Flint

What it sounds like

A dry crack with a bright spark sitting on top, over before your finger has finished moving. There is no ring and no low end to speak of, just a hard edge and a glint of high frequency. Clicking with it feels like striking something that does not give.

Good for

• Fast, repetitive clicking where every press should register
• Screen recordings that need a click to cut through a voice-over
• Anyone who finds a stock mouse switch too mushy

How it is made

A single burst of filtered white noise centered around 4.2 kHz, plus a short sine that drops from 2.3 to 1.5 kHz in ten milliseconds. Both run through a body tuned high, at about 3.1 and 5.2 kHz, which puts the spark on top; the release is a smaller, slightly brighter version.

Every qliqr sound is synthesised from a small text recipe, so the version you hear here is the same one the Mac app plays, with natural variation so no two presses are identical.