The AW Ultra suddenly seems like a bargain now with Garmins silly pricing

[trumptman]

Instead of your non-smartwatch, my AWU has the feature „Focus“. I can set different focus based on time or location. When I am at work it is different than I am training. Can your garmin watch do that? Nope? The garmin watch is even beeping when not wearing it. Bad software combined with bad hardware 🤣

Older Garmin Watches let you determine notification types based on whether you were working out or not. Newer watches do have a focus feature. However you raise an interesting point, if Apple’s focus feature is as excellent as you make it out to be, why does it not notify third party apps to behave in a certain manner? It can keep them from showing the notifications but ideally everything connected to your phone would act in a consistent manner but that isn’t the case here. If Connect tried to send a notification to your watch when your phone is in Do Not Disturb Mode, it should be impossible for that third party app to bypass act differently than the first party focus feature on the phone. Yet it doesn’t work this way.

My AWU don‘t need to display in 5K. But during navigation I want a fast user experience. Honestly. It’s not usable. It’s so crappy I still cannot believe it.

Well your expectations must be quite high because I’ve used all manner of Garmin bike computers and watches and the onboard maps move and update just fine.

Your fall detection is useless without a phone. My phone has also fall detection. Useless. In addition to that garmin NEVER noticed any falls. Great safety net 😎.

I’m sensing a sort of insular understanding with regard to the Apple way and everything else. I don’t know why you haven’t been able to get your feature to work but Garmin has excellent tech support involving both chat and calls. Perhaps give them a call or text.

Ok. Now we are talking about the enduro3. Before we were talking about the fenix 8 47 mm.

Well we can swap around but we have to compare apples to apples as it were. Comparing the 47mm variant of any Garmin to the Ultra2 is not the same with regard to battery size. It’s no different than comparing the AW10 to the Ultra2. People understand the trade-offs made in each case.

But even then. What killer workout are you doing that you need that kind of fake battery life.

Sleep tracking, body battery, HRV measured over days and weeks, training load and more. That is part of the real point here. I don’t need a smaller iPhone or an iPhone Mini. My phone does not measure my body temp, my sleeping respiration rate, my resting heart rate, my HRV, and so on. I want a device that can do those things and while the Apple Watch can do some of them you often end up trying to manage either battery anxiety or they have to go Ultra2. To do this with the regular Apple Watches requires some sort of battery top up during the day which is why one of Apple’s “new features” is how quick can you charge the watch to get some sleep tracking.

Really what a lot of Apple Watch users end up doing is just forgoing all that and charging the watch while they sleep.

I tried it again. Even with the newest software update: put the garmin down on a desk: it’s beeping when a message is coming or a call. I think the Apple Watch is way more customizable than any garmin watch regarding beeping when using Apples Focus feature. There is nothing equal on a garmin watch. Shocking. Really

If if third party app can bypass the first party feature, is that the fault of the third party or the first party?

That said if you have the latest Garmin, there is a focus feature. If you do not have the latest Garmin you can also have a key combo that quickly activates DND aka Do Not Disturb.

Adding Hot Keys to fēnix 7 or fēnix 7 Pro Watches | Garmin Customer Support

Garmin Support Center is where you will find answers to frequently asked questions and resources to help with all of your Garmin products.

support.garmin.com

 

[Zelegorm]

Based on my location?

 

[Zelegorm]

Really what a lot of Apple Watch users end up doing is just forgoing all that and charging the watch while they sleep.

Nope. Charging it after sleeping which not necessary every day. When going out of the house the battery is full. No issue with that

 

[NME42]

Nope. Charging it after sleeping which not necessary every day. When going out of the house the battery is full. No issue with that

Same here. Charging when taking a shower after running.

 

[meetree]

You can feel that while navigation. The garmin is soooo Slow. Unbelievable for that price tag. When you are using footpath or WorkOutDoors you are back from 1980s into the year 2024. Still unbelievable for me how slow that processor is. 😂

Well, WOD doesn't have turn-by-turn navigation in 2024 (yes, I know, it's in the roadmap).

Well, Footpath maps are not the best comparing to the Garmin ones.

You are trying to convince everyone to use AW, but there are a lot of guys who use Garmin or Suunto to cover their needs, where AW doesn't work properly.

And yes, smart features on Garmin are a joke, but it has other advantages. battery time is not the main reason.

You love AW, we love Garmin. Peace.

