SteelSeries Arena 3 review: Delightful simplicity

Lately, I find myself less inclined to wear a headset if possible. Having been diagnosed with tinnitus, I find wearing a headset for too long can irritate my ears and cause my condition to flare up. After a decade with my old PC speakers, I figured it was time to try something more modern, but I also didn’t want to deal with more cables or equipment than I had before. Thankfully, the SteelSeries Arena 3 speakers were the perfect upgrade both in terms of simplicity and quality.

What’s in the box?

The SteelSeries Arena 3 speakers are as easy as it gets for setting up any type of audio for your PC. The box included two speakers, a cable to connect the speakers together, a power adapter, and a 3.5 mm audio cable to connect the speakers to your PC. From the time I opened the box to the time I had functional speakers was under five minutes, and the setup was identical to how my old system worked. The main difference is that the SteelSeries Arena 3 speakers included a 4” driver speaker, headset jack, auxiliary audio input, and an option for Bluetooth pairing. While most of that doesn’t interest me, the sound quality was noticeably better from the moment I turned them on.

Isn’t that lovely

The quality of the Arena 3 speakers cannot be understated given the simplicity of the system and the $129.99 NA price. It has me excited to hear what my colleague, TJ Denzer, thought of the Arena 9 speakers that he tested. Right away, I noticed how much fuller and smoother the sound was. This is crucial to me. The tinnitus condition I spoke to earlier is never more of an issue than when I’m forced to listen to low-quality sound from either a bad mic while on a call, or any audio that has hard ins and outs. The best way to describe it is that it’s much easier on my ears when sound flows consistently, and the Arena 3 speakers provide that when compared to my old gear.

I tried the Arena 3 speakers with everything that I’d normally use my old gear for. That ranged from watching YouTube to listening to music to playing PvP in Destiny 2. Nowhere was the bump in quality more apparent than while gaming or listening to music, as the front bass port really beefed things up. I wouldn’t call the Arena 3 audio headset quality, but it’s certainly closed the gap from what I’m used to. The one downfall of the Arena 3 speakers is that I haven’t been able to get them working with the SteelSeries GG software that works flawlessly with both my mouse and keyboard from SteelSeries. Not that I don’t mind something being a simple plug-and-play in 2022, but even following the included instructions didn’t help.

Soothing sounds

If the opportunity to review the Arena 3 speakers hadn’t crossed my desk, I would have happily continued to use my old speakers and not known how much better things could get. While I’m not a medical professional and you shouldn’t take any advice from me in that regard, my personal experience with the Arena 3 speakers is that it made my tinnitus condition a bit less of an issue, and simultaneously improved on my overall computer audio experience. If you’re in the market for some new computer speakers that won’t break the bank, have a poke around the internet and see what people are saying about the Arena speakers from SteelSeries.

This review is based on a sample provided by SteelSeries. The SteelSeries Arena 3 will be available on August 23, 2022, with a North American retail price of $129.99.

Bill Lavoy

Managing Editor

Bill, who is also known as Rumpo, is a lifelong gamer and Toronto Maple Leafs fan. He made his mark early in his career through guide writing and a deep understanding of editorial SEO. He enjoys putting in the work to create a great content, be it a wild feature or grinding out an in-depth collectible guide. Tweet him @RumpoPlays if you have a question or comment about one of his articles.