Surface Dial is a physical scroll wheel for your digital art

During today’s big event, Microsoft introduce a new Surface-centric peripheral alongside the new all-in-one Studio desktop. The Surface Dial is a wireless, brushed aluminum puck that adds new gestures and functionality to a variety of Surface-friendly apps.

Onstage, Microsoft CVP Panos Panay demoed the Surface Dial on the Studio itself, showing off its ability to quickly flip through document pages like a scroll wheel, adjust screen brightness or music volume and rewind through pen strokes like a rotating Ctrl-Z button. But the dial also has the ability to work directly on-screen for additional functions based on the app and the context — like changing paint color without picking up your pen. While the dial can rotate smoothly with ten points of precision per degree, it also packs haptic feedback to give you the feeling of a real-life dial click. For Engadget’s first impressions on the Dial, check out our hands-on with the Studio.

Naturally, the Surface Dial works with Surface Studio, but it is also backwards compatible with the Surface Pro 3, Pro 4 and Surface Book. (Although the on-screen functions will only work with the Studio.) At launch there are 14 compatible apps including Sketchable, Spotify, Microsoft Office apps and the new MS Paint 3D. The Surface Dial is available for pre-order today for $99.99 and it ships on November 10th.

Click here to catch all the latest news from Microsoft’s big Surface event.