As someone who isn't the target market for this, is there significant demand for this? $1200 for a smart watch that'll be e-waste in a few years is steep, plus $8/mo to keep it working (though I guess if you're going to pay four figures for a smart watch the $96/yr probably makes no difference).
I guess if you intend to carry a watch anyway, you can save the few ounces and leave your phone at home? And maybe a few ounces for a battery pack to charge a phone? But at the same time, the absolute last time I'd ever want to be tapping out a text message on my watch is when I'm in need of rescue through satellite message. In the most genuine sense possible, I really don't know who the actual target audience is that's not just buying it for the clout.
They are built to last. I've had my Fenix 5 for at least 7 years and it shows no signs of slowing or dying. Battery still lasts 5 days or so with normal use. Think it's just stopped getting software updates.
Admittedly they were a bit cheaper back then (but this will one will be too next year)...
Perhaps I'm being overly cynical, but I have zero faith that any device whose primary distinguishing feature is a subscription connectivity service will be usable in more than five years.
It's more of a PR/interest piece rather than anything that moves the needle for buyers.
Garmin buyers typically choose the brand due to the much longer battery life, however Garmin doesn't have any magic battery technology - the longer battery life is simply from less full time services. If enabling the additional hardware functions that bring it on-par with the ultra, the ultra actually has a longer battery life.
The other issue is that both brands diverge in how they offer satellite connectivity. For iPhones, satellite connectivity includes messaging, sending locations, and carrier-provided functionality via satellite (e.g. SMS), alongside with the road-side assistance and SOS features. These are included at no cost (at this time).
Garmin on the other hand starts with a $40 activation fee, then a minimum per month charge of $8 USD which then still charges 50c per text message, $1 for voice messages and 60c an hour for location tracking. Garmin's also offers a $50 USD per month plan where some of these tariffs are included, but notably voice messages are limited to 50 units before reverting back to $1 each. The $40 activation fee prevents users from saving money by switching off the functionality when not needed.
I don't know how it works on these Garmin watches but on my current inReach plan I can pause it at any time. And it looks like these use the same plans.
They also run their own satellite network team that responds and forwards to SAR services which obviously has additional overhead
> the longer battery life is simply from less full time services
I imagine the transfective screen tech helps quite a bit too. Not having to max out the backlight's brightness to compete with the brightness of the sun has to help.
I think there is demand. Hikers or trail runners may buy this for peace of mind, plus the other capabilities like maps.
> the absolute last time I'd ever want to be tapping out a text message on my watch is when I'm in need of rescue through satellite message. In the most genuine sense possible, I really don't know who the actual target audience is that's not just buying it for the clout
If you're truly in danger I think there's a button to contact rescue.
They are well built, work very well, and provide metrics that motivate me to exercise more and monitor my progress. There is a touch screen but the buttons are simply a better and easier way to interact with it. It looks cool, and there definitely is a "garmin watch" tribe. Over time, you build an emotional relationship with it.
I got a Garmin Epix 2 watch 3 years ago as a replacement for the Apple Watch ULtra, which turned out to be a terrible sports watch. The Garmin still has two weeks battery life and gets all the functionality upgrades the newer watches are getting. More importantly, it looks great and does exactly what I want it to do simply, and reliably. At the time I also had a whoop. Now I only have the Garmin and it does all I need. It's one of those things you need to try to truly get.
I'm not sold on the prices involved but I could really do with satellite emergency calling for MTB rides where there's no phone signal.
That's far more common than you might think even in areas that should, on paper, have coverage.
I already take my phone for that reason but I think it's far more likely to be damaged in a crash than a smaller watch.
I currently have a Garmin Epix I've had for a few years that I'm otherwise happy with. I would consider switching for satellite SOS if the prices get less crazy.
I'd even consider an Apple watch despite it not working with my power meter and other sensors.
$1200 is stupid expensive, my Fenix 6 Pro was half that. The F6P was worth every one of those 60,000 pennies, which is coincidentally approximately how many hours I've worn it since purchasing it in 2018.
I always leave my phone at home for running, biking, hiking, kayaking, etc: not being tethered is part of the appeal.
The subscriptions for this new one or for InReach are infuriating, and they even recently made it worse because you can no longer effectively deactivate it. I only do 3 or 4 real backcountry expeditions in a year, I don't need this activated for 12 months.
