Of all the CES 2016 announcements, the one from Withings took me by surprise in a pleasant way. The company more known for its weighing scales and Activite line of pseudo smart watches showcased their newest tracker, the Withings Go, a back to basics fitness tracker.

There are no fancy heart rate monitoring functions, no audio nor vibration feedback, and no smart notifications. The Withings Go is essentially a hip worn accelerometer with an e-ink display. Just wear and Go. But don’t let the simplicity fool you.

The 24/7 activity tracker records steps, distance, calories. It will also automatically track walk, run, swim and sleep. I had the Withings Pulse previously and can assure you the automatic identification of running and walking is spot on

To further exemplify the simplicity ethos, the Withings Go fitness tracker does away with physical buttons and touch controls. A single press towards the center of the e-ink display toggles between watch mode and progress display.

List of features:

• 24/7 activity tracker
• Tracks steps, distance, calories
• Automatically tracks running and swimming activities
• 8 month battery life
• Watch display and progress meter
• Can be worn 3 ways
• E-ink display

Coupled with the Withings Healthmate mobile app, the downloaded data is succinctly presented with graphs, rankings and deeper insights.

I’m all for simplicity and doing away with the frills. While I know the Withings Go is meant to be left tracking in the back ground, there’s a part of my that’s concerned about visibility in low light conditions since there’s no indication of back light. I’ll probably get a better sensing when I get my hands on one unit.

The Withings Go is priced at $69.96 and there’s no confirmed news on availability as yet.