Watches have long served vanity first, utility second. The fact that a watch tells time isn’t material if it looks bad while doing it.

So if you tell me my smartwatch is “pointless” or “a waste of money,” don’t mind if I quirk an eyebrow.

I think many people are bothered by not using an item to its full potential. The average bracelet is objectively useless, but because of that, you’re using it to its maximum just by virtue of wearing it. A $70 bracelet is a justified purchase if you simply put it on.

But you had better use every goddamned feature of your $70 smartwatch for it to be worth the purchase. Right?

Wrong.

I’d like to give you express permission to buy a smartwatch just because you like how it looks. And on top of that, it also tells the time. And on top of THAT it can track some interesting stuff.

I’ve worn a Garmin Vivoactive 5 (which I bought for $270) for about 5 months. I think I actively use 5% of its capabilities. The only feature that I wouldn’t want to live without is the vibration alarm, which makes waking up in the morning so much nicer. I’m past the point in my life where I need a firetruck sound to rouse me.

I also track a lot of stuff. That’s the primary draw for people, I think. The stuff I track rarely informs any type of decision-making, but it can definitely be interesting. Probably, you’re in the same boat, no? Even if you track your sleep, how often are you making decisions based on your sleep score? For me, I know when my score is low before looking at my watch.

Even though I wear it every day, my trusty Garmin has a fair number of downsides. Its ugliness being the main one. It’s ugly inside and out: hardware and software. The companion app is utilitarian rather than joyful. It’s something you tolerate rather than love.

Hence my attraction to the CMF by Nothing Watch Pro 3. It basically does everything the Garmin does and looks good while doing it.

This watch is also wildly underpriced. I got it on sale for just $70.

After wearing both watches for a day (and being mocked by the grocery store clerk for doing so), I took the Garmin off and haven’t put it back on since.

I’d highly recommend this device to anyone attracted to the idea of the smartwatch, especially if you’re buying it to serve your vanity.

First impressions

On unboxing the Watch Pro 3, I felt a bit let down. I had some early concerns with the CMF:

• Larger & heavier form factor than the Garmin
• Confusing companion app menu design. It took me a long time to realize there was a separate “Health” tab for metrics. It seems like the devs know this is a problem but refuse to change it, since the app prompts you to switch the default tab to “Health” the first time you visit it.
• Watch faces can be switched, but aren’t individually customizable. The out-of-the-box watch faces are miles better than what Garmin comes with, and super pretty. But, you can’t pick a design you like then swap out the default metrics.
• No USB-C. I know, I know … it’s a small form factor. This is a tie though - each device has a (different) proprietary charger.
• Bad watch band. This is also a tie. Both devices come with an uncomfortable silicone band that traps water underneath. I immediately got new ones for both.

Setup for the CMF was very easy though. And, my opinion began to change after my first activity.

I’ll go through the major features of each watch and declare a winner for each category.

Activities: ★ CMF

• Faster to start on the CMF, since the default menu shows 8 and you don’t need to scroll to find them.
• Much prettier display during the activity - huge win, since how enjoyable it is to work out directly affects how much you do it. Also, crazy that the Garmin WATCH doesn’t let you see the time while working out.
• Lock feature for the activity display - super nice so you don’t accidentally swipe to a screen you don’t want

Both devices measure very similar heart rates, but I prefer the CMF zone names. Garmin calls Zone 2 “easy”, while CMF calls it “fat burning”. Do you want your watch patronizing or pseud-science-y? I would just prefer numbers. Still, the “easy” label has always annoyed me on days where I was dragging myself to the stationary bike.

One pro for Garmin is its post-workout heart rate graph. Especially for strength training, it’s cool to see spikes for each set.

Alarms: ★ CMF

How can a vibration alarm possibly be better or worse than another? Well, the CMF allows you to name alarms. That the Garmin does not has been a pain, since my morning alarm automatically labels the snooze button “wake up”, leading to early morning half-asleep confusion.

CMF defaults to sound on for alarms, which surprised me the first morning. The silent mode setting was easy to find, though. It also allows you to adjust the snooze time, though I’ve always been happy with the default 9 or 10 minutes.

Companion app: ★ CMF

I can see reasonable people differing in their opinions on this one.

As I mentioned earlier, tracking stuff about my body is rarely actually useful to me; it’s more of a curiosity. Even though Garmin appears to offer a lot more power-user type features for tracking workouts, I really don’t use them. A lot of the AI coach features boil down to really obvious basics. The Sleep Coach spouts off stuff like, “You only got 6 hours of sleep. Try getting more next time.”

So, CMF wins out because of its beautiful design. It’s just a lot prettier to look at while the Garmin app is sparse, overstuffed, and joyless.

Garmin also frustratingly has two apps: one for core functionality and one for customizations like watch faces. Most watch faces are paid. In a sense it’s nice that you can develop your own watch faces (I’d certainly like to), but I think it’s only needed because the default ones are so ugly.

Display: ★ Garmin

I think this is the only category where Garmin seriously wins out. Its main advantages are:

• Tapping on the watch face reliably turns on the display
• Raise-to-wake reliably works when you intend for it to, and doesn’t when you don’t

Meanwhile CMF’s display turns on pretty frequently when I’m rustling around in bed at night, occasionally bothering my wife. And, the whole “cover the dial to turn off the display” is both completely unreliable and irrelevant, since lowering your hand accomplishes the same thing.

Apple health integration: tie (good)

This is a major win for me, since I’ve developed an ecosystem of apps that connects to step, activity, and sleep data via HealthKit.

The CMF was a drop-in replacement that required no re-configuration for that ecosystem. Its integration worked perfectly out of the box.

Bluetooth & sync: tie (okay)

I’ve never had data loss issues, but both devices have their own sync problems. One complaint I’ve always had with the Garmin is that it syncs slowly to the companion (sometimes taking up to 30 seconds). It also doesn’t show the time last synced (unfortunately, the CMF doesn’t either). The CMF also has a separate issue with weather syncing. It seems like if you haven’t opened the app in the last day or so, you just won’t get a weather display.

But, the CMF syncs much faster (usually in a few seconds). It’s hard to say who comes out on top. If it weren’t for the weather issue, I’d say CMF.

Menus: tie (bad)

It doesn’t seem like either company has got the on-device menus down. Garmin has several different menus activated by pressing or long-pressing its buttons, making some options hard to find. But, CMF just gives you one giant menu with like 30 options. You know where everything is, but it’s not fast to get there. No clear winner to me; they’re both bad.

My overall recommendation

While owning a smartwatch in the first place might be a bit of a folly, you really can’t go wrong with the CMF by Nothing Watch Pro 3, especially at its price point ($99 retail, $70 on sale). It’s amazing that this watch can edge out the nearly 3x more expensive Garmin in so many categories.

If you prefer beauty to utilitarianism, I’d highly recommend it.

And, check out this heavy duty canvas watch band while you’re at it.

Happy tracking!