The Cherry MX Low Profile keeps the MX stem at 11.9mm tall
The Cherry MX Low Profile switch stands 11.9mm tall, about 35% shorter than a standard MX switch. The lower height lets a keyboard lie almost as flat as a laptop deck, and the switch keeps the MX cross-mount stem. Cherry sells a second, thinner rung too.
Key Takeaways
- The Cherry MX Low Profile switch stands 11.9mm tall, about a third shorter than standard.
- It keeps the familiar MX cross-mount stem, so it is still an MX switch.
- Cherry sells the height cut as slimmer boards, with the feel unchanged.
- A thinner rung, the MX Ultra Low Profile, stands just 3.5mm above the board.
- A shorter switch means a shorter keystroke, so travel is what you trade.
What is the Cherry MX Low Profile switch?
The Cherry MX Low Profile is a mechanical switch that stands just 11.9mm tall, about 35% lower than a standard MX switch. That figure comes from Cherry’s own MX Low Profile switch page; no independent lab has confirmed it.
Cherry pitches the reduced height as enabling sleek, compact designs for notebooks and slim high-end boards, with the typing feel unchanged. A slim board can still borrow desktop tricks, and NuPhy fitted a true gasket mount to its 13.2mm Air75 V3.
The shorter housing keeps the same MX cross-mount stem, so the switch belongs to the MX family. Cherry rates it for the same lifespan as its taller siblings, over 100 million keystrokes per switch.
The lineup is small, and both options are linear. Cherry lists the MX Low Profile 2.0 Red, a smooth linear, and the 2.0 Speed, a faster linear, each offered with RGB or no lighting. These are Cherry’s own low-profile switches, separate from the many third-party low-profile stems on the market.
How much thinner is 11.9mm?
A standard MX switch stands 18.5mm tall, a figure Cherry lists on its switches overview. Removing about 35% of it lands near 11.9mm, which is where Cherry’s “35% lower” figure comes from.
All of the saved height comes off above the board, so a keyboard built on these switches looks flatter, closer to a laptop deck than to a chunky full-height mechanical board.
A shorter switch body leaves less room for the stem to move, so a lower housing means a shorter keystroke than a full-height MX. Cherry’s MX Low Profile 2.0 Red page lists 3.2mm total travel and 1.2mm pre-travel at 45cN, against the 4mm total and 2mm pre-travel of a standard MX Red.
Two groups benefit: writers and gamers who want a mechanical feel on a slim desk, and laptop makers who cannot fit a full-height switch at all.
Cherry’s low-profile ladder, from 11.9mm to 3.5mm
Cherry sells two rungs. The MX Low Profile at 11.9mm is the taller one, a slim board that keeps a familiar mechanical keystroke.
The thinner rung, the MX Ultra Low Profile, stands just 3.5mm above the board. Cherry calls it the flattest and the first mechanical SMD switch in the MX portfolio on its MX Ultra Low Profile switch page. It reaches that height by being a surface-mount part soldered flat to the board, which is something a socketed switch cannot do. It ships as ULP Click and ULP Tactile variants, both made in Germany.
Here is how the family stacks up against a standard switch:
| Switch | Height | Mount and type | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Standard MX | 18.5mm | cross-mount, socketed | full-height mechanical boards |
| MX Low Profile | 11.9mm | cross-mount, socketed | slim boards and laptops |
| MX Ultra Low Profile | 3.5mm | SMD, soldered flat | ultra-thin notebooks |
Dropping from 11.9mm to 3.5mm buys extreme thinness and leaves almost no room for the stem to travel, so the Ultra tier feels closer to a very good laptop key than to a full mechanical press.
Do standard MX keycaps fit the Low Profile switch?
In principle, yes. The MX Low Profile keeps the MX cross-mount stem, so a keycap made for that mount will physically clip onto it.
Tall sculpted keycaps built for full-height boards undo the whole point of a low-profile switch, and they can foul on each other. That is why low-profile boards ship with dedicated low-profile caps. Borrow from the MX range if you like, but pick low-profile profiles to keep the build thin.
The Ultra Low Profile, a surface-mount switch with its own shape, is not a drop-in for standard MX caps. Cherry designs it into a finished keyboard, so an Ultra board is bought whole.
Cherry’s pages do not publish a keycap-compatibility table, so confirm profile and mount against the specific keyboard before you buy replacement caps.
Where the height ladder stops paying off
For most people the 11.9mm rung is the sweet spot: it keeps a mechanical keystroke and the MX stem while saving about a third of the height. The 3.5mm Ultra rung buys thinness that only a laptop or a minimalist board needs, and it gives up most of the travel to get there.
The choice comes down to how much keystroke you want to keep. For a slim board that still types like a mechanical one, stop at the MX Low Profile.