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Watches and wearables · Garmin

Garmin 245

7owners with an opinion
83%of verdicts positive
2/1positive/negative since 2024
0happy after 3+ years

Praised for battery and performance; criticized for software and ergonomics.

What people wrote

Likes itOwned 1 year
Last year I bought a Garmin Forerunner 245 smartwatch. I have notifications totally disabled, I don’t really use it as an actual smartwatch. But I’ve found its measurements of my heart rate and stress levels (via heart rate variability) really interesting and useful for planning when to exercise, working out why I can’t get to sleep, and monitoring illness. I had an incident involving significant blood loss over a several week period and it was very useful having such detailed heart rate data throughout.
Doesn’t like it
That's absolutely good news. The only thing I hope is to keep it thin design, which basically means no pulse measurements. But I also understand that maybe there are ppl that want this. I tried Garmin Forerunner 245. It was the closest but OS and button placement were less intuitive. And it was thicker. Pebble time has a much sleaker design that doesn't give sport vibes but an everyday watch style. PTR looked great too but battery life wasn't great
Likes it
In general I agree, for instance an Apple Watch crams in so much hardware, that the battery frequently lasts less than a day. Compare that to my Garmin 245, which often lasts 2 weeks on a single charge if it's not using the GPS. It doesn't do as much, but that's fine. I'd love to see more "quiet" tech which eschews the pattern you describe above, and just focusses on doing the thing it's supposed to well so you don't have to think about it. EInk is another promising technology in this area.
Likes it
One doesn't need to buy an expensive Garmin model. I've got an Edge 130 and an older Edge 25 that I've bought second hand. The 130 came as an upgrade to the older device and is perfect for my use. Both devices connect with my Forerunner 245 watch for the HR. Whenever I don't want to use them (commute or sub 20 km workout), I just use the watch. Dual frequency GPS is probably going to make its way into cheaper Garmin models soon enough, maybe thanks to Apple. Having a phone on the handlebar/top tube is cumbersome and annoying, battery life is crap and distractions galore. I don't want needless phone calls from annoying people interrupting my workout and distracting me from watching the road. I've set up my Garmin devices to ignore phone calls and texts from the phone during workouts.
Likes it
I often hear about the great battery life of the Pebble watch, and that there is no smart watch with a comparable one. Thats kind of true, depending what one wants from their smart watch. But there actually is an alternative if you only need basic smart watch capabilites: Sport Watches. I personally only want notifications from my phone, which my Garmin Forerunner 245 can do perfectly well. And it has a battery life of up to 2 weeks, depending on how much I use the GPS of the watch.