CMF, Nothing’s budget-focused offshoot, is jumping into the open-ear headphones market with its brand-new Clip Pro.
Designed around a three-point clip setup, they spread pressure evenly across your ear to stop them feeling overly tight or uncomfortable. At a featherweight 5.9g each, they are built to fit pretty much any ear shape, making them easy to forget you are even wearing them.
Instead of jamming inside your ear canal, the Clip Pro simply rests on the outside. Which means there is no active noise cancellation, but on the flip side, you get to enjoy your favourite music or podcasts while staying fully aware of your surroundings. Under the headphones, you will find 10.8mm dual-magnet dynamic drivers tuned to deliver punchy bass, clear mids, and balanced highs.
To make up for the bass loss that usually plagues open-ear kit, CMF has baked in their Ultra Bass Technology. It is designed to intelligently boost low frequencies while keeping high-frequency distortion at bay.
Audio quality gets a nod with Hi-Res certification alongside support for the LDAC, AAC, and SBC codecs. Call quality is handled by four HD microphones tuned to filter out background noise. Cleverly, the earbuds tweak mid and high frequencies so your voice stays clear to the caller without leaking your private conversation to anyone sitting next to you. You can tweak all of this to your liking inside the Nothing app.
The standout feature might just be the Smart Dial built into the charging case. It gives you a physical wheel to tweak the volume, skip tracks, or handle calls, saving you from fumbling with awkward earbud taps or pulling out your phone.
If you do prefer controlling things directly on the buds, CMF has opted for clicky mechanical buttons rather than fiddly touch controls.
Battery life looks solid, offering up to 10 hours of continuous tunes on a single charge and extending to 32.5 hours with the case. A quick 10-minute top-up nets you an extra four hours of playback. You also get a low-latency game mode, dual-device Bluetooth multipoint, Google Fast Pair, Microsoft Swift Pair, and an IP54 dust and splash resistance rating that easily copes with sweat or a bit of rain.
The CMF Clip Pro launches on 15 August in Dark Grey, Light Grey, and Coral for USD99 (~RM405). Initial availability is limited to the US, UK, and Japan, with local pricing and release details for Malaysia yet to be confirmed.