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Similar to other Arctis products, the SteelSeries Arctis 3 Bluetooth ships in a sleek orange and grey box with the headset fully displayed on the front. The rear of the box displays an infographic of the uses, contents and features that the Arctis 3 Bluetooth has to offer.
Within the box comes a variety of cables that enable the Arctis 3 to connect to a variety of devices. From left to right, we have 1x main cable that plugs into the headset and connects to both the 3.5mm headphone jack and the dual 3.5mm extension cable; x1 dual 3.5mm extension cable to enable both the headphones and microphone to work on PC; x1 standalone charging cable to enable its wireless Bluetooth feature; and x1 3.5mm headphone jack to connect to any device with a 3.5mm jack.
Moving onto the headset itself, the Arctis 3 features 90-degree rotatable ear cups to make it easier to travel with, while the rotatable cups also help users to take the device off more comfortably. The SteelSeries logo is neatly placed at the base of each cup in white font against a black background.
Each ear cup is padded with a foam cushion surrounding the driver, which is housed in a closed back design. The cloth fabric that covers the foam cushioning is SteelSeries’ proprietary ‘AirWeave’ material, built to be light and breathable.
SteelSeries has once again opted for the ski band design, with a flexible rubber band separating the user’s head from the sturdy plastic frame. The rubber band can be tightened or loosened with the Velcro straps on either side, however the default sizing stretches to fit most sizes comfortably.
There are 8 styles of ski band to choose from, and my sample came fitted with the ‘Crushed Snow' band. There are plenty of styles and colours to choose from, though, including two ‘Artist Series' variants displaying artwork by ThankYouX and Lauren Asta.
A lot of the functionality has been placed on the ear cups of the SteelSeries Arctis 3 Bluetooth, with three connectors on the left ear cup – one microUSB for charging, one proprietary connector for the primary headset cable, and also one 3.5mm input which ‘shares' whatever you're listening to so a friend can plug in and listen as well.
The media controls are housed a little further down the left ear cup, with a volume wheel a dedicated mic mute button being included.
In comparison, the right ear cup is distinctly less busy having just a single Bluetooth button. Holding this Bluetooth button down for approximately 4 seconds will yield a short beeping noise and slow flashing of the green LED indicator to show that the headset is now discoverable to devices it is already paired with.
Entering pairing mode is a little trickier as users have to hold the button down for a total of approximately 7 seconds. This will prompt the user with a second, faster beeping noise and a rapid flashing of the LED indicator until paired with a device.
Lastly, the microphone can be extended and retracted from the left ear cup. The boom arm is fully flexible, enabling the user to pull the microphone closer or push it further away, while the microphone itself is bidirectional.