 

[Zelegorm]

My goal is not to convince anyone. My goal is to share my experience with that company. Bad hardware. Bad software. Fake battery life. Unusable features. And I can underline that the AW is a serious sports watch. Unwilling Not mention the security part (Garmins data breach). Never I will give any health data to such a company. Yes. Peace ✌️

 

[turbineseaplane]

Agreed.

Gorgeous! 😍

 

[martint235]

Most of the garmin users which are complaining about battery life never run anything over 10k. 😂🤣

… and are satisfied with a UI lag like in 1980s a navigation map performance which is unbelievable bad. I would be ashamed if you should be the one releasing such a watch with such a bad processor. Why is it still the bad processor? Sure. Because anything else will let the battery life shrink even more. The garmin never reached 6 days in my experience as a serious athlete.

Useless features: fall detection 🤣. Without a phone. Great. Amazing. Nice marketing trick. I am falling from time to time. The garmin NEVER realized any crash. It’s like everything with garmin. Many features. Unusable.

Btw: I would never give my health data to garmin or my credit card information. Unbelievable who is trusting that company which was unacceptable quiet during the data breach.

I don't run but I have cycled over 200 miles with a Garmin. Try that with an AWU

 

[Zelegorm]

Like I said. That’s the 1% niche for garmin left. Nothing more. 😂😎

 

[martint235]

Like I said. That’s the 1% niche for garmin left. Nothing more. 😂😎

So basically anyone that isn't you is either a niche, lying or both?

 

[rbart]

I don't run but I have cycled over 200 miles with a Garmin. Try that with an AWU

Usually, when you cycle 200 miles, it's better to use anything else than a watch.
It's not super secure to look at a watch while riding.
Yes it's a niche, and you are right you can't do that with an AWU.
You can just use it for around 15h with GPS on.
If you need more, you need to choose another device, but we are talking of a very small percentage of users.

 

[martint235]

Usually, when you cycle 200 miles, it's better to use anything else than a watch.
It's not super secure to look at a watch while riding.
Yes it's a niche, and you are right you can't do that with an AWU.
You can just use it for around 15h with GPS on.

I don't look at the watch. It records my heart rate and distance cycles so that I can review it later

 

[meetree]

Usually, when you cycle 200 miles, it's better to use anything else than a watch.
It's not super secure to look at a watch while riding.

Absolutely.

Since I don't have a cycling computer, I mount my Garmin FR955 on the handlebar (I use a chest strap). Not a perfect setup, especially for the navigation, but it works.

 

[trumptman]

I don't run but I have cycled over 200 miles with a Garmin. Try that with an AWU

I have as well. California Triple Crown?

Usually, when you cycle 200 miles, it's better to use anything else than a watch.
It's not super secure to look at a watch while riding.
Yes it's a niche, and you are right you can't do that with an AWU.
You can just use it for around 15h with GPS on.
If you need more, you need to choose another device, but we are talking of a very small percentage of users.

You have a completely valid point here. However the secondary point is that very often if you already have the means, using your bike computer and your watch to double record just gives a nice bit of redundancy when doing something as insane as a double century. Since Garmin watches can also broadcast HR, it's a nice trade off. The watch can send HR to the bike computer but also back it up in the event there is a problem.

For example a friend of mine was doing the LA Marathon and his Apple Watch 7 died during the run. In Apple's defense he didn't use low power mode but it died and he used his phone with Strava to cover the remaining distance.

 

[akidokraja]

My goal is not to convince anyone. My goal is to share my experience with that company. Bad hardware. Bad software. Fake battery life. Unusable features. And I can underline that the AW is a serious sports watch. Unwilling Not mention the security part (Garmins data breach). Never I will give any health data to such a company. Yes. Peace ✌️

What does “fake battery life” mean?

 

[martint235]

I have as well. California Triple Crown?

No London-Edinburgh-London. Once every 4 years, 1400km in 5 days

 

[meetree]

What does “fake battery life” mean?

I am sorry for jumping in. Conversations about AW vs Garmin are giving me a bit of guilty pleasure.

If I remember correctly, the main point was a comparison between real-world usage by a specific person (with links to Garmin Forums) and the data provided by manufacturers. For the AWU, it was accurate (like 2-3 days), but for Garmin, it differed by two or three times (5 days instead of 14+).

For other people in this discussion, Garmin’s battery time aligns with the manufacturer’s data.

So, it became a reason for the flame.

However, I agree with many points here about the poor quality of Garmin software, but not about the battery life (again, from my personal experience).

