Niche handheld gaming console maker Ayaneo has officially entered the U.S. market to compete with the best PC gaming handhelds. You can now find the 8.4-inch Kunand 7-inch Next Lite from Ayaneo at your favorite Best Buy store.
Although the Ayaneo is already popular among handheld console enthusiasts, it’s largely unknown compared to consoles from mainstream brands, such as Valve’s Steam Deck or Asus’ ROG Ally. The brand’s entry into Best Buy would allow it to be seen by more mainstream customers, especially as it’s now available in both online and brick-and-mortar branches of Best Buy.
The brand’s availability on Best Buy would also make service, repair, maintenance, and returns much easier, as the retailer should be able to handle those services directly instead of the customer working with Ayaneo through email and international shipping.
Ayaneo only included two consoles from its healthy line-up of twelve devices. The first one is its top-of-the-line Ayaneo Kun, which retails for $999, $200 off from the regular price. It sports an 8.4-inch screen with an AMD Ryzen 7 7840U processor and Radeon 780M graphics. It also has 16GB of RAM and a 512GB SSD, which is plentiful performance. However, its current price is $999, putting it significantly higher than its competitors that are also available at Best Buy, like the 8.8-inch Lenovo Legion Go at $749.99 (AMD Ryzen Z1 Extreme / 16GB RAM / 1TB SSD) or the 7-inch Asus ROG Ally X at $799.99 (AMD Ryzen Z1 Extreme / 24GB RAM / 1TB SSD).
On the other hand, if you’re looking for a budget Windows handheld console, the Ayaneo Next Lite could be a good bet. It only costs $399, undercutting its competitors, like the 7-inch MSI Claw A1M for $699.99 (Intel Core Ultra 155H / 16GB RAM / 1TB SSD @ $699.99) or the 7-inch vanilla ROG Ally at $499.99 (AMD Ryzen Z1 / 16GB RAM / 512GB SSD), for at least a hundred dollars. However, its specifications are feeble, only featuring an AMD Ryzen 7 4800U chip with an AMD Radeon Vega 8 integrated graphics. It has a decent amount of RAM at 16GB and a 512GB SSD, making it good enough if your budget is tight.
Although it only has two entries in Best Buy right now, we hope that Ayaneo introduces more of its models to the U.S. market sooner rather than later. That way, consumers would have more options in the hotly contested handheld gaming PC market. This competition would hopefully lead to better products at better pricing, making the gamer the winner.