I used to carry an InReach until the MBAs decided I was cheating them out of surplus cash that they could demand. Now I have an ACR PLB1 instead, no subscription but it can still call in the cavalry if I break my ankle twenty miles from civilization.
I would buy this if (honestly, when) the price drops by half, or better yet the Enduro version with a MIP screen. Some rich sucker will probably want to trade theirs in when the $3000 Fenix 9 Supreme comes out....
I feel 1200 is not that bad for what it offers. Also if we're talking Fenix 8: there's a cheaper version that has the same software and features but is like 900 or something (simpler design and hardware). The 1200 USD is the most expensive OLED + Titanium with Sapphire glass edition AFAIK.
It beats having to buy a running watch AND a scuba diving computer AND an oxygen saturation sensor AND some kind of sleep monitor. And it's nice for surfing and sleeping better and jetlag recovery tips and heat aclimation and checking the pressure sensor to see when airplane cabin pressure starts dropping and tons more. After a while I noticed tons of other random interesting things too: when HRV goes down for a few days, I'll know I'll be sick 1 to 2 weeks later, when resting heart rate is like 55 or higher (high for me) I probably did exercise too close to bed time or am having sleeping probems, etc.
IMO super cool that it does all of those and more very well.
I feel like Garmin watches are kind of slept on by normies. They seem to have a niche for fitness enthusiasts. I got one primarily because it looks like a normal watch and not a tech product. But I do appreciate the fitness tracking.
I've had the same one for 5 years and it's still solid.
I agree, it's the right level of smart for me. That said, while it's squarely in the "fitness tracker" niche, I think it is very popular with anyone who has even a passing interest in running, cycling, etc. The last few years I have seen loads of people around the office wearing one.
If by GPS you specifically mean car navigation. Because almost the entirety of Garmin as a company is built around putting GPS into various things including wearables.
But even in automotive they pivoted to working with car OEMs instead of relying on sale of independent devices.
You can use the device as a fitness tracker without registering an account. And you can download activity files with a USB cable. But anything more, including the satellite connectivity, requires registering an account.
I am not sure what you can do without an account, because I created an account on day 1.
It connects to the phone over Bluetooth. Many operations need your phone to have internet. There is a kind of primitive app platform. The only app I really use is for Home Assistant, it makes https requests to HA over the phone. I connected it to Strava too, it can realtime send heart rate to that app without going to the internet, but it required jumping a few hoops in settings.
If you've got a Garmin device check out GarminDB [0]. Garmin actually exposes an API that you can access with your credentials and get the raw activity, heart rate, etc data.
I didn't realize this. Just verified on my Forerunner 965, if I put my phone in Airplane Mode, turn off Wi-Fi, leave Bluetooth on, then Garmin Connect disabled the sync button and says "No Internet connection".
This is why when Garmin Connect has outages you can’t sync the watch to the phone, it’s a pretty bad architecture. It should sync to the phone without internet or any services and then use internet to sync from the phone to the cloud.
As a rule, non-LTE watches upload data over Bluetooth to the app (offline), which then relays that to whatever cloud service once there’s a connection. If you don’t want the second part, install Gadgetbridge and have your pick of the supported devices[1] (keeping in mind that that support not a boolean but rather feature-per-feature, so check the details).
This has not been my experience. If you know of a fitness tracker or smartwatch that can sync without a cloud account or cellular data connection I would be very interested. But I have not found any devices that meet those criteria.
(And GadgetBridge does not work on iOS. It is Android-only.)
I have a 2 year old Amazfit GTR 4. I just disabled wifi & cellular data on my phone, opened the Zepp app, pulled down to sync and it happily downloaded my today's activity to the app. And oh, compared to Apple, I only need to charge it once per two weeks (with almost everything enabled, except always on display).
They're using geostationary satellites, but their Inreach stuff is using Iridium. Anyone know which satellites they're using for this, and if the coverage can be expected to increase in the future?
It's Skylo, which makes me really sad about this. This 'breaks' the InReach name completely if they're selling both global pole-to-pole Iridium and limited Skylo coverage devices under the same umbrella, and almost angling it as if you should put more faith in "just carry one less thing!" when it might doom you when you need it.
Wow. Full coverage of the contiguous US is nice, but other than that you can mostly send emergency messages in places that are already close to civilization. Places that probably have cell coverage anyways
In a ten minute drive from Issaquah, WA (major suburb 20 minutes from Seattle), I can be in the woods with no cell coverage on a mountain frequented by many hikers (parts of Cougar Mt. are especially dead to cell phones). Let alone driving another half hour and having no cell coverage at all once you walk from the trailhead.