 

[Zelegorm]

Good summary. I will add the points:

Bad sensors (heart rate, ECG, oxygen, barometer,…)
Bad performance (old processor) especially when using maps even on the flagship model
Bad smartwatch: Without the smartphone it’s a dumbwatch. Cannot even give me the safetynet that someone can reach me out when i am at home: Changing a room is enough to miss a call.

Unusable Features: Fall detection makes no sense without a phone near a garmin.

Data security: Garmins data breach was handled like 🤬

Bad software quality.

Fighting against: A little more battery life. Reality as a sportsman with the 47 mm garmin is: you will never reach one week battery life: my experience and not only mine ( see Garmins forums). For sure you will get more battery life when sitting at home 🤣

A real smart watch and a real sports watch for real sports man’s.

Plus: Much better apps on the App Store.

Recommendation for battery fanatics: You can get three Suunto race for one Garmin watch. They have real battery life with the highest precision and not fake precision like SATIQ and a very good build quality for a shocking price.

I never see any adventures on our side with a garmin. They always use a Suunto. Why? The compass is accurate and lightning fast. During running and mounting biking the maps are lightning fast. The GPS is more reliable. And finally: Shocking news for you: The battery last long enough 🤣, it’s not a garmin.

And now we are back to the topic: Garmin is WAY too expensive for the value they are providing. The smallest Apple Watch can do 99% better than a garmin for a fraction of a price. For the rest get a Suunto. Those are watches for adventurers for 1/3 the price.

If you want some fun today search garmin forums for the great battery life on the flagship model:

Fenix 8 loses battery charge very quickly - fēnix 8 Series - Wearables - Garmin Forums

A dedicated community for Garmin users to ask questions, provide answers, and share feedback.

forums.garmin.com

 

[xDKP]

Just for the ones that use the battery as the sole reason the ultra isn’t good enough, I just wanted to share. Did a massive hike yesterday around a big area with forests and many beautiful lakes north of Copenhagen - 65 km. hike and GPS/heart rate was turned on for over 13 hours and 33 minutes! Pretty damn impressed. GPS and heart rate full blast no limited mode but the watch was in power save mode from the morning (normal one - not fewer GPS signals one) and finished with around 13-15% (was a bit hazy so don’t remember)

Pretty damn great performance

 

[trumptman]

Good summary. I will add the points:

Bad sensors (heart rate, ECG, oxygen, barometer,…)

This is a ridiculous assertion. There are hundreds of reviews of Garmin Watches that show great results with the sensors. You complaint if given full credence would be along the lines of a percentage different here or there on strong intervals or changes.

Seriously anyone being honest isn't going to worry about if their watch took two extra seconds to respond to their fourth interval out of ten but the other watch only took one second.

Bad performance (old processor) especially when using maps even on the flagship model

Your own linked video showed the response and it is completely adequate.

Bad smartwatch: Without the smartphone it’s a dumbwatch. Cannot even give me the safetynet that someone can reach me out when i am at home: Changing a room is enough to miss a call.

You are claiming your watch can't even connect to your phone via bluetooth from a room away? Check your phone then because mine is just fine. If you are talking about taking a phone call as a "safety net" that shouldn't be the primary purpose of a watch.Also it appears like you are conflating incident reporting with assistance. If you hold down the top left button on your Garmin for seven seconds it can send out an alert like if you were being followed, possibly mugged, etc.

Unusable Features: Fall detection makes no sense without a phone near a garmin.

The Apple Watch assumes you basically have an iPhone around it 95%+ of the time.

Videos like this one where they use it as a stand alone device all day show it basically not making it through even one day.

Data security: Garmins data breach was handled like 🤬

How those nude photos were leaked (and why you should care)

What does the hack mean for your own cloud security? Here are all of your nude selfie-related questions answered.

www.cnet.com

Apple seriously has had celebrity nudes leaked. I don't think I'd hold them up as the perfect example of data security.

Bad software quality.

Fighting against: A little more battery life. Reality as a sportsman with the 47 mm garmin is: you will never reach one week battery life: my experience and not only mine ( see Garmins forums). For sure you will get more battery life when sitting at home 🤣

A real smart watch and a real sports watch for real sports man’s.

Plus: Much better apps on the App Store.

Apple has had plenty of instances where their software is so bad out the gate that people often declare you should wait at a minimum fo the .01 release if not the .1 release. There are still threads up from how terrible Watch OS 10 went out the gate last year both in battery life, app performance, bugs and more. Garmin basically had a bad month for software withe all the updates they pushed out but they have released firmware updates that have addressed it quickly and will continue to improve and support their watches.

