Julian Chokkattu writing for Wired: Nothing’s CMF Devices Prove Yet Again Cheap Doesn't Have to Mean Boring

What's most remarkable about these devices is the price. I have tested cheap and flagship smartphones for nearly a decade, and after setting up the CMF Phone 1, I was pretty surprised to hear it costs just $199—it looks, feels, and performs nearly twice the price.

The phone looks nice, and the $199 price point is really compelling. It’s also a healthy reminder that 120Hz displays aren’t some massively expensive product that you can only work into $1,000+ phones like Apple does, they’re very cheap and are being withheld for market segmentation reasons. Anyway…

I also watched mrwhosetheboss’s video about the CMF line and he said this:

This whole thing reminds me very much of a mentality that I discovered in India. It's called “jugaad”. It means frugal innovation. Inventive ways to use what you have to achieve things that would normally require more resources. Because just by properly thinking this through before building it, this company has genuinely achieved a really high level of functionality without making it cost them any more to build this thing.

I like this, and I think it’s something us in the tech punditry should think about and value more often. We’re so obsessed with “build quality” and “premium feel” for so many things, even if those elements make the product technically worse. I can’t help but think about the Vision Pro, which is built with metal and glass when plastic would be cheaper, lighter, and likely easier to produce. And still, pundits like me lauded the Vision Pro for its build quality.

Maybe it’s not intentional, but I get the vibe that some people (myself included) see phones like this and go, “ew, that’s not for someone like me, a person of means.” The CMF Phone 1 is a cheap phone, and it certainly compromises on some things to get to that price point, but it also seems to have good build quality, looks very well designed, and has practical features that are unique compared to the top-of-the-line phones on the market. Depending on your needs, this might be a straight up better phone for you than a 5x more expensive Samsung of Google Android flagship device.