Vibrant milk carton speakers explode in color and sound

If you enjoy minimalist design in your tech, you're going to want to take a closer look at CMF's first portable speakers. Available in two sizes, they resemble milk cartons – in the best way – and have me wanting all four colorways. That might actually not be the worst idea I've ever had.

Design-forward hardware brand Nothing recently spun CMF off into a standalone company. The latter makes a range of budget-friendly gadgets, and you can still see the strong influence of Swedish electronics firm Teenage Engineering in the look and feel of its products.

That includes colorblock styling, chunky knobs and physical controls, and simple shapes that make each device memorable and distinctive. If you enjoy that design language, you'll have to shell out a pretty penny (Teenage Engineering only makes a couple of speakers, which cost about $580 and $1,000) – so snagging an alternative from CMF is a much easier way to get your fix.

The CMF Speaker S is the smaller of the two models, and it's absolutely adorable in its 5-inch-tall (130.5-mm) form factor. The simple industrial design gets a neat little accent in the form of a physical knob for adjusting playback, track navigation, and volume.

What's especially cool about the S and the larger Speaker M is that their front panels are replaceable, so you can swap them out for different colors, and interchange the knobs too. CMF doesn't yet have a set of panels and knobs to buy separately, but those will hopefully appear in its store later on.

The S promises 18 hours of playback time from its custom 45-mm driver that delivers 10-W output. It's also got two passive radiators for deep bass, and CMF says it's tuned the driver to extend its low-end range.

It's not only about good looks. The S can pair with a second speaker for a wide soundstage in stereo mode, and supports Auracast so you can beam a single audio stream from one phone (or other source) to multiple speakers in sync. It'll also support dual connections, so you can use it with, say, a phone and your laptop at the same time.

Pairing with a mobile app lets you adjust EQ settings, and the inclusion of Bluetooth 6 means it should work up to 328 ft (100 m) away from your audio source. Ten minutes of charging will net you an hour's play time. And if you want lag-free sound for movies or gaming, you can connect this to a computer via USB-C. Not bad for a stubby little 12-oz (334-g) speaker.

The Speaker M has a taller design, and the crimp on top has a cutout that serves as a handle for this 21-oz (602-g) model. There's a bit more firepower here: a 70-mm woofer along with a 16-mm tweeter that combine to deliver a healthy 35 W. CMF says you can expect "deeper bass, textured vocals and separation between instruments."

Other than that, they're both practically identical in terms of features, down to the battery life and IP68 rating for protection against dust and water.

Oof, it's really hard to choose between these neat colorways. White, dark grey, teal, and orange are on offer, and each of them have knobs in contrasting colors.

The Speaker S comes in at US$59, while the M costs $109. That's a lot less than you'd pay for Teenage Engineering gear, and even a bit cheaper than similarly specced options from Sony and JBL.

Find the CMF Speaker S and Speaker M on Nothing's site, as well as on Amazon (Speaker S, Speaker M).

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