Queen Bee Review: Seventh Day of Dicksmas

6/23/21 update – This product seems to no longer be produced.

Christmas has come and gone, but Dicksmas continues. This Queen Bee review captures some of what is difficult about reviewing toys: while this isn’t a perfect toy for me, it will definitely be a perfect toy for many of my readers. Let’s talk about it!

Background info

I first saw the Queen Bee while I was at Pleasure Chest in Greenwich Village, New York. A friend of mine showed me the toy, which immediately intrigued me. It’s a wand vibrator with an oscillating pattern instead of traditional vibration. The company who makes it is called Hot Octopuss, and I love that because I have an octopus tattoo on my shoulder.

They’re my favorite creature. How could I not write?

I’ll talk about the awesomeness of Hot Octopuss in a minute, but to skip ahead to the conclusion, I wrote to them and they happily agreed to send me a Queen Bee for review.

What’s Hot about Hot Octopuss

I did some research into Hot Octopuss before writing to them, and I was pleased at what I found. With a focus on toys for all bodies, abilities, genders, and sexualities, Hot Octopuss is one of the most inclusive companies I’ve researched. Most good sex toy companies have a broader sense of sexuality, marketing not just to heterosexual couples but also to queer couples as well. That’s good. But most don’t have a good sense of sex for those with disabilities, and as a result, they ignore that population altogether.

By contrast, Hot Octopuss knows sex should be enjoyable by all people regardless of their physical abilities or age. They make the Pulse III, which is an external masturbator for people with penises, but it doesn’t require erections for it to work. Unlike other masturbation sleeves that require an erect penis to penetrate the sleeve, their device cups the penis and provides vibration and stimulation for both the user and their partner. This makes the device great for people with paralysis or  erectile dysfunction as well as for those with full use of their genitals, since it can be used when the penis is flaccid or erect.

This is pretty damn awesome, honestly. I am an able-bodied person, and I’m often guilty of forgetting the needs of people with disabilities. Hot Octopuss reminds me to do better while also prioritizing accessibility. Thus, of course I wanted to try their Queen Bee.

Queen Bee: Out of the Box

The packaging of the Queen Bee is gorgeous. Sleek, royal blue and silver, it’s visually lovely.

When you look at the top of the box, you are greeted with this gorgeous tattooed vixen and her luscious sideboob.

I realize now that these words might sound like sarcasm, but they are not. This chick is fine af and I want to see the rest of her.

*clears throat* I digress.

Out of the package, the Queen Bee is still lovely. Open the box, and you have the toy waiting with its sexy packaging.

Notice how the Queen Bee comes with this soft silky bag and a USB charger. That’s all you need! Simple and elegant.

In hand, the Queen Bee is a small, light wand vibrator.

You can see that the Queen Bee has an oval-shaped plate on one side, which is the PulsePlate. The PulsePlate has more intense oscillations than the other side, which is for a more gentle massage.

I’ll get into function in a minute, but first, here is the device hooked up to its charger, with some of the control buttons visible.

You can see plus and minus. Above that (not pictured) are an equals sign to change the type of oscillation (solid to pattern) and above that is a power button.

Function and design

The Queen Bee is designed to use oscillations instead of vibrations. The pulse plate moves back and forth in an oscillating pattern, rather than just vibrating. As you might know from my Eroscillator review, oscillations are more powerful than vibrations, in part because they travel deeper and stimulate more of the internal erogenous zones than vibrations can.

I’m going to talk about the Queen Bee in terms of vibrations, because that’s the most familiar terminology, but it’s not exactly vibrating. Please keep that in mind as you read.

The Queen Bee has a lot of customization in its vibration (oscillation) intensity and pattern. In addition to steady vibration, it has five patterns. You can also increase and decrease the intensity of not just the vibration, but the patterns. This is really fucking cool. With most toys, you have variation in vibration intensity, but you’re stuck with whatever the default pattern intensity is. Not so with the Queen Bee.

The shape of the device means it’s going to be useful for people with limited mobility, since you don’t have to be able to reach your clitoris to put the Queen Bee against it. It’s also not heavy, so it’s ideal with people who have grip strength issues, too.

