CMF Watch Pro 2 by Nothing review: Good-looking budget smartwatch with a twist

The CMF Watch Professional 2 is the Nothing spin-off’s second smartwatch that wishes to indicate as soon as once more that you just don’t should spend large to strap on a classy smartwatch.

Not like the CMF Watch Professional, CMF has gone round for the design this time however is sticking to the identical value as its squarer predecessor to make it each pleasing on the attention and on the financial institution steadiness very like Amazfit’s Bip collection and the likes of the Honor Watch 4.

Some software program gripes apart, the primary CMF Watch Professional received numerous issues proper to make it a reasonably likeable low-cost smartwatch and it seems to be like extra of the identical with the Watch Professional 2 – and it nonetheless prices simply £69. It was introduced alongside the fascinating CMF Cellphone 1.

Design & Construct

• Interchangeable bezels and straps
• Options watch crown 
• Not appropriate for swimming

The distinction in seems to be of the Watch Professional and Watch Professional 2 is dramatic to say the least. Whereas the Professional had a display-dominating 47mm, sq. design, CMF has opted to shrink issues all the way down to a 45mm, round case, made out of aluminium alloy that is available in both black or silver seems to be.

That’s matched up with considered one of 4 22mm watch straps that are available silicone or leather-based (pictured) and are available black, orange (pictured), gentle inexperienced or blue shades. It nonetheless closely channels an industrial-strong design strategy with a minimalist look that’s a little bit of a throwback to the LG Watch Model, which had the identical bezel-heavy look.

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

That bezel sits barely raised over the touchscreen show and has the CMF by Nothing title etched into it, which I feel it may in all probability do with out.

The opposite particular trick right here is that the bezel is interchangeable, with 4 out there and it’s a easy means of twisting to clip it away from the watch physique like a digicam lens. That is one thing we’ve additionally seen just lately from the Xiaomi Watch S3, although in contrast to Xiaomi, CMF is making it clear that it’s promoting strap and bezel packs for £19, which implies you’re going to wish to spend a bit additional to have the ability to customise the look.

A brand new rotating crown button is in line with the understated but engaging design and could be pressed to get up the display and get into the primary menu display. It’s also possible to maintain it all the way down to energy off or restart the watch.

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

One factor that’s disappointing to see is that there’s no motion on water safety. That is nonetheless a smartwatch with an IP68 waterproof score, which means it may be dunked in water however there’s no 5ATM score to issues like monitoring for swimming.

When it comes to making a smartwatch that doesn’t look as low-cost as its low-cost price ticket, CMF does a reasonably good job right here. It’s comfy to put on, there’s a really good high quality strap and the actual fact these bezels are simple to take away and fairly low-cost to exchange are likeable qualities in regards to the Watch Professional 2.

Display screen & Audio 

• 1.32-inch, always-on AMOLED
• New auto brightness function
• Could make calls over Bluetooth

The primary Watch Professional had a hulking AMOLED display and the Professional 2 drops to a smaller 1.32-inch, 466 x 466 decision one that may be set to remain on always.

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

It’s a display with as much as 620 nits brightness, so not fairly as brilliant because the Watch Professional’s display, although a 60fps refresh price does imply a small enchancment in that division (up from 50fps). An added auto brightness mode means it is going to alter brightness based mostly on the extent of lighting in your setting and ensure it’s not shining too brightly when it doesn’t have to.

The general display high quality is nice for a smartwatch at this value. It’s an AMOLED panel with fairly deep blacks, good max brightness, although colors are a contact saturated. It doesn’t higher the standout smartwatch shows at this value, nevertheless it’s actually not within the class of unhealthy ones both.

It’s no shock to seek out this price range smartwatch lacks any kind of additional LTE connectivity to make it function extra standalone, although in order for you one thing to make calls whereas paired to your Android telephone or iPhone over Bluetooth, that may be a solution to do it.