There are dozens of reviews I have seen where they state the 47mm Fenix 8 gets a 6-7 days of battery life and that is with always on display and one to two hours of GPS activity per day.

Recommendation for battery fanatics: You can get three Suunto race for one Garmin watch. They have real battery life with the highest precision and not fake precision like SATIQ and a very good build quality for a shocking price.

I never see any adventures on our side with a garmin. They always use a Suunto. Why? The compass is accurate and lightning fast. During running and mounting biking the maps are lightning fast. The GPS is more reliable. And finally: Shocking news for you: The battery last long enough 🤣, it’s not a garmin.

No one has ever claimed that Garmin was the only option. However since you want to knock Garmin as not "smart enough" you'd have to knock Suunto twice as bad for that since they don't even have ConnectIQ nor something as basic as offline music playback.

And now we are back to the topic: Garmin is WAY too expensive for the value they are providing. The smallest Apple Watch can do 99% better than a garmin for a fraction of a price. For the rest get a Suunto. Those are watches for adventurers for 1/3 the price.

Garmin as a huge array of watches at all price points. The Forerunner 965 is going for $500 US right now. The previous generation Fenix 7 Pro and Epix Pro are going for $650. Garmin's least expensive AMOLED GPS watch is the Forerunner 165 and is $200 US base or $250 if you want more storage for offline music.

You can spend $1200 on a Garmin but you can also spend $200 and get a great GPS watch.

That is a great Forerunner 165 review and anyone interested can also see plenty of the supposedly super laggy display represented there. (Hint it is just fine.)

If you want some fun today search garmin forums for the great battery life on the flagship model:

Fenix 8 loses battery charge very quickly - fēnix 8 Series - Wearables - Garmin Forums

A dedicated community for Garmin users to ask questions, provide answers, and share feedback.

forums.garmin.com

You can find dozens of threads about Apple Watch and battery drain on these very forums.

Just for the ones that use the battery as the sole reason the ultra isn’t good enough, I just wanted to share. Did a massive hike yesterday around a big area with forests and many beautiful lakes north of Copenhagen - 65 km. hike and GPS/heart rate was turned on for over 13 hours and 33 minutes! Pretty damn impressed. GPS and heart rate full blast no limited mode but the watch was in power save mode from the morning (normal one - not fewer GPS signals one) and finished with around 13-15% (was a bit hazy so don’t remember)

Pretty damn great performance

Congratulations on the hike!

Did you use anything that provided navigation or elevation guides?

This would be the battery performance for all band GPS with the Garmin Fenix 8 in 47 and 51mm

Up to 35 hours with Gesture1 Up to 28 hours with Always On Display1

Up to 62 hours with Gesture1 Up to 49 hours with Always On Display1

So the mid-size one would nearly triple the Apple Ultra and the larger would be nearly 500% more.

 

[Indianwin2001]

The high road is always the one to take
👍

This is a ridiculous assertion. There are hundreds of reviews of Garmin Watches that show great results with the sensors. You complaint if given full credence would be along the lines of a percentage different here or there on strong intervals or changes.

Seriously anyone being honest isn't going to worry about if their watch took two extra seconds to respond to their fourth interval out of ten but the other watch only took one second.





Your own linked video showed the response and it is completely adequate.



You are claiming your watch can't even connect to your phone via bluetooth from a room away? Check your phone then because mine is just fine. If you are talking about taking a phone call as a "safety net" that shouldn't be the primary purpose of a watch.Also it appears like you are conflating incident reporting with assistance. If you hold down the top left button on your Garmin for seven seconds it can send out an alert like if you were being followed, possibly mugged, etc.



The Apple Watch assumes you basically have an iPhone around it 95%+ of the time.

Videos like this one where they use it as a stand alone device all day show it basically not making it through even one day.

How those nude photos were leaked (and why you should care)

What does the hack mean for your own cloud security? Here are all of your nude selfie-related questions answered.

www.cnet.com

Apple seriously has had celebrity nudes leaked. I don't think I'd hold them up as the perfect example of data security.



Apple has had plenty of instances where their software is so bad out the gate that people often declare you should wait at a minimum fo the .01 release if not the .1 release. There are still threads up from how terrible Watch OS 10 went out the gate last year both in battery life, app performance, bugs and more. Garmin basically had a bad month for software withe all the updates they pushed out but they have released firmware updates that have addressed it quickly and will continue to improve and support their watches.