While I’ll mention it again later in “Cheers and Caveats,” I want to say it here too: the Queen Bee is 100% waterproof. Awesome. Take this fucker in the bathtub.

Because of the shape of the toy, I think this could easily be used between two clitoris-having partners who were in a scissor position. Only one would get the PulsePlate, but they could still share. I have not had a chance to try this, so it’s purely hypothetical. (Any of my readers want to give this a go and report back?)

But enough about the universal comments. Let’s talk about my particular experience.

Into My Box

The first thing I noticed when I started using the Queen Bee was the broad area of the sensation. The Queen Bee is not a pinpoint vibration device. The PulsePlate, which is the strongest part of the toy, is wide. While it does come to a bit of a high point in the middle, the whole thing pressed broadly against my clitoris and labia rather than focusing explicitly on my clitoris.

The sensation of oscillation was pleasant. I didn’t find it buzzy or ticklish like most vibrators. I could easily hold it in place between my thighs. After a while in this position, I found that I really wanted to grind against this toy, so I knelt upright and tucked it against my clit. It was a good position, and I could easily put the Queen Bee where I wanted it.

I had a difficult time with the buttons. Because they’re on the back of the toy opposite the PulsePlate, I couldn’t see them while I was using them. They are all on one long button panel with different raised symbols, but there are four symbols. Three or four times, I hit the “up” button instead of the “change pattern” buttons, and once I turned the toy off by hitting the “power” button instead of the “change pattern” button. It was great if I found a pattern I wanted to keep, but I change that shit often during wanking, and I had to take a few focused moments to actually count the buttons down from the top to make sure I was hitting the right one.

For me, personally, the Queen Bee is more broad than I like. My labia kept getting in the way of focused stimulation. Once I figured out a good position, though, which for me was upright and leaning forward, I could get the kind of pressure I needed to get off.

Here is where the oscillation definitely comes in handy: I was able to keep up the stimulation with the Queen Bee even after I came, without becoming too sensitive or having my clit get itchy or overstimulated. The oscillations penetrated more deeply than surface vibrations, which created a really nice type of stimulation.

Cheers and Caveats

Cheers for oscillation over vibration. Oscillation is good, rumbly, deep, and everything that more toys should use. While I can’t always tell the difference mid-wank, the difference becomes noticeable for me during orgasm, when my oscillation-induced orgasms don’t oversensitize me and induce a deeper type of orgasm.

The design of the toy is mostly cheers, with one caveat. Cheers to a light toy with a handle for good mobility, and cheers for it being wireless and waterproof. Seriously, a waterproof wand? Awesome. Caveat? The buttons are easy to hit wrong. If you’re using the less strong side of the toy, you’ll be able to see them, but most people will (I think) use the PulsePlate side instead. Buttons on the back are kind of meh.

Cheers to having variable intensity patterns. Seriously, why don’t most toys do this? It seems like a no-brainer.

Caveat: the Queen Bee is loud. Like, Hitachi Magic Wand loud. It’s probably my loudest toy. Your roommates and housemates will all know what you’re doing, and probably your neighbors, too. (Who cares, though? None of their fucking business.) But seriously, if discretion is your aim, the Queen Bee is not the toy for you.

So who Would Like It?

I am not huge into wand vibrators. The Queen Bee, sadly, is not an exception. I like it better than a lot of wand devices, and definitely better than the Hitachi, since it isn’t going to rip an orgasm out of me and smack me upside the head with it. I need more focused, pinpoint clitoral stimulation, and wand vibes generally aren’t good for that.

But many people, I think, would love it. If you like your Hitachi, but find that the vibrations make you itchy, or the device itself is way too heavy? Get a Queen Bee. If you want a wand you can take in the bath, get a Queen Bee. If you want a wand with more broad, deep sensations instead of the surface vibrations, get a Queen Bee.

Final Thoughts

I think this company is great. I love their company goals, their focus on accessibility, and their nontraditional models and target audience. Even though the Queen Bee isn’t a great toy for me, personally, that has way more to do with me rather than the quality of the toy. It’s a high-quality, well-made oscillator, and I will recommend it to my wand-loving friends and readers. Go forth and try the Bee.

I received the Queen Bee in exchange for this honest review. Affiliate links are being used in this post, and purchasing products through those links benefits this blog.

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