Garmin 3

on the flip side, my 12 year old garmin fenix 3 still works great. I finally upgraded to an instinct crossover last year because I wanted the mechanical hands and a smaller face, but the old Fenix is still great.

I had a Fenix 3 for over 5 years and I've had an Epix 2 for close to 3 years now and I don't have any of those problems. GPS normally takes about 30 seconds, and certainly under a minute. It has 5 buttons and for the first year I kept the touchscreen off completely until my bank started supporting Garmin Pay. Yeah, it does use a custom charging cable, but the one for the Fenix 3 was solid and since I only charged it once a week (more than I really needed to) it wasn't a problem. The Epix 2 gets charged twice a week since it has the AMOLED screen and I keep it always on and I record workouts at least 6 times a week unless I'm on vacation. But still, the charge points are inset so they're not noticeable.

Apple Watch has never lasted the full night for me. I'm super happy with my Garmin Instinct 3. A full blown iOS device on my wrist was too stimulating anyways. I'll take charging once every ~25 days-ish over the color + capacitive touch screen. The Garmin Instinct 3 is my favorite tech purchase I have made in a very very long time.

I have a Garmin Vivoactive 3. Fantastic watch but I find the HRM underwhelming. Not very accurate and drains battery. I pair a chest band with it instead for much better quality monitoring.

Yeah, my Garmin Instinct Solar 3 gets a 4-week battery life. I never looked back at my Pebble Time.

> Garmin discontinuing their e-paper smartwatches Wait what? Do you have a source? I can't find anything about that, and I see the Instinct 3 is still being sold. Very disappointing if so, as that line has been the perfect pebble replacement for me.

I love digital watches and have a few Casios, including a protrek like the G-Shock he mentions at the end, that syncs to a radio signal and has solar charging. I switched to a Garmin with oled screen for running, sleep, and Garmin pay. I liked the functionality but hated having to charge it every few days. Especially coming from Casios that you never need to take off your wrist. And I hated having to choose between being able to always see the time at a glance and needing to charge it every day due to always on display. I recently caved and bought a solar powered instinct 3, with MIP display and I love it. I can go over a month without charging, and without turning off features, and I can always see the screen outdoors, when cycling or doing some activity. So yeah, the first one was probably just not the right watch for me.

Even the OLED Garmin watches last much longer than a day. My Venu 3 lasts for about 4 days with me running every day.

I had been an Apple Watch user until it died after I was in a water park. It is supposed to be waterproof, but I guess Apple wants me to refresh after two years. I switched to a Garmin Venu 3. It is better than AW in many aspects, but is also lacking in some. But the Connect app is a lot better than Apple Health.

I just got my first Garmin Watch (Venu 3) in December for Xmas. So far I'm enjoying it. I'm happy to see the company knows how to survive because my last few smart watches didn't fare so well, not exactly from market changes, but from acquisitions. I had the original Pebble and Pebble 2. Loved them. Then one day Pebble was just shut down because of an acquisition by Fibit[1]. There was a group of people that started Rebble[2] to restore web services and support the watch but I was not interested so I switched over to Fitbit. I had the Fitbit Versa 2 and Versa 3 watches and for a while they were great. Then Google bought Fitbit[3]. The impending "Killed by Google" was always in the back of mind, especially since they already sold smart watches. But I have been on Pixel phones for a while now and I thought maybe Google buying them would lead to good things. At first not much changed, but eventually I started having issues with the watch (more info about that below) and I got fed up with it and now I have a Garmin Watch. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pebble_(watch)#Closing_of_Pebb... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pebble_(watch)#Rebble [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fitbit#Google's_acquisition The issues I was having with my Versa 3: Daily I would notice I had missed a sms notification and realize that my watch was disconnected from my phone. I had to go in and manually reconnect it. I also had issues using the voice command feature. I used to be able to use my G…

Interesting article. My partner bought an Apple watch a couple of years ago and I was shocked at what a poor value proposition it was. Very expensive and wouldn't even hold a charge for a day. I guess you get used to it but having to charge my watch every day would drive me mad. Obviously there are things it will do better than a Garmin (and things it can do that a Garmin simply can't) but overall it didn't make sense to me as a product (or, evidently, to my partner, who now leaves it gathering dust). I do think Garmin have found a really good balance for their devices in being smart but not "too smart". I have had a Vívoactive 3 for years that I am pretty happy with. Good battery life and does all the basic fitness stuff plus some actually useful extras like alerting me to phone notifications, etc. Also interesting is that the phone never just replaced standalone GPS fitness trackers. It's entirely possible to just use your phone to track your run, though obviously there are downsides, like you don't get heart rate tracking and it's a lot bulkier (though I think most people probably run with their phone anyway).

