I don't really like spending money. But if I have to, I want to be sure that whatever I'm buying is a good value, especially when it comes to weights.
After all, some of the best adjustable dumbbells cost hundreds of dollars; on paper, it’s hard to justify spending that amount when you can pick up a more rough and ready set for $50. So I was a bit skeptical when I came to start reviewing a premium set of dumbbells from Chris Hemsworth’s Centr.
Yes, that’s the same Chris Hemsworth from the Marvel movies, and Centr began life as a standalone workout app before branching out to equipment. So my brain made the leap that the price was, at least in part, because of the famous name attached to the fitness brand.
But none of that really matters because, after using the Centr Smart Stack Adjustable Dumbbells in my strength workouts, I can tell you that they are very definitely worth the money. These are some of the comfiest weights I’ve ever held, with very efficient adjustment mechanisms that meant I could just focus on the exercise at hand.
And I know that might be hard to believe — they look like weights; pretty weights, but just weights. But it’s the small details that only reveal themselves once you’re actually using them. For example, the tray is not a cheap bit of plastic liable to break if you drop a dumbbell on it.
Instead, you get a substantial tray that feels more like a product in its own right with magnets at points where the dumbbells touch down. This is a safety feature to make sure the weights are properly secured before you change the load or lift them off (and may prevent the kind of issues BowFlex had which led to a recall of almost 4 million dumbbells).
And rather than playing around with switches or having to manually change weights plates, the Centr Smart Stack Dumbbells have a rotating handle which allows you to move between 5 lbs and 50 lbs incredibly quickly. For most of my time exercising at home, I've used manually adjustable 'bells with weights plates.
These are cheap, but also very slow. If I'm doing a high-intensity resistance training workout with just a 15 or 20-second break, I often spend the whole rest period changing the load. But with the Centr weights, I'd finish a set, place them back in the tray, rotate the handle, and still have 10 seconds to catch my breath.
And this might be a weird thing to include in what is essentially a product review, but the best thing about the Centr dumbbells is that I didn't really think about them at all while working out. I've used some terrible weights in the past, and I spent each session readjusting plates or worried bits would fly off mid-session.
The best thing about the Centr dumbbells is that I didn't really think about them at all while working out.
These dumbbells aren't like that. If you've used regular (non-adjustable) dumbbells before, you'll know that there's basically nothing to them. There's a metal handle, and two heads on either end. Some are hexagonal to prevent rolling, some are circular so you can move them around easily. But that's as much as you need to think about.
Adjustable dumbbells are not quite as straightforward, as there's the adjustment mechanism, the heads, the materials, the grip (important when you're loaded to a higher weight) and how you store them. But the Centr weights just kinda faded into the background while I was training, which is the biggest compliment I can give them.
There's no getting around the fact, though, that they're pretty expensive. Usually, that'd mean I find it hard to recommend them, but adjustable dumbbells are a rare category where, if you can spend the money, it can be good value in the long run.
The weights run from 5 lbs up to a fairly substantial 50 lbs, so unless you buy them when you're already training with heavy weights, they're likely to last you quite a long time. This is true of all adjustable dumbbells, of course, which is why they're good companions if you're using the progressive overload training technique.
But if you estimate that you'll get five years use out of them, even at full price, that's around $50 per year, far less than you pay for Netflix or Amazon Prime annually. It's still a lot to pay upfront, and that won't be on the cards for everyone, but if you can, you get a set of dumbbells that act and feel as premium as their price tag.
Though if you're looking for something more wallet-friendly, I recently tried out the LifePro PowerFlow Plus adjustable dumbbells, which were a lot of fun to train with but are about half the price of the Centr Smart Stack weights.
Of course, there are compromises; they feel cheaper, the plastic tray seems very fragile, and the adjustment mechanism isn't quite as seamless, but as I wrote in our adjustable dumbbells round up, "I'd call the LifePro PowerFlow Plus cheap premium adjustable dumbbells."
You get a lot of what I like about the Centr weights, though with a bit less finesse, and each weight runs up to 25 lbs versus 50 lbs on the Smart Stack. However, this may actually make them a better choice for beginners, as you might not want to drop double the money on double the load when you're just starting out.
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