There’s a microphone and speaker onboard, with the flexibility so as to add contacts from the companion from the CMF app to make calls. AI noise discount know-how is used to enhance name high quality, which I’d say is nice sufficient to make it worthy of creating calls out of your wrist.

That microphone and speaker array may also be used to faucet into your smartphone’s voice assistant, so it’s ready to connect with Apple and Google’s assistants to provide you one much less purpose to achieve on your smartphone.

Software program & Options 

• In-house working system
• Works with Android and iOS
• Over 100 watch faces

The Watch Professional 2 makes use of an in-house constructed working system, which has the person interface really feel of Google’s Put on OS, or a minimum of an older model of its smartwatch working system.

It’s one which’s appropriate with each Android and iOS through the CMF watch app and I’ve used it each with the Android and iOS variations of the app the place setup, pairing and syncing information has usually been faultless.

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

On the watch, it’s a closely gesture-based software program, letting you swipe in all instructions from the watch face to get to widgets, notifications, music controls, fast settings all stylised in that customary CMF color palette.

The primary menu display reveals additional options like a torch, a calendar view, discover my telephone mode and the flexibility to set reminders. I really feel just like the UI appears extra optimised for a sq. smartwatch as a result of components like widgets don’t actually sit so neatly on a spherical display. 

Along with swiping on display, you need to use a collection of fast gestures to work together with the software program for dealing with calls, or skipping a music by rotating your wrist as soon as or shaking your arm. These could be turned on from within the watch settings.

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

Clearly numerous work has gone into the styling right here, and that features the watch faces the place there’s a handful of preloaded ones with just a few extra choices out there within the companion app with scope to customize watch faces.

Not like my time with the primary Watch Professional, there appears to be much less of the bugginess I skilled with notification assist and the software program normally, in order that’s one large optimistic right here. It won’t be bringing something essentially new, however what it does have appears to have been executed properly and crucially, made it fairly a simple smartwatch to familiarize yourself with.

Health & Monitoring 

• Constructed-in GPS
• Promised improved sleep monitoring
• 120 sports activities modes

The Watch Professional 2 isn’t any completely different to just about each smartwatch that claims it’s going to have the ability to observe your exercises, your coronary heart price inside and out of doors of exercises and have the ability to monitor your sleep.

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

Sensors-wise, there’s an accelerometer sensor for fundamental exercise monitoring and sleep monitoring, an optical coronary heart price and SpO2 sensor (for blood oxygen stage) and there’s built-in GPS with assist for 5 satellite tv for pc techniques. So, not the newest dual-band GPS assist we’re seeing on costlier smartwatches however that’s comprehensible.

In sports activities monitoring mode, 5 of the 120 out there sports activities modes supply automated exercise recognition assist in case you’re not fussed about manually monitoring exercises. For some exercises like runs, there’s the choice to view some warm-up animations, which is one thing related we’ve seen on Huawei’s watches. 

There’s the addition of sports activities watch-centric insights like displaying your coaching load to be sure you’re not over or under-training and recommending perfect restoration time to take it additional into these severe sports activities monitoring realms.

From an accuracy perspective, it wasn’t a fantastic story for me. For indoor rowing, the info is restricted to exercise length and coronary heart price monitoring, the latter for me wasn’t very correct with minimal and most readings very far off a coronary heart price monitor chest strap.

Issues didn’t get higher for outside monitoring the place locking to a GPS sign took an absolute age and it took the third try at utilizing it for a run to lastly get a lock on. That meant accelerometer-based distance monitoring was off from a devoted working watch. With GPS lastly in play, issues have been higher, however coronary heart price monitoring once more was a little bit of a catastrophe present.

As a health and normal wellness monitoring, it is going to constantly monitor coronary heart price, SpO2 measurements when enabled and can monitor stress from coronary heart price variability measurements. There’s additionally sleep monitoring, which is outwardly upgraded from the earlier watch although it’s not clear what precisely has been upgraded.

You’re additionally getting new menstrual cycle monitoring and Exercise scores with the purpose to purpose for 100 scores to be sure you’re staying energetic sufficient every day.

