CircuitMess Connect

Get your phone talking to your device

CircuitMess Connect is our new Android app for pairing your phone with CircuitMess devices — Artemis Watch, Clockstar, Butter Bot and the rest. Here is how to set it up, whether your device is fresh out of the box or you have been using it for a while.

Start here

There are three ways through this page. Find yourself below.

Android, device made in or after August 2026

Your device already ships with firmware that knows about the app. Install and pair — that's it. If you're not sure when yours was made, start at step 1 anyway.

Go to step 2 →

Android, device made before August 2026 — or you're not sure

Your device was built before the app existed. It still works with it — it just needs newer firmware first. One extra step, done once.

Start at step 1 →

iPhone

You don't need the app at all. But updating your Artemis Watch or Clockstar gets you something new: media control.

Read the iPhone bit →

Setting it up

Update the firmware from your computer

Only if your device was made before August 2026 — or you're not sure

Devices made before August 2026 shipped with firmware that predates the app. Restoring the firmware brings them up to date. You do this once, from a computer — not from the phone. If you're not sure when yours was made, do it anyway — restoring a device that is already up to date does no harm.

Plug your device into your computer with a USB cable.
Open CircuitBlocks at code.circuitmess.com and log in.
Go to the top right of the screen, choose Restore firmware, then pick your device.
Wait for it to finish, then unplug your device.

Restoring the firmware clears the device. Saved games and settings are all wiped. The firmware itself comes out newer than it went in — that is the point of doing it — but nothing you have saved carries over.

Used Bangle.js before? CircuitMess Connect replaces it. Once your firmware is updated, this is the app you'll use with your watch.

Install CircuitMess Connect

Get it from Google Play: CircuitMess Connect. You can also open the Play Store on your phone and search for it by name.

**Check the publisher.** The right listing says **CircuitMess** under the app name.

Open the app and grant the permissions

The first time you open CircuitMess Connect it shows a Permissions screen. The app can't find or talk to anything until these are granted, so it is worth doing properly now rather than wondering later why your watch never turns up.

**What you start with.** Each permission has its own green button. **Continue** stays grey until they are all done.

**Scroll down for the rest.** The last two send you into your phone's settings — switch them on there and come back.

**All granted.** **Continue** turns green and takes you to the Devices screen.

What each one is for:

Bluetooth — has to be switched on at all. If this one isn't already green, turn Bluetooth on in your phone's quick settings.
Bluetooth Scan — lets the app find your device in the first place.
Bluetooth Connect — lets it talk to the device once it has found it.
Notifications — lets the app keep running in the background so the connection stays up.
Notification access — passes your phone's notifications through to your watch, and powers media control.
Display over other apps — lets Find My Phone show its alert over whatever you happen to be doing.

When everything reads Granted, tap Continue.

Wake your device up and keep it close

Pairing happens over Bluetooth, so both ends need to be awake and within reach of each other.

Turn your device on and check it has some charge.
Keep it within arm's reach of your phone while you pair.
Make sure Bluetooth is switched on on your phone.

Pair them

Open the app. It starts on the Devices screen. If you have never paired anything, it looks like this:

Tap Start searching devices at the bottom — or, once you have devices in your list, the + in the top right corner.

**Scanning.** The blue badge spins while the app looks around. Devices appear as they are found.

**Found one.** Each entry shows the product name and its Bluetooth address.

**Found several.** Match the address if you have two of the same device. Here one has been tapped and is connecting.

Tap the one you want. It pairs, connects, and the app drops you back on the Devices screen with a confirmation along the bottom.

The blue badge. Whenever the app is busy — searching, or connecting to a device you tapped — a blue badge spins. When it stops, it is done.

Nothing happening? Wake the device's screen. A watch that has dozed off may not answer the app — press a button so the screen lights up, then tap it in the list again.

Reading the Devices screen

Everything lives on one screen. Here is what it is telling you.

Connected and Disconnected

Your paired devices are sorted into two groups. Green means the app is talking to that device right now. Red means it is still paired but not connected — usually it is switched off, out of range, or flat.

**Two connected, one not.** Devices stay in your list either way.

**More than one device?** They all live here together.

Reconnecting a device

Turn the device back on, then tap it in the list. It won't reconnect on its own — the tap is what does it.

**Tap the row.** The blue badge spins while it connects, then the device moves up to Connected.

The red "Outdated firmware" bar

A red bar across a device card means it is running older firmware. The device still works, but you're missing whatever the newer firmware added.

The bar is a notice, not a button — tapping it does nothing. To clear it you need your computer: restore the firmware the same way as step 1.

What you can do with a device

The ••• button on each card opens three actions:

Disconnect — drop the link but keep the device paired.
Refresh — re-check the device's status.
Unpair — remove it from the app completely.

Tapping a connected device opens its details instead: a photo, its status, its Bluetooth address, and whether its firmware is up to date.

**The ••• menu.** Unpair is red because it can't be undone without pairing again.

**Device details.** **Firmware status** is where you check whether an update is due.

Messages along the bottom

The app confirms every change with a short message. They stay until you tap Got it.

Message	What happened
paired successfully	The device is now in your list for good. You only pair once.
connected successfully	The app has re-established the link to a device you already paired.
has been disconnected	The link dropped, but the device stays in your list. It moves down to Disconnected.
has been unpaired	The device is removed from the app entirely. To use it again you have to pair it from scratch.

On iPhone

No app needed — but update anyway

There is no CircuitMess Connect for iPhone, and you don't need one. Your device connects straight through your iPhone's Bluetooth settings.

Updating the firmware on your Artemis Watch or Clockstar is still worth doing, because it adds media control: play, pause and skip whatever your phone is playing, straight from your wrist. That wasn't possible before.

Same procedure as step 1 — plug it into a computer and restore the firmware from CircuitBlocks.

Restoring the firmware clears the device. Saved games and settings are all wiped here too. The firmware itself comes out newer than it went in — that is the point of doing it — but nothing you have saved carries over.

If your device doesn't show up

The list stays empty when I search

Check the boring things first: is the device actually on, is it charged, and is it close to the phone? Then open the app's Permissions screen and check every line reads Granted — a single missing one is enough to keep the list empty. See step 3.

I bought my device a while ago and nothing works

If it was made before August 2026 — or you're not sure — it needs the firmware update first. Go back to step 1 and restore the firmware from CircuitBlocks — the app can't see the device until you do.

It finds my device but won't connect

Check that the device's screen is on. A watch whose screen has gone dark may not answer the app. Press a button to wake it, then tap it in the list again. The same goes for reconnecting something that has dropped down to Disconnected.

It's already paired to my other phone

A device can only be paired to one phone at a time. Open the app on the first phone, tap the ••• button next to the device and choose Unpair. Then pair it with the new phone as in step 5.

Still stuck

Write to us at contact@circuitmess.com and tell us which device you have, when you bought it, and what your phone is. That's usually enough for us to spot the problem.