you feel dialed in when playing racing games like Forza Horizon 6, on the Nimbus Cloud I felt disconnected when trying to modulate the throttle. This was the same whether I was playing locally on my PC or via cloud gaming on mobile, so wasn’t a Bluetooth latency issue.

The mechanical face buttons are super clicky, tactile, and satisfying to press, as is the d-pad. They’re responsive for general gameplay; however, I noticed the Nimbus Cloud would occasionally miss inputs in situations where I was pressing the same button repeatedly.

This originally cropped up when spam jumping waiting for the Battle Bus in a Fortnite lobby and I was able to confirm it with dedicated testing after getting eliminated. Interestingly, this didn't seem to be an issue when pressing a combination of buttons so appears to be a debounce problem. The face buttons are pretty quiet but the same can’t be said for the bumpers. It’s nice to see these use mechanical switches, but unlike the face buttons they’re loud and almost sound like a cheap old-fashioned mouse.

When stretched out in mobile grip mode the Steel Series Nimbus Cloud performs well. On both i OS and Android it was immediately recognized, though the controller itself is a little shy in confirming this for you. The four battery LEDs do briefly light up initially, but I’d like a persistent indicator like you find on rivals.

Both Fortnite and Call of Duty Mobile recognized the controller on launch with no extra config or mapping needed, as did Xbox Cloud Gaming. It all worked nicely and naturally out of the box, which is just as well, because without an app you’d be completely stuck otherwise. I mentioned it before, but the Nimbus Cloud having no companion app feels like a real misstep. Rivals like the Game Sir G8+ allow for deep customization like dead zone adjustment and hair trigger modes, both of which are notably absent here on a controller that costs nearly twice as much.

Where things fell apart completely in my testing was when I tried to use the Nimbus Cloud with mac OS. Steel Series lists Mac as a compatible platform, but in my experience it was borderline unusable. It happily connected via Bluetooth without any fuss, but that’s where the joy ended.

In Forza Horizon 6 via Xbox Cloud Gaming I was greeted by the left stick input being inverted and triggers that were mapped to start and select. It turned out the bumpers were acting as triggers instead, and while I attempted to remap through mac OS system settings, it didn't seem to be respected in game. This wasn’t a Forza problem; either, Stardew Valley didn’t even recognize it at all. Steam fared just as badly, albeit in a different way. There it detected the Nimbus Cloud as two separate controllers simultaneously, neither of which worked correctly.

The good news is that I was actually quite impressed with how the Steel Series Nimbus Cloud performed over Bluetooth (as long as you’re not a Mac main, of course). My i Pad Pro immediately recognized the Nimbus Cloud without issue and playing Fortnite natively could easily have been mistaken for a scaled-down console experience.

Connected to my Windows gaming PC I happily spent a couple of hours in Roadcraft and at this slower pace the Nimbus Cloud kept up nicely. I did have to go through the full Steam controller setup procedure, however, something I’ve not needed to do with controllers in the past. Cloud gaming was fine on Windows too, up was up, down was down, and triggers were triggers.

You consistently jump between mobile and desktop devices The Nimbus Cloud combines two controllers into one. The extending mechanism works well to stretch out into a mobile grip and the form factor in both modes is comfortable to hold for longer sessions.

You mainly game on PC While the Windows experience is good enough, there are many better dedicated PC controllers that’ll set you back far less. Gaming on mac OS? Look elsewhere, the Nimbus Cloud is barely compatible.

You have a larger phone While Steel Series does include a couple of sizes of rubber insert, larger phones like the i Phone 17 Pro don’t sit securely in the Nimbus Cloud. You’ll be left with your phone rubbing against hard plastic which is unlikely to end well.

After a more consistent experience? Here are two capable alternatives.

i Phone 15+, Android, i Pad, Apple TV, Mac, PC, Chromebook, Smart TV

i Phone 15+, Android, i Pad, Apple TV, Mac, PC, Chromebook, Smart TV

i Phone 15 Series, Android, PC, smart TV, Nintendo Switch

i Phone 15 Series, Android, PC, smart TV, Nintendo Switch

Game Sir G8+ MFi The Game Sir G8+ lacks the Nimbus Cloud's dual-mode trick, but it's a better mobile controller in virtually every other way. You get Hall Effect sticks and triggers, dual vibration motors, MFi certification for i Phone and i Pad Mini, a companion app for full customization, and swappable ABXY button caps, all for

For more information, check out our full Game Sir G8+ MFi review

Backbone Pro The Backbone Pro is the Nimbus Cloud's most direct competitor. It costs a touch more and doesn’t fully fold down to a conventional controller form factor, but in return you get a polished companion app, a 3.5mm headphone jack, double the battery life, and reliable cross-platform Bluetooth. Its sticks aren't Hall Effect, but the overall package is refined and, crucially, actually works on every platform it claims to support.

For more information, check out our full Backbone Pro review

I spent a few days testing across devices, including an i Phone 17 Pro and POCO X5 Pro, an i Pad Pro, a Mac Book Air, and a gaming PC

I played Fortnite and Call of Duty Mobile natively on mobile and i Pad, Roadcraft on desktop, and Forza Horizon 6 via Xbox Cloud Gaming.

Over the course of a week I tested the Steel Series Nimbus Cloud across multiple platforms and game genres. Mobile testing was split between an i Phone 17 Pro and a POCO X5 Pro, covering both i OS and Android in the extended USB-C mode. I played a mix of native mobile games and cloud-streamed titles via Xbox Game Pass.

For Bluetooth testing, I paired the Nimbus Cloud with a Windows PC and a Mac Book Air, looking at games on Steam and cloud gaming on both platforms. When I noticed potential missed button inputs during regular gameplay, I used a dedicated button testing app to verify.

With a background in sports media leading Northamptonshire cricket club’s communications for five years, these days Alex has turned his attention more to virtual grass than real turf. A fan of all things simulation and sandbox, you’ll often find him behind the wheel of an F1 sim rig or agonizing over individual rock placements in Planet Coaster or Cities: Skylines. Having streamed on Twitch for the best part of a decade, he’s tried and tested more microphones, mixers, cameras, and controllers than you can imagine, writing for Games Radar, Trusted Reviews, Mediaberry, and now Tech Radar.

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Key Takeaways

• News, deals, reviews, guides and more on the newest computing gadgets

• Start exploring exclusive deals, expert advice and more

• Unlock and manage exclusive Techradar member rewards

• I tried the Steel Series Nimbus Cloud and feel like it’s just trying to do too much

• Steel Series' dual-mode controller is a neat concept that doesn’t live up to its promise