Backbone Pro review: A premium gamepad at a very premium price

Price When Reviewed

$169.99

Best Prices Today: Backbone Pro

As a gaming device, the iPhone has much to recommend it: it’s highly portable, you’re probably carrying one anyway, and you’ve got a million compatible games to choose from. The main problem is that many of the best iOS games (such as Fortnite, which finally returned to iOS this year) were designed with other platforms in mind, and don’t suit touchscreen controls. That’s when you need to buy yourself a gamepad.

As iPhone gamepads go, the Backbone Pro sits right at the top end. It costs a whopping $169.99/£159.99, more than three times what you’d pay for an official Xbox controller (which iPhones are compatible with), so it needs to perform miracles to justify that price. Does it? Well, let’s find out.

Design and workmanship

The Backbone Pro looks like a gamepad or gaming handheld with the middle part missing. There’s a reason for that: the gap is designed to accommodate an iPhone, although this isn’t compulsory. More on this in the next section.

There are lots of hardware controls. On the left side you get an ALPS thumb joystick, a D-pad, and two option buttons; on the right there are X/Y/A/B buttons (in the traditional Xbox configuration rather than the heretical Switch style), another thumb joystick, another option button, and a dedicated button for the Backbone app. Then there are four shoulder buttons–L1 and L2, and R1 and R2–and even two lower rear M1 and M2 buttons which sit under your ring fingers. There are also two ports on the bottom, a female USB-C for charging and a 3.5mm headphone jack, together with a final button for wireless pairing.

Aside from being astonishingly numerous, these controls are robust, accurate in use, and mostly very comfortable. (The one exception is that I wouldn’t want to use the M1 and M2 buttons very much, because the ring fingers are naturally weaker than the rest, and with my hand size it wasn’t possible to use middle fingers while still being able to reach L1 and R1. But for occasional functions, they’re fine.) Serious gamers will quibble about some choices, such as the joysticks being ALPS rather than Hall effect, which is more precise and has a longer lifespan. The lack of rumble/vibration may also cause some raised eyebrows at this price point. But using the Backbone Pro is a delight, and thanks to the ergonomic design, weight in the hand, and pleasingly textured finish, it feels like the premium gaming accessory it is.

What’s the Backbone Pro like to use?

Setting up the Backbone Pro is relatively easy. Tuck the top edge of your phone into the slot on the left, push the gamepad’s two halves apart, then attach your iPhone to the male USB-C connector on the right. (This is the method illustrated in the marketing video, and I find it much easier than opening the halves before fitting the phone into the slot, which was my misguided first instinct.) Your iPhone is thus held securely in landscape orientation, and you can use the D pad, thumb controllers, and X/Y/A/B buttons to play games on a super-sharp display without having to waste screen space on sub-optimal touch controls.

I tested the Backbone Pro with an iPhone 17, and this fit just fine with or without a standard silicone MagSafe case. That’s an important consideration, because having to uncase your iPhone and then recase it after adds an element of friction that will put you off using the product. It’s also compatible with the iPhone 17 Pro and 17 Pro Max, the iPhone Air, all five 16-series iPhones, and all four 15-series iPhones.

Note that you can also use the device as a standalone controller by connecting wirelessly to an iPhone, iPad, Mac, smart TV, VR headset, or other device (even a PC!). This adds the complications of Bluetooth–you may notice some slight lag on very speed-intensive games, although I didn’t–and of course you will need to keep track separately of the Backbone’s battery as well as that of whatever device you’re playing on. The simplicity of plugging a single USB-C cable into the Backbone’s port and charging both the gamepad and its docked phone can be a pleasing convenience for the forgetful.

There is, however, one minor point in favor of playing wirelessly: the first few times you use the gamepad in docked mode, you may find it fiddly navigating to your desired game. iOS home screens don’t have a landscape orientation, so you end up awkwardly holding the docked phone at 90 degrees until you’ve found the app and launched it, before returning to a normal position in the game. The slot covers on either side also block access to the short edges of your phone’s screen, which makes it difficult to access the home indicator when you’re in a portrait-orientation app–which you shouldn’t be, but this may still catch you out if you dock your phone before thinking to close down the previous app.

But these are just teething pains. You’ll quickly realise that the best approach is to open your game of choice, then put the phone in the gamepad.

Testing out the app

There’s another option which you may find easier still, and that’s to use the Backbone app. This can be accessed at any time by pressing the bright orange button assigned to that purpose.

The makers would clearly like you to treat the Backbone app as your central gaming hub, and it serves moderately well in that role. The “Your games” library is a convenient way to jump straight to your favorite titles without having to navigate your phone. Sensibly, this list is compiled manually rather than simply auto-populating with all the compatible titles on your device, and while the in-app search function isn’t always intuitive (insisting I need to download games that are already on the device, for example, or serving ads encouraging me to sign up for the Apple Arcade service I already get through Apple One) you can simply press the orange button while in a game to add it to the library.

The app also contains a rather endearing selection of “Instant games,” quick and cheap retro browser games that are good for a laugh. It’s a shame that, here again, the interface proves less than helpful; the app initially offered a selection I could add to my library, but once I’d done so, that option was no longer easy to find. (Eventually, I found the remaining games by going to the main search and selecting Edit filters > HTML5 Games.)

But the most useful functions of the Backbone app are more utilitarian. Under Settings, you’ll find recording modes (together with Twitch integration), and the ability to create controller profiles with assigned buttons. And under Controller Center, you can pair with, manage, or forget known devices. This is important because the gamepad will, by default, try to connect with the most recently connected device. But to be honest, my experience of device switching was very impressive; almost Apple-esque in its ability to second-guess what I wanted it to do without needing to be prompted. Thanks to a clever feature called FlowState, you don’t need to keep re-pairing each time you want to switch devices, and that’s a big plus point.

Should you buy the Backbone Pro?

There are certainly issues with this product. If you’re a serious gamer, the lack of vibration and Hall-effect joysticks may be off-putting; if you’re not, there’s that $169.99/£159.99 price tag. So the head says no, but the heart says yes. I love the attractive design, comfortable and reliable controls, and easy-switching, device-agnostic versatility. Against my better judgment, and with several caveats, this extremely premium gamepad gets my recommendation.

Best Prices Today: Backbone Pro

Author: David Price, Editor, Macworld