Hauser Sonic Gel Pens – Test

Gold ink pens and metallic ink stationery are our favourites. These metallic ink gel pens by Hauser may have some of the shiniest and best gold ink pens, and silver too, which we’ve ever come across. How is this set as a journaling and artistic tool? Read below to find out.

Vishal: Hello and welcome to Stationery Test Drive where today we’re looking at the Hauser Sonic Gel Pens. I’m Vishal.

Minjal: This is Minjal.

Samir: I’m Samir.

Vishal: Yeah, we have covered several stationery objects from Hauser before. It’s a brand that says it’s from Germany but it is quite prevalent in India. We’ve reviewed the Hauser INX Jazz Fountain Pen, we’ve also reviewed the Hauser 4 – in – 1 multi ballpen, and now this set because we trust the name here at Stationery Test Drive.

Vishal: And here are a set of 12 gel pens. I’ll let you get acquainted with the colors because when I got them like a good diligent artist I made a nice test sheet of all of the colors. What can we say about gel pens and Hauser that we haven’t already said? But maybe we should try. ( Watch the demonstration of the Hauser Sonic Gel Pens here – https://youtu.be/ckR4RiwrLXo?si=74VhyAeu6_CJQFCp&t=76 )

Samir: I mean honestly it looks like something that you’d find in an office but it’s actually a fairly decent artistic tool.

Vishal: Yeah, I love the line quality. And, if you have been watching our episodes you know that we love the line quality as well because in our Liquitex Marker episode even though we had a gold Liquitex marker, a nice big fat one, Minjal you also used the Hauser Gold Gel Pen from this set, right?

Minjal: Yeah. I have a couple of gold metallic gel pens and this one really stands out for the quality and shine of the gold color.

Vishal: Yeah! This set was just a surprise, we saw it at our local stationery store, it costs around Rs.180/-, approximately $2.5, which is quite economical for a full set. This set would make for a nice gift or just to buy it for yourself and make things.

Because that’s what we do on this show, we make things. We take things on artistic test drives. We’re artists, calligraphers, designers. Minjal, why don’t you show us your test piece?

Vishal: That is superb! And, yes, you used a lot of the gold again. So tell us about this.

Minjal: Hauser is a German brand and it was acquired by the Indian company Flair World in India in 2014. So, I believe Flair is now distributing and manufacturing Hauser pens, right?

Samir: Yes. I think they are, and also they are the only remaining Hauser pen manufacturer in the world I think.

Minjal: Right. And like Vishal said you could simply just doodle or write, do your journaling stuff with these pens but they’re really smooth, that’s one thing I noticed. And as far as the colors are concerned, the metallic colors are so shiny!

And the other colors in the set are just so vibrant. If you want to just sit with the pens and doodle away or even write, this is such a great set to have. I also tried writing with them, they’re very smooth to write with. I think it’s a great buy, I really enjoyed using these.

Samir: I genuinely like the selection of colors in the set. I like that they have these fairly muted things like browns which you rarely find in pens. They have colors that are very neon and kind of hot pink, and then you also have regular blues and greens, and as a bonus you a very shiny gold and silver gel pen as well.

Minjal: It’s a thoughtfully curated set with all the colors that you would need to draw, write, make Zentangles and just de-stress.

Vishal: It’s very freeing and it’s beautiful. I would love to have a large version of this but also this something this size in a frame to really take advantage of those lines. The Hauser Sonic Gel Pens are perfect, they’re not fine liner – fine and they’re not marker – thick, there’s some perfect like Goldilocks zone that these have.

Samir: And they still have a certain level of human variation to them so they look like someone drew them rather than it’s just a print.

Vishal: Speaking of things that are just right I put it to my test drive. I used 3 pens from the set. The pink, the lighter blue which is a bit thinner I should note, just slightly, maybe it’s just the one we have, but doesn’t flow as much. And this purple which was so deep and kind of meaty almost, it’s luscious, it’s like I’m running out of words to describe it. But here is my test drive.

This is actually based on a picture, behind the scenes picture seemingly from I guess ‘The Empire Strikes Back’. And for some reason I saw it and yes, I’ve taken some artistic license with some of the ends of the piece. But this is a great way to interpret a picture a photograph or a something and it was so much fun to do all the details.

Usually you take on a piece like this, and yes it took time, but you might enjoy the line work and then you get to the shading, and the shading is just like ‘Oh My God!’ this is like pulling teeth. But there are a couple of pens we’ve really enjoyed. The Inkjoys by Papermate and the previous Hauser, the original one that we tried which was their fountain pen.

Samir: On a slight side note I think the hot pink color that these people have produced is in some ways very similar to the pink that came out of the Inkjoy.

Vishal: Yes, yes, yes, very similar.

Vishal: So this is a great deal of conjecture but we loved the Paper Mate Inkjoys but you can’t technically get them in India. But you can get the Hauser Sonic Gel Pens in India and they are very close in terms of the color.

Samir: The color vibrance is very similar.

Vishal: And even the experience of just using the pen I think the Inkjoys were slightly superior in terms of their overall uniform kind of way of doing the line. But this is still 99% of the way there.

Samir: I think what I’d say is that the Inkjoys write a little drier so therefore they’re more controllable. This one’s a little bit more fluid, it’s like a fountain pen.

Vishal: I will say that there is one negative in that you need to watch it, especially when you’re drawing, of some smearing, there’s a very minor amount of smearing here, this after I thought it was dry. So yes, do be careful, keep an extra sheet when you’re drawing and try not to overlap.