And cell service is surprisingly poor at my home in the heart of Redmond suburbs, even. If you rely on a cell phone to get out of a tight spot, stay out of the woods, at least in the U. S. West.
And...I could not care less. Garmin needs to fix their software, I am a long time garmin user, from using garmin head units on mountain bikes for the last 30 years, using garmin watches, I have had 4 fenix watches over the years, I swapped to a Apple watch ultra this year, and as a ultra distance trail runner and mountain biker, I could not be happier. Yes, the garmin units are more rugged and can handle more abuse, yes, their battery is light years ahead, but, it does not really matter anymore, the apple watch ultra is tough enough and the battery good enough, and the software is so much better. I can download multiple different running apps, and follow a training plan with it (runna workoutoutdoors, or one of the many other ones), I can do my cross training using one of the lifting apps, like heavy or strong, I can use it with golf etc. yes, the fenix range can do all of that aswell, but the experience is just so much nicer on the ultra. I struggle to see, how garmin can compete software wise, as a single company battling the army of independant developers out there building iOS/watchOS apps. And more importantly, my ultra never crash, my fenix went through a phase, where it would randomly reboot, until garmin pushed a fix. Bugs happen, I get it, but...it's been happening now for years with garmin.
Their bike GPS range is...not good. I've owned two (Edge something?). Both were completely unusable for bike navigation. They're basically overpriced odometers with a shitty map bolted on as an afterthought.
Updating the maps was an exercise anger management, involving setting up accounts and syncing data to their cloud (why would I want to do that to update a map???). The maps turned out to be woefully out of date even after updating.
I managed to flash recent OSM data to one of the units, but the map rendering is so awful, cluttered, and so slow that this turned out to be just as pointless.
> my fenix went through a phase, where it would randomly reboot, until garmin pushed a fix
This is something that just can't happen for this kind of use case, and the fact that bugs like this repeatedly happen with Garmin is mind-blowing to me. This company makes glass cockpits- if you ask me, they need to borrow someone from that team to show their consumer electronics team how to test their product and have a sense of urgency when things break.
That’s because after Apple Watch Edition sold like dog poop sandwiches, even Apple isn’t going to try and charge $2K for a watch. When I bought the original Apple Watch Ultra at $800, I thought that was pricey. And then Garmin these past few years has said, “hold this…”
No, but it does require you to hold your arm in a particular way. I would be unsurprised if they're factoring in the capacitance and ground plane effect of the "big bag of saltwater" in their antenna design!
It uses the magnetic compass, accelerometer, and GPS to help you aim it at the satellite (south, ~35 degrees above the horizon).
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I guess if you intend to carry a watch anyway, you can save the few ounces and leave your phone at home? And maybe a few ounces for a battery pack to charge a phone? But at the same time, the absolute last time I'd ever want to be tapping out a text message on my watch is when I'm in need of rescue through satellite message. In the most genuine sense possible, I really don't know who the actual target audience is that's not just buying it for the clout.
Admittedly they were a bit cheaper back then (but this will one will be too next year)...
Garmin buyers typically choose the brand due to the much longer battery life, however Garmin doesn't have any magic battery technology - the longer battery life is simply from less full time services. If enabling the additional hardware functions that bring it on-par with the ultra, the ultra actually has a longer battery life.
The other issue is that both brands diverge in how they offer satellite connectivity. For iPhones, satellite connectivity includes messaging, sending locations, and carrier-provided functionality via satellite (e.g. SMS), alongside with the road-side assistance and SOS features. These are included at no cost (at this time).
Garmin on the other hand starts with a $40 activation fee, then a minimum per month charge of $8 USD which then still charges 50c per text message, $1 for voice messages and 60c an hour for location tracking. Garmin's also offers a $50 USD per month plan where some of these tariffs are included, but notably voice messages are limited to 50 units before reverting back to $1 each. The $40 activation fee prevents users from saving money by switching off the functionality when not needed.
They also run their own satellite network team that responds and forwards to SAR services which obviously has additional overhead
I imagine the transfective screen tech helps quite a bit too. Not having to max out the backlight's brightness to compete with the brightness of the sun has to help.
> the absolute last time I'd ever want to be tapping out a text message on my watch is when I'm in need of rescue through satellite message. In the most genuine sense possible, I really don't know who the actual target audience is that's not just buying it for the clout
If you're truly in danger I think there's a button to contact rescue.