There are dozens of reviews I have seen where they state the 47mm Fenix 8 gets a 6-7 days of battery life and that is with always on display and one to two hours of GPS activity per day.

No one has ever claimed that Garmin was the only option. However since you want to knock Garmin as not "smart enough" you'd have to knock Suunto twice as bad for that since they don't even have ConnectIQ nor something as basic as offline music playback.



Garmin as a huge array of watches at all price points. The Forerunner 965 is going for $500 US right now. The previous generation Fenix 7 Pro and Epix Pro are going for $650. Garmin's least expensive AMOLED GPS watch is the Forerunner 165 and is $200 US base or $250 if you want more storage for offline music.

You can spend $1200 on a Garmin but you can also spend $200 and get a great GPS watch.

That is a great Forerunner 165 review and anyone interested can also see plenty of the supposedly super laggy display represented there. (Hint it is just fine.)



You can find dozens of threads about Apple Watch and battery drain on these very forums.




Congratulations on the hike!

Did you use anything that provided navigation or elevation guides?

This would be the battery performance for all band GPS with the Garmin Fenix 8 in 47 and 51mm

Up to 35 hours with Gesture1 Up to 28 hours with Always On Display1

Up to 62 hours with Gesture1 Up to 49 hours with Always On Display1

So the mid-size one would nearly triple the Apple Ultra and the larger would be nearly 500% more.

Garmin only puts out software updates every three months. The rest of the time they just put out beta software and don’t listen to the results from their users. Pick any watch on Garmin forums and you will see the complaints over and over again.

 

[rbart]

From a software point of view, Garmin is far from Apple.
My wife owns a 165 Music, it's a nightmare to set it up, you have tons of options everywhere without any logic, the rounded display doesn't help to show data/menus. The app on iPhone is super complex, with also tons of menus, options.
For a software company, the hardest is to be able to say no and have a good UX, putting all the features without any logic is not something acceptable from a such big company.
In the past I have owned a Garmin, there was les features and the software was less cluttered, way cleaner.
I understand better why new competitors are growing so much (like Coros).

 

[xDKP]

Congratulations on the hike!

Did you use anything that provided navigation or elevation guides?

This would be the battery performance for all band GPS with the Garmin Fenix 8 in 47 and 51mm

Up to 35 hours with Gesture1 Up to 28 hours with Always On Display1

Up to 62 hours with Gesture1 Up to 49 hours with Always On Display1

So the mid-size one would nearly triple the Apple Ultra and the larger would be nearly 500% more.

Thanks - was a pretty insane "Let's try it out" kind of project 😁 I run and train for two main events a year and given they are marathons I have quite a lot of hours on my feet every single day - but 13,5 hours and 88.000 steps is pretty insane even for me

My primary point was - If battery is your concern for doing long epic stuff with your Apple Watch, then it has to be pretty damn long. And even though the Garmin hours you list are impressive, it would not really matter if it was 62 hours or a whole month with GPS - still PLENTY for me with the Ultra - even enough for doing an Ironman and finishing with the average time.

If I go for a 100K Ultra marathon and almost go a full 2 minutes slower per kilometer than my marathon pace, it would still be around 10 hours and 3,5 hours less than Saturday = enough battery.

My point was just that it impressed me quite a lot. I didn't do any mapping on my watch for the day as my buddy had made the route on Footpath (only subscribtion app I have - not "a dosen") and he was the "guide for the day".

 

[NME42]

My goal is not to convince anyone. My goal is to share my experience with that company. Bad hardware. Bad software. Fake battery life. Unusable features. And I can underline that the AW is a serious sports watch. Unwilling Not mention the security part (Garmins data breach). Never I will give any health data to such a company. Yes. Peace ✌️

Another fresh example. This guy is doing 6.5h of GPS stuff a week and has to charge his Fenix 7 Solar.

Battery life - fēnix 7 Series - Wearables - Garmin Forums

A dedicated community for Garmin users to ask questions, provide answers, and share feedback.

forums.garmin.com

How can this be true if the promised values are realistic?

 

[Indianwin2001]

Another fresh example. This guy is doing 6.5h of GPS stuff a week and has to charge his Fenix 7 Solar.

Battery life - fēnix 7 Series - Wearables - Garmin Forums

A dedicated community for Garmin users to ask questions, provide answers, and share feedback.

forums.garmin.com

How can this be true if the promised values are realistic?

I always do research before I buy something. If anyone is considering buying a Garmin, look at the Garmin forums under any watch either the outdoor division or the sport division. Complaint after complaint.