Fitbit Air owners are placing automatic watches on the same strap as the tracker, and it’s easy

The Fitbit Air doesn’t replace your analog or digital watch, and that’s one of the biggest reasons it works. Naturally, some users are already strapping their automatic watches to Google’s fitness tracker.

Google’s Fitbit Air isn’t some novel product. In fact, it returns to the basics of traditional Fitbit products. It’s essentially just a sensor chassis on a strap. No display. No buttons.

One benefit of wearing the Fitbit Air is that it doesn’t replace your analog or digital watch. Let’s say you want to wear a new Longines Hydroconquest with a fitness tracker. Your options are a fitness band like the Fitbit Air or a smart ring like the Oura Ring, because wearing a smartwatch and an automatic watch is a bold move.

Wearing a fitness tracker with a watch doesn’t look half-bad, but you’re still wearing two bracelets.

Enter the latest trend – sliding your analog watch onto the Fitbit Air strap. Some have already taken to social media to post their latest Frankenstein’s monster. The end product is a watch with the Fitbit Air on the same strap, tucked under the wrist. One creator even printed an adaptor for his Casio calculator watch.

How to strap your watch to the Fitbit Air

1. Undo the Fitbit Air strap but leave the body attached.
2. Remove the strap from your analog/digital watch.
   • Note: Leave the spring bars in place.
3. Slip the Fitbit Air strap through your watch spring bars like a single-pass NATO band.
4. Secure the band so the Fitbit Air sits under your wrist, and the watch on top.

The Fitbit Air has a strap width of 18mm, so your watch will need to have a similar lug width. With 20mm lugs, the Fitbit Air strap seems to work fine, but there’s going to be a gap. You can probably get away with 19mm if you have something like the Certina DS Action Diver 38mm, which uses an odd gap size.

The Fitbit Air placed underneath doesn’t actually look all that bad. It sits so low that it almost looks as thick as a clasp on a metal bracelet.

The major downside to this method is how good the strap looks. Strap choices are limited, and you can’t really buy alternative options like a basic NATO strap or a Marine Nationale band.

Google recently released its own designs so band manufacturers can build near-OEM straps. It’s only a matter of time before more hit the market.

• Related: Fitbit Air is a near-perfect fitness tracker with an imperfect AI Health Coach

Google doesn’t officially support this method, because why would it? It’s a fun project that’s easy to do on your own, especially if you don’t want to wear two bands.