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If you look closely using explore on the phone app it looks like 4 on each side for a total of 8.
If you need to take more than that out I think it would look ridiculous on you.
 
Looked to be about 6 on each side, but I can't say for absolute sure.

This is what I thought as well. It is a little confusing since Apple's website shows 4 links per side. Take comfort knowing they stated it fits 140mm+

I'm guessing you need to leave one removable link in on each side to close it back up. I'd guess you could remove 5 per side but I'm not 100% sure
 
I saw it in the store but couldn't make out how many links could be removed as they didn't have one for try on
 
After further research a video released by "phone dog" on youtube stated 5 on each side around 2:15 in. On the contrary, a review by Danny Winget on youtube showed 6 or 7 links on one side around 2:58 in.

Hard to tell since so many people play around with the links in store. Phone dog actually stated 5 on each side so I'd roll with that.
 
My memory is extremely fuzzy on this, but I thought I read somewhere that it's 4 links on each side for the 38mm and 6 links on each side for the 42mm.
 
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