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Apple Watch 4 Vs Fenix 5S Plus

G

Golfguru2828

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Dec 8, 2018
4
0
Hi All,

I was just wondering peoples thought between these two watches, I understand this is a mac forum so I understand there may be a little bias.

I will mainly be using my watch for fitness tracking (boxing and swimming), I am a little worried that the apple watch won't work well for swimming as I can use the chest strap since it only uses bluetooth, my other issue is I have herd the golf gps apps for the apple watch are crap

Are there any major positives or negatives that you could inform me about or please give me your opinion on what to buy.

Thanks :)
 
The Apple Watch works very well for swimming and is one of the few watches that enables optical hr in that mode. It depends how serious you are about fitness really. I bought a Garmin Instinct recently (pared down Fenix) and have been enjoying the dumb display with buttons, great for battery life and rugged as hell. I'm going to send it back though as the gps tracking is nothing short of awful. I have friends who have the Fenix and similar issues. The AW is handy for short activities/music etc. but falls down in extreme conditions for me due to the touchscreen (is very laggy in the cold/pain to use in hot sweaty conditions.
One thing to note is that for swimming the AW screen is not always on so if you want to glance to see stats while moving it's tricky as you have to contort your arm which ruins your form.
 
I really love the Apple Watch for swimming - the stroke detection just works - everything is really well thought out and outside of running seems like the one that has the most work done to it.
 
I wrote a long review on this forum that more or less still holds.

Basically, the Garmin is better at training / running / workouts, while the AW is better at being a fitness device / usable tool for daily life.

I find myself leaning back towards the Garmin, because I’ve had a couple of bad GPS tracks on the AW, but the thing is, the AW is better at everything else and not really that much worse at the exercise fitness stuff.

Another way to put it, for 95% of the population who work out an hour a day, or more accurately doesn’t work out at all, is in the Apple ecosystem, and just wants to be healthier, it’s no contest, go AW. If you are training for a marathon, or some other fitness goal, it’s a Garmin.
 
I use a Fenix for running and cycling and an AW the rest of the day. I bring my AW with me during workouts to use for music and LTE.

If I only had one I'd opt for the AW primarily because I don't enjoy running with a phone.
 
Long time Garmin user and more recent AW devotee here. I have a Fenix 3, 5, 5+, and two AW series 4. One of my series 4 has LTE service. I enjoy the AW for running without a phone but still having connectivity.

You listed boxing and swimming. The Garmin will track swimming as well as anything but requires the HRM Tri or HRM Swim HR straps to "store" your HR and load it after the activity. Battery life is superior on the Garmin as are the trackable metrics and Garmin Connect IQ store sources for data fields, widgets, etc. If you run or bike for training also, the Garmins pair with foot pods, cadence, power, temperature sensors, etc., if you want that data. I use a Scosche Rhythm optical HR sensor whether I run with Garmin or AW.

AW is going to be superior with apps and smart watch activities and generally will have to be charged at least a couple hours per day.

For boxing I don't know what kind of protection you would need for the watch, but I would think the AW screen is more exposed and prone to damage. Garmin protects its screens a little better.

Good luck
 
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