I'd like to give a +1 for Beekeeb as a vendor. Leo there is a rockstar with incredible support. They provide kits with everything in them so you can assemble them like Legos, or presoldered and assembled boards too. Beyond that, Beekeeb invests in open source, often releasing new designs but also publishing variations of boards and cases and firmware for all of us to use.
A good place to start is our wiki, you'll find there a small list of some popular keyboards as well as links to other databases of keyboards what hopefully will help you. some obvious ones: Corne (crkbd), Kyria, Iris, Lily58, Sofle, Sweep.
If you search, the open-source ones linked generally are being sold as kits in a few places, so have a look around. you can see a list of vendors in our wiki too, it may not be exhaustive but it's pretty comprehensive.
Some questions that you will have to ask yourself is what keys you're interested in losing. Do you need a number row? Function key row? Expectations for how much you use layers and thumbs can help to decide.
Depending on what region you're in, there's probably gonna be some folks selling cool ergomech kits. I'm personally in the EU, can recommend keeb.supply, Keycapsss, 42keebs, splitkb.com, Keygem.
I'm probably forgetting some, and these are only the EU-based ones. Maybe someone else could recommend vendors in other regions :)
Whew boy, what a rabbit hole chancing into this thread was for me.
Went to keeb.supply and then that fantastic word document on keyboard layouts and now I want to buy a soldering iron, hundreds of pounds of keyboard parts, and learn an entirely new layout.
Aay very happy that linking that document in the intro to small keyboards helped someone :)
You can also easily try alternative layouts on your current keyboard via tools such as kmonad.
ErgoMechKeyboards
Ergonomic, split and other weird keyboards
Rules
Keep it ergo
Posts must be of/about keyboards that have a clear delineation between the left and right halves of the keyboard, column stagger, or both. This includes one-handed (one half doesn't exist, what clearer delineation is that!?)
i.e. no regular non-split¹ row-stagger and no non-split¹ ortholinear²
¹ split meaning a separation of the halves, whether fixed in place or entirely separate, both are fine.
² ortholinear meaning keys layed out in a grid
No Spam
No excessive posting/"shilling" for commercial purposes. Vendors are permitted to promote their products/services but keep it to a minimum and use the [vendor] flair. Posts that appear to be marketing without being transparent about it will be removed.
No Buy/Sell/Trade
This subreddit is not a marketplace, please post on r/mechmarket or other relevant marketplace.
Some useful links
- EMK wiki
- Split keyboard compare tool
- Compare keycap profiles Looking for another set of keycaps - check this site to compare the different keycap profiles https://www.keycaps.info/
- Keymap database A database with all kinds of keymap layouts - some of them fits ergo keyboards - get inspired https://keymapdb.com/