To date, transdermal patches, containing infused substances like nicotine and caffeine, are kept hidden underneath your clothes, as they are not something people generally advertise.
These patches are typically placed near areas with high blood flow, so that the chemicals can enter and move through your body faster. But patch placement can lead to skin irritation, and general discomfort in wearing a sticky adhesive all day.
Enter Joule – a caffeine wearable designed to take away that discomfort, while also placing the patch in an area without much fat resistance, allowing the substance to flow faster into your body.
Joule isn’t exactly “smart” in the usual sense, as there’s no Bluetooth, notifications, or anything of the sort. Instead, it’s pretty simple in that it offers a way to put a patch in a high blood flow area without having to deal with any discomfort from placing a sticky patch on your body.
The company just launched an Indiegogo campaign, and has currently raised $3,283 out of $15,000 needed, as of publication.
The FDA-approved patch dispatches caffeine immediately — faster than drinking coffee — and has the same amount of caffeine as a medium cup of java, or 65mg.
While it begins quickly, the process proceeds slowly, as the Joule works “gradually for a steady supply of caffeine and energy without any of the typical energy crashes, jitters, or other negative effects of consuming your caffeine through beverages,” according to Joule’s Indiegogo page.
You’ll be getting the benefits of caffeine for four hours after placing the patch in the bracelet, and you can just take it off if you want it to stop.
The one-size-fits-all bracelet is made of a durable silicon material, and while it comes in a few colors, it doesn’t look too stylish. What does look decent is the watch version of the bracelet — which essentially adds a timepiece.
If you want to get into using patches and avoid the negatives of drinking coffee, including the jitters and coffee breath, the Joule bracelet will cost you $29 via the Indiegogo campaign, which is 20 percent off the projected market price. It comes with 30 patches, and you can always buy more separately when you run out.
The Joule Time model costs $99 on the Indiegogo page, and you need to be 18 or over to use either.
The OnePlus Buds Clip are a new pair of open-ear earbuds built around a simple convenience. They join Sony’s LinkBuds Clip in the growing ear-cuff category, but either OnePlus bud can go on either ear.
Sensors recognize how the earbuds are being worn and route the audio channels accordingly. There’s no label to check before putting them on, and the feature also works when only one bud is used.
We buy fitness bands and activity trackers to keep tabs on our exercise, but it is easy to forget to start tracking or switch modes when moving between different activities. For Fitbit and Pixel Watch users, that could soon become a lot less annoying, as Google is rolling out a major upgrade to automatic activity tracking that can recognize more than 100 types of exercise, up from just 10 before.
Google first showed off the improved tracking earlier this month alongside the Fitbit Edge. It is now coming to Fitbit Air and the Pixel Watch 3, 4, and 5, and Google claims the added context behind the system makes workout detection nearly twice as accurate while cutting missed activities by more than half. Fitbit Edge will support it too.