Clicks Finally Has a Working Communicator
At long last, and quite literally at the buzzer, Clicks has unveiled a first look at a working unit of the Clicks Communicator. They promised we would see it in action before the end of June, and they delivered by dropping the video at midnight on June 30.
Instead of just replaying their footage, let's pull out the six biggest, most important hardware and software takeaways from this early look at the device.
The Niagara Launcher Vibe
The home screen interface shares an identical layout style with the popular third-party Niagara Launcher, with just a few small additions on top. The core experience centers around a clean, vertical sidebar app ribbon that lets you quickly jump into your favorite applications. The swipe-up gesture animation to return home looks incredibly smooth.
The physical keyboard makes this layout shine thanks to a feature reminiscent of the classic Palm webOS "Just Type" functionality. You can simply start typing the name of an application from anywhere on the home screen, a search bar pops up, and you can launch the app instantly without digging through menus.
Tool-Free SIM and 2TB MicroSD Expansion
Pop off the back plate using the little fingernail cutout at the bottom, and you are greeted by an old-school luxury: toolless card slots. You don't need to fish around for a paperclip or a specialized SIM ejector tool to access your connectivity or storage. The physical SIM card slides into the bottom slot, and a MicroSD card supporting up to 2TB fits right above it.
While looking at this exposed layout initially made it look like the device might feature a removable silicon-carbon battery, official documentation indicates they do not plan to sell replacement batteries or make it customer-serviceable. Even if it looks swappable, it is likely glued down, but the toolless tray design for storage and cellular access is still a massive win.
Biometric Spacebar Integration
On many modern physical keyboard phones, the fingerprint scanner is embedded in the top power button, forcing your hands out of typing position just to unlock the screen. To solve this, the Communicator features a fingerprint sensor built directly into the physical spacebar.
The key itself has a contoured, sculpted shape to make the scanning process completely natural. It allows you to authenticate or unlock the device while keeping your hands in a comfortable, standard typing grip.
Pro Audio: Triple Mics and a Headphone Jack
Audio is a clear priority here. The chassis houses three separate microphones, located at the top, bottom, and back, which are engineered to work in concert with a dedicated audio algorithm team for advanced ambient noise cancellation.
Complementing the triple-mic setup is a physical 3.5mm headphone jack on the top edge. Even if you rely primarily on wireless earbuds, having a zero-latency, adapter-free audio jack built into the frame is excellent news for audiophiles and power users who rely on high-quality wired gear.
The Touch-Sensitive Keyboard
While the first-look video only teases it for future deep-dive content, the presenter explicitly confirmed that the device includes a touch-sensitive capacitive keyboard. This means the physical keys double as a trackpad, a feature that was sorely missed on the original Clicks power keyboard.
You will be able to swipe your thumb across the physical keys to scroll through web pages or text fields, keeping your fingers off the display so your content is never blocked while you read. It will be interesting to see if they eventually roll out a dedicated cursor control mode for fine editing down the line.
Pre-Release Software Quirks
Because this is a prototype running early code, there are a few visual rough edges in the user interface. For instance, when a WhatsApp notification arrives, the UI adds some redundant text blocks and leaves the last sent message visible on the widget until you manually swipe it away.
More noticeably, launching an app and returning home causes a temporary glitch where the system status bar appears, forcing the clock up into the top left corner where it gets partially clipped by the hole-punch selfie camera. The floating notification window could also use a slight downward adjustment of a few pixels to avoid the same camera obstruction. There is no need to panic over these minor visual bugs, as this is standard behavior for pre-release software that will be ironed out well before final production.
According to the official timeline, Q3 will be reserved for testing and certification, at which point buyers can configure their color choices, keyboard layouts, and bonus covers. Mass production is still fully on track to begin in Q4.
