Keychron, a company specializing in the production of input devices, presented the project ZGM (Zephyr Gaming Mouse), within which developing the first full-fledged open firmware for gaming mice. The project aims to create a platform that is easy to assemble, study, customize, and expand. The development focus is on minimizing delays, flexibility to adapt to new equipment, and ensuring ease of long-term product maintenance. Currently, the firmware is at an early design stage, release is scheduled for the 1st quarter of 2027. The code will be published under the GPLv3 license. The first device to support ZGM installation will be the G6 HE gaming mouse.
The Zephyr real-time operating system will be used as the basis for the firmware. To support various hardware layout options for mice, a modular driver architecture has been proposed. Drivers for sensors, buttons, scroll wheels, and backlights will be placed in separate replaceable and expandable layers. To increase responsiveness and reduce delays when processing input, polling of sensors, processing of buttons, clicks, and wheel rotation will be optimized. Both wired and wireless mice will be supported at the same level.
Keychron is already developing open firmware for QMK keyboards and has been successful in making keyboards more customizable. However, for gaming mice, only closed firmware is currently used, which does not allow checking or modifying the code responsible for processing clicks, fine-tuning sensors, wheel operation, backlighting, and organizing wireless communications. The ZGM project aims to create an open platform that will allow software and hardware developers to experiment, share improvements, and develop new firmware for gaming mice.