Who Owns HyperX, The PC Accessory Brand?

Dedicated gaming brands have been all the rage over the past several years. It's easy to see why, with the gaming segment of the market continuing to grow year after year. But what a lot of people might not realize is that major technology brands are behind some of the largest PC accessory brands out there. This includes HyperX, maker of various PC accessories, great budget gaming headsets, and even full-fledged gaming laptops.

One reason that HyperX has grown so fast over the years and has such a presence in the gaming space is that the company is a subsidiary of HP. But this wasn't always the case, as people of a certain age might remember that HyperX was originally owned by Kingston. And before eventually becoming a dedicated gaming brand, HyperX started in 2002 as Kingston's moniker for its high-performance memory modules.

In 2021, Kingston sold the HyperX brand to HP in a deal worth $425 million. But what's interesting about the acquisition is that the deal only included the HyperX name and its peripherals, and not the memory and storage that it was most known for. This is why the HyperX memory line was rebranded as Kingston Fury after the acquisition.

While HP is best known for its business machines and printers, the company has tried a number of times to enter the PC gaming space. I've owned a couple of HP Pavilion gaming PCs over the years, and while they've been solid machines, their proprietary motherboards and power supplies made them difficult to upgrade and thus not very gamer-friendly.

HP eventually built its gaming lineup around the premium OMEN line and the more affordable Victus line, which replaced Pavilion Gaming in 2021, with the HP OMEN 35L gaming desktop going on to be one of the most dependable PCs that will last for years to come – Tom's Guide calls it "built to last." And while HP still uses the OMEN name, it has since added HyperX branding to new OMEN machines such as the HyperX OMEN 15 gaming laptop.

Today, HP is leveraging the HyperX brand to give it a place in the PC gaming space, without having to push the HP branding and any preconceived notions that many might have about it. This would include that crazy HP Instant Ink subscription service that charges by the number of pages printed like I'm at a Kinko's circa 1999.