To answer your question, there is no "embrace of opensource tools" and I'm not aware of any in existence. They could exist, I haven't looked for them. Here's a quick writeup of my experience: I'm a very happy Garmin customer. I'm on my 2nd watch, a Venu 3. My favorite feature: the battery lasts multiple days, usually a week, w/o a charge (depending on how I use it). The watch provides access to its flash storage using MTP (Media Transfer Protocol). This allows me to access the contents and update the music on it using my Linux computer. I manage the other watch features (tap-to-pay, custom watchfaces, apps) using the Garmin Connect and Garmin IQ app on an Android phone. These are not open source, and I don't know of clones. The watch UI itself is a pretty clunky, menu-driven design. It took quite a bit of tweaking to configure it to my tastes, but the combination of "glances" and "shortcuts" let me access the features I want within a few swipes, taps, or button presses. Configuring apps and custom watchfaces requires internet access, as these use javascript-based applets running on your phone inside the Garmin app to do the configuration. This is annoying. Everything else works offline, or with a bluetooth connection to an offline phone (for example, I have a habit of changing the time to my destination timezone when I'm on a flight, this works once I update the timezone on my phone with no internet). There is a desktop Garmin program for updating firmware, but it is terrible…

I think most Garmins have it. I have a Venu 3 and am very happy with it, the killer feature for me is it getting over a week of battery life on a single charge vs the apple watch with it's 20 hours.

18 hour battery life seems tiny compared to my 10 day battery life on my Garmin Venu 3. Does Garmin just have better battery technology, or some patents that Apple can't use? Why such a large gap in comparable products?

I haven't tried one as I am currently happy with my Garmin vívoactive 3, but the BangleJS 2 looks very interesting: https://banglejs.com/

Smart watches with long battery life exist. Garmin watches generally have ~2 week battery life: * Venu 3 for $350 has 2 week battery life [1] * Forerunner 55 for $150 has 2 week battery life [2] I don't see why you are defining success as 30 days of battery life when the baseline is charging your watch every day. [1] https://www.garmin.com/en-US/p/873008/pn/010-02784-00/ [2] https://www.garmin.com/en-US/p/741137/

There are other full featured smart watches like the Garmin Enduro 3 with several weeks of battery life (or even longer with solar charging). Of course it's larger and more expensive. https://www.garmin.com/en-US/p/851039 No one really needs payments on their watch but I'm surprised that anyone wouldn't want it. It's quite convenient, and gives you a backup option in case you forget your wallet or something.

I have an older relative who uses their Venu3 to take their own ECG and combine that with a Garmin Index BPM (~$150) to help monitor their heart function. The ECG is simple to use on the watch and the BPM syncs to Garmin Connect so that all that data is stored daily for their cardiac specialist to review when they go in for appointments. They had a diagnosis of A-Fib a while back that explained all their decrease in energy levels and since beginning treatment for it they have had no further issues. Now they have the ability to sit and take an ECG to transmit to their cardiologist if they start feeling bad. For them it provides peace of mind that their meds are working as designed. They regularly get in 5k - 10k steps daily which is pretty great for someone making a strong run at 90 y.o. I don't think Garmin has a device that is able to track or identify sleep anea events but would not be surprised to see that functionality appear in the near future on some product. I have an Instinct 2 Solar and it has been great for me. I told other relatives about it and they have picked their own models to suit their lifestyles. I think that is Garmin's strength, the wide variety of fitness devices suited for almost any activity or personality.

Vivoactive doesn't have the best heart tracking, especially compared to Apple watches which are the gold standard for it. Someone who can afford an Apple watch should probably go for Garmin Venu 3. Same hybrid model benefits with a better sensor.

I'm a long distance runner. So my requirements are slightly different than the average person. But that said. It seems to me Garmin's strategy is clear, the Forerunner and even the Fenix lines are going to be OLED. Where as the Enduro is the MIP line. Sure there's a MIP Fenix 8, but I feel like that might be something that eventually goes as more people who are newer to sports watches, the people transitioning over from Apple or Google watches.. those people who see 7 days battery life and think "wow" where as we look at the GPS always on time and think "more please". The absolute pick of this generation is the Enduro 3 now. It's cheaper, lasts waaaaay longer, and does everything we want. Fenix 8? Dive computer, and the ability to take calls? No thanks. I just want more battery life, and better solar thanks.