This case turns your Apple Watch into a tiny iPod

If you’ve been feeling nostalgic for your old iPod lately, well, I’ve got some great news. TinyPod is a case that you put on your Apple Watch – without a strap – so you can hold it and use it like your favorite vintage MP3 player. A $79 version includes a scroll wheel, which physically rotates the watch’s digital crown. For $29, you can get a case without a scroll wheel and with a cutout to directly access the Digital Crown.

But the TinyPod could be more than just a way to turn your watch into a cute media player – it’s designed to make your watch a more capable companion to your phone. Recently, we’ve seen all kinds of minimalist gadgets and phones that promise to help you disconnect while keeping you connected to the essentials. But for the most part, they’re too weak, complicated, or simply not smart enough to be useful, and the smartphone as we know it remains undefeated.

That’s why TinyPod’s “if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em” stance is so appealing. It is not a replacement for your phone, it is designed to be “your phone away from your phone”. what the company calls. And while you can put any old Apple Watch in the case, the concept makes more sense with a cell phone model. Set your phone aside while still having access to essentials like messaging, calling, mobile payments and music playback – the minimalist phone dream.

If this all sounds familiar, you might be thinking about the concept of an iPod Nano-inspired watch case designed by Joyce Kang that emerged a few years ago. Despite claims that it would “arrive soon”, it does not appear that the case has reached the market. Kang’s case was also more of an exercise in nostalgia, as the scroll wheel didn’t work.