Razer launched its Zephyr N95 face mask in 2021. It was quite the affair, with all sorts of intakes, RGB lighting (of course), and… that was about it. There was a missing feature: voice projection. Well, at CES 2022, Razer announced a fix for that. A new mask, the Zephyr Pro, that’ll doubtless sell out just as fast as its first one did.

Jack Parow is a Zephyr Pro, isn’t he?

At Las Vegas this year, Razer corrected its oversight by announcing the Zephyr Pro. It looks… fairly close to the original Zephyr, but it’s got a few additional bits. There’s a pair of speaker grilles integrated into the base of the unit, and then there’s a button, near one of the intakes, that turns on voice amplification.

Razer says that this’ll send your voice out through the brightly-lit plastic air-purifier on your face at 60dB. That’s the regular volume of conversations, so unfortunately you won’t be using it from a commanding position to address a crowd. That volume holds true for about a metre, because Razer doesn’t want its users to be a dick while conversing.

Otherwise, it’s more or less the same mask as the Zephyr N95. It’ll use the same filters and should weigh more or less the same. See, Razer claims it left voice projection out of the last mask because of weight and battery concerns. It seems to have solved the issue, by milling down the speaker grilles to save some weight. This should counter the obligatory new bits that enable actual conversations while wearing the Zephyr Pro.

The Razer Zephyr Pro will launch sometime this year — towards year-end if the last launch is any indication. It’ll cost buyers about R2,400 ($150, at today’s exchange rates). The company will also offer a package version, which includes the mask and about 100 days’ worth of filters, for around R3,200.