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

Every day step monitoring totals tended to be properly according to one other health tracker and also you’ve received a really Apple Rings-like widget on the watch and off it to chart your progress. For sleep monitoring, I wore it alongside the Oura Ring Gen 3, among the finest sleep trackers I’ve examined and it recorded related occasions I’d fallen asleep and woken up within the morning. Sleep length was usually 10-20 minutes out from the Oura with sleep levels, although it didn’t appear to select up the events I’d woken up.

With steady coronary heart price monitoring, I discovered that day by day resting coronary heart price information matched up with Garmin’s dependable monitoring on some days and on others, it felt a contact excessive. The irregular low coronary heart price alerts chimed in as properly, although as a reasonably energetic individual, my usually low coronary heart price was triggering that.

Whereas information largely lives within the CMF app, you do have the flexibility to share stats to Apple Well being, Google Join and in addition Strava for these chasing kudos on the well-loved health app.

Battery Life & Charging

• As much as 11 days battery life 
• As much as 9 days in heavy use
• Fees totally in over 1.5 hours

The Watch Professional 2 packs in a 305mAh capability battery, so smaller than the one nestled within the Watch Professional.

CMF says that ought to get you as much as 11 days in typical use or 9 days in heavy use. In the event you set the display to always-on, that quantity will drop additional.

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

I’ve been utilizing it with a mix of the display set to always-on and with the increase to wake and I’d say these numbers do appear to ring true. There isn’t any worrying drain by the day or over in a single day to say this isn’t a watch that may get you every week a minimum of, even in heavy utilization and you’ll dwell with out that display being on 24/7.

There’s additionally a power-saving mode, which restricts you to the watch face and gives you 45.8 days of battery life. Once you’re placing the GPS to make use of, you’ll be able to count on as much as 25 hours of battery life. I’d wish to let you know how properly the GPS battery carried out however I merely couldn’t get the watch to lock onto a GPS sign to let you know that.

There’s a proprietary charging cable when it does want powering up, with no fast cost mode right here, and can take 100 minutes to go from 0-100%.

Worth & Availability

The CMF Watch Professional 2 goes on pre-order from July eighth 2024, earlier than happening normal sale on the twelfth July.

It’s be out there from the CMF web site and in UK and EU Amazon on-line shops. Pricing is £69, so the identical because the CMF Watch Professional, and as talked about, you’ll have the ability to choose up optionally available bezel and strap units for £19.

That pricing places it under different price range smartwatches just like the Amazfit Bip 5, Honor Watch 4 and the Huawei Watch Match 3. So this actually is among the least expensive, feature-packed smartwatches you’ll have the ability to put in your wrist.

Try our record of the finest smartwatches for the highest choices.

Must you purchase the CMF Watch Professional 2?

In order for you a smartwatch that bucks the pattern that price range smartwatches should feel and look price range, then the Watch Professional 2 goes to enchantment. 

It’s well-made with very likeable {hardware} and software program that whereas not groundbreaking does numerous the smartwatch fundamentals properly. It delivers good battery life, some good and never so good health and wellness monitoring assist in an general fashionable package deal.

I’d say that its rivals just like the Huawei Watch Match 3, Honor Watch 4 and Amazfit Bip 5 supply somewhat extra high quality on the health and well being entrance, however outdoors of that it’s actually about how you want issues to be packaged.

I’d say this is among the most visually pleasing low-cost smartwatches I’ve worn and I feel lots of people shall be pleased with what this price range choose affords in case you can handle to snag one. It’s simply not breaking new floor when it comes to precise smarts.

Specs:

• 1.32-inch, AMOLED always-on show
• IP68 waterproof score
• Constructed-in speaker
• Constructed-in GPS
• 300mAh capability battery
• As much as 11 days battery life
• Coronary heart price sensor
• Blood oxygen sensor
• Bluetooth calls
• Sleep monitoring
• Stress monitoring