But yeah this is great. I love these pens, I love that we have 12 of them and you have a great gold and a great silver. It’s great to just have this for a few dollars and for a few dollars more Samir why don’t you show us your test drive?

Samir: Since we were saying that this set is so much fun I thought I’d have some fun too.

Vishal: Oui Oui!

Samir: Obviously I went for a slightly less serious take on things than the two of you did.

Vishal: Yes! In your drawing you used the silver, the orange, the black as well or the brown?

Samir: The brown, no black. There’s brown in the hair, there’s black in just the outline of the the cup and the lettering.

Vishal: Like you said it’s not very common for earth tones in ink pens to be other than fountain pen inks.

Samir: Right and then the fact that you have earth tones and kind of neon tones and metallic tones in the same set that’s very unusual but very useful to have in one box.

And yes again, in case we haven’t made a big enough deal of it the metallic silver and the metallic gold is just perfect. You cannot believe that this came out of a pen and it’s not some sort of gold leaf.

Vishal: I mean we could do some really intricate work with that gold thing.

Minjal: Having tried a lot of metallic pens, like I mentioned earlier, I’ve tried the Uni-ball metallics, they do silver and gold pens, I’ve also tried the Staedtler metallic pens, I haven’t found a silver or gold that is so vibrant and not muddy brown or gray or black but the actual silver and gold color. So just for those two colors I would buy this set.

Samir: I mean considering the price it is genuinely worth buying the set just for those two pens. It’s not a very expensive set.

Vishal: If you told me a here are 2 great silver and gold pens and there are 8 or 10 others free with them that would still be a good deal, that would be an excellent deal. But yeah, that purple and that hot pink and that gold! I did not explore the greens and the reds, maybe next time. I have nothing to complain about this set.

Samir: Even the orange which I used quite a lot just as kind of a outline here and the base there, it has a lot of richness to it.

Minjal: I think that is probably the case with all our Hauser episodes. We unanimously like the Hauser products so much they end up being short episodes because we have nothing to complain.

Vishal: And the price point is such a huge deal because it’s 200 rupees.

Samir: Like if each of these pens was 50 rupees then I would say you know what it’s not the best pen, it smears, and then I can pull out all of these minor niggles that you can have with it. But if you’re getting an entire set of these for less than 200 rupees, I don’t think a bit of smudging is a problem.

Minjal: We see a lot of episodes on YouTube where these pens are usually tested by school children or college going kids. Sure, you can’t write your exams with these pens because there’s going to be smudging and smearing all over the place.

Vishal: For that kind of thing I think go and get a Pilot Kakuno fountain pen or the Cello, the very bestselling ballpen that barely smears and barely balls.

Samir: But as a thing that you could use for some work but then really go crazy with and play with in all sorts of ways whether journaling, zentangling.

Vishal: Yes, journaling. I think we talked about that at the beginning and now we bring it up. We don’t journal, we make art like this.

Samir: Or, if you’re one of those people who likes to take sketch notes or one of those things a set like this is just perfect.

Vishal: Yeah! Gold highlights and filigrees and you can make a nice illuminated manuscript of your daily thoughts and meetings. We should do that sometime maybe. The artistic journal of Stationery Test Drive and our thoughts and our feelings and our fears.

Samir: Aren’t all your journals illuminated manuscripts or is that just me?

Vishal: Oh wow! Well on that bombshell we’ll probably get back to making artistic things. Maybe we’ll journal, maybe we should go and find some gold glitter paint, and yet more because we have done now I think 4 or 5 different golds and some of them have been very disappointing. And the Liquitex Acrylic Paint Marker was good, this one is good.

Samir: I think we’ve done enough videos now that we need to make a playlist on metallic stationery that we have covered.

Minjal: And maybe have an espresso shot!

Vishal: Have an espresso shot. Well I mean why not? I think we all could use some coffee. It’s been quite a day of filming, but we have more to do and more exciting things to do. We have a lovely fountain pen, we have a lovely set of color pencils. They were so good that I kind of forgot whether they were markers or pencils, but yeah, look forward to those, they’re coming up soon. And for everything else you can subscribe to the YouTube channel. We will see you next time. Any more thoughts?

Samir: No, I think this is just a really good set of pens.

Vishal: And in some way I’m like I can’t wait to finish the episode and maybe go and doodle more with these. So yeah get get them! Until next time I’m Vishal.

Minjal: This is Minjal.

Samir: I am Samir. And if you like very brightly colored gel pens then you really should check out our episode on the Paper Mate Inkjoys. And if you like brightly colored Indian inks in general check out our Krishna inks episode.

1. Hauser Sonic Gel Pens Set – https://amzn.to/4gkt1kA
2. Hauser Sonic Gel Pens, Blue Ink – https://amzn.to/4ipDPQ5
3. Hauser INX Jazz Fountain Pen – Pack of 6 – https://amzn.to/3BghOmd
4. Hauser 4 in 1 Retractable Ball Pen Box of 4 | 4 Ink Colors In One Pen – https://amzn.to/3ZFHcLp
5. Paper Mate InkJoy Pens, Gel Pens, Fine Point (0.5 mm), Assorted, 14 Count – https://amzn.to/4gpcPyG
6. Uni-ball Impact Gel Pens, Bold Point (1.0mm), Assorted Metallic, 3 Count – https://amzn.to/3BggRKF
7. Staedtler Design Journey Metallic Pen, Assorted Colours – https://amzn.to/4gdZfOA
8. Cello Butterflow Ballpoint Pen – https://amzn.to/4gmVsy6
9. Pilot Kakuno Fountain Pen, Clear Barrel, Extra Fine Nib – https://amzn.to/3OFWGsN