CMF's first clip-style open earbuds are here with a tempting price tag and, thankfully, none of Nothing's flagship surveillance…

Nothing's cheaper CMF arm just launched CMF Clip Pro, its first clip-on buds

LDAC, new '3-point Clip Design', 10.8mm driver and just 5.9g per bud

£79 / $99 with no flagship 'Audio Snapshot' or call recording — and I'm glad

Loved Nothing until recently, but now you’re not so sure? If you looked at my recent Nothing Ear (3a) review and thought "Wait, they record calls? Why?" you're not alone.

Thankfully, the firm’s cheaper CMF arm just launched its first-ever clip-style open earbuds with LDAC and the basics — ie., no in-call recording — and they're delightfully chic and affordable. I predict a return to form.

CMF says the Clip Pro (for that is their name) are designed to deliver a listening experience that "feels as natural as it sounds" and that the buds are built for "people who move through busy cities, long workdays and active lifestyles".

Open earbuds of this type are growing rapidly in number, but achieving comfort, the ability to hear your surroundings (to be clear: the 10.8mm driver in each earpiece rests in the well of your outer ear, like an ear cuff), and decent sound quality is one of this category's biggest challenges. With Clip Pro, CMF says it set out to solve these issues.

How? First, it starts with a new 3-point Clip Design, which the company describes as a "carefully balanced three-point support system that distributes pressure naturally across the ear instead of concentrating it in a single area". Lovely stuff.

CMF Clip Pro: what you need to know

(Image credit: CMF)

The design features an "elastic titanium wire core" with a "slim C-bridge" to fit your shell-like, and at 5.9g per earpiece, a barely-there wearing experience is the goal.

In terms of audio chops, the 10.8 mm dual-magnet dynamic driver in each earbud is aided by CMF's own Ultra Bass Technology, which the company says "intelligently enhances low frequencies while simultaneously reducing treble distortion" for a more engaging experience through those tricky-to-nail-in-this-design lower frequencies.

Clip Pro supports LDAC, for higher-quality wireless streaming. It's not the first time we've seen the better-quality codec supported in Nothing's affordable earbuds, but it's welcome at this entry-level price if you own a Samsung or Sony phone.

Think they'll be a bit hit-and-miss for calls? CMF thought of that too. Clip Pro combines what the company calls its "flagship VPU-powered Clear Voice Technology and a four HD mic system" to separate the wearer's voice from surrounding noise in real time. For users who value privacy (and I'd say that's all of us), CMF says its Sound Seal system should reduce sound leakage by intelligently managing mid and high frequencies. The goal? Making conversations and music less audible to people nearby.

All of this can be customized in the Nothing X app (a companion app I like very much, having tested most of Nothing's output to date), with dedicated settings for calls or both calls and audio playback.

Oh, and Clip Pro also totes CMF's signature smart dial, as seen in the CMF Buds Pro 2 . It's a tactile rotating control built into the charging case for adjusting volume, managing playback, answering calls and pairing devices without needing to unlock your phone. We were wary of the implementation previously, summarising in our review of those July 2024-issue buds: "The dial is prone to accidental turns or presses in your pocket, the notification sound to tell you that a function has been triggered is startlingly loud, and there’s a significant delay between using the dial and hearing its result", so it'll be interesting to see if CMF has tweaked its efficacy here. You also get on-ear physical controls (which the company says will work even if the user is wearing gloves) as well as a low-latency mode for gaming, dual device connectivity and Nothing's 'find my' solution, which makes your lost earbud emit a rattlesnake-like sound to help you find it under the couch, say.

Your color options here are Dark Grey, Light Grey, and Coral. In case I haven't stressed this enough, you should not wear all three hues like the model in the main image of this missive. The buds are also IP54 rated for water and dust ingress.

Stamina? Of course: Clip Pro's battery claim is up to 10 hours of continuous playback on a single charge and up to 32.5 hours of total playback with the charging case.

Let's talk money: £79 / $99 (so around AU$150), and they'll hit shelves on August 15, 2026. We can't vouch for them yet, but we'll be working on it…

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