I got a Garmin Epix 2 watch 3 years ago as a replacement for the Apple Watch ULtra, which turned out to be a terrible sports watch. The Garmin still has two weeks battery life and gets all the functionality upgrades the newer watches are getting. More importantly, it looks great and does exactly what I want it to do simply, and reliably. At the time I also had a whoop. Now I only have the Garmin and it does all I need. It's one of those things you need to try to truly get.
That's far more common than you might think even in areas that should, on paper, have coverage.
I already take my phone for that reason but I think it's far more likely to be damaged in a crash than a smaller watch.
I currently have a Garmin Epix I've had for a few years that I'm otherwise happy with. I would consider switching for satellite SOS if the prices get less crazy.
I'd even consider an Apple watch despite it not working with my power meter and other sensors.
I always leave my phone at home for running, biking, hiking, kayaking, etc: not being tethered is part of the appeal.
The subscriptions for this new one or for InReach are infuriating, and they even recently made it worse because you can no longer effectively deactivate it. I only do 3 or 4 real backcountry expeditions in a year, I don't need this activated for 12 months.
I used to carry an InReach until the MBAs decided I was cheating them out of surplus cash that they could demand. Now I have an ACR PLB1 instead, no subscription but it can still call in the cavalry if I break my ankle twenty miles from civilization.
I would buy this if (honestly, when) the price drops by half, or better yet the Enduro version with a MIP screen. Some rich sucker will probably want to trade theirs in when the $3000 Fenix 9 Supreme comes out....
It beats having to buy a running watch AND a scuba diving computer AND an oxygen saturation sensor AND some kind of sleep monitor. And it's nice for surfing and sleeping better and jetlag recovery tips and heat aclimation and checking the pressure sensor to see when airplane cabin pressure starts dropping and tons more. After a while I noticed tons of other random interesting things too: when HRV goes down for a few days, I'll know I'll be sick 1 to 2 weeks later, when resting heart rate is like 55 or higher (high for me) I probably did exercise too close to bed time or am having sleeping probems, etc.
IMO super cool that it does all of those and more very well.
I've had the same one for 5 years and it's still solid.
But even in automotive they pivoted to working with car OEMs instead of relying on sale of independent devices.
I wouldn't want to go into the lobster season without the ability to track my pods.
It connects to the phone over Bluetooth. Many operations need your phone to have internet. There is a kind of primitive app platform. The only app I really use is for Home Assistant, it makes https requests to HA over the phone. I connected it to Strava too, it can realtime send heart rate to that app without going to the internet, but it required jumping a few hoops in settings.
If you do a quick Google images for Garmin Fenix 6s and then for mi band 4, I think you will see the visual contrast we're talking about.
[0]: https://github.com/tcgoetz/GarminDB
(Stealing the cellular data connection over Bluetooth to sync to the cloud does not count. True Bluetooth sync works when there is no cell service.)
[1] https://gadgetbridge.org/gadgets/wearables/
(And GadgetBridge does not work on iOS. It is Android-only.)
Deleted Comment
Huh? Do not all FitBits do this?
They're using geostationary satellites, but their Inreach stuff is using Iridium. Anyone know which satellites they're using for this, and if the coverage can be expected to increase in the future?
Guess I won't be selling my Mini anytime soon !
https://www.skylo.tech/newsroom/skylo-expands-collaboration-...
And cell service is surprisingly poor at my home in the heart of Redmond suburbs, even. If you rely on a cell phone to get out of a tight spot, stay out of the woods, at least in the U. S. West.
Updating the maps was an exercise anger management, involving setting up accounts and syncing data to their cloud (why would I want to do that to update a map???). The maps turned out to be woefully out of date even after updating.
I managed to flash recent OSM data to one of the units, but the map rendering is so awful, cluttered, and so slow that this turned out to be just as pointless.
This is something that just can't happen for this kind of use case, and the fact that bugs like this repeatedly happen with Garmin is mind-blowing to me. This company makes glass cockpits- if you ask me, they need to borrow someone from that team to show their consumer electronics team how to test their product and have a sense of urgency when things break.
But, given the amount of power that needs to be emitted from that watch to make it to the Satellite I assume you need to take it off your wrist first?
It uses the magnetic compass, accelerometer, and GPS to help you aim it at the satellite (south, ~35 degrees above the horizon).