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What is your preferred fitness tracker/smartwatch?
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this post was submitted on 22 Jul 2023
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For the most detailed exercise/health tracking, I'd highly recommend Garmin watches. First, no subscription fees, you buy the hardware and you own it and can customize it a lot. Second, the battery life can't be beat. Third, stats, graphs, analytics! Plus it works just as well whether you're an apple or android user.
I have the Forerunner 265 and it is so much fun for a stats and graph loving nerd like myself. My gf chose the Venu 2 Sq because she wanted a square screen and she is really happy with it.
I've been a happy Fitbit user for years, but am finding their Premium push increasingly annoying. I shouldn't have to pay a subscription fee to see data that my tracker is already getting. I almost switched to Garmin last time but didn't, and I regret that now. My current Fitbit is still in great shape so it'll be a while until I can justify a new tracker.
I've always associated Garmin with big over the top styling, but I like that Venu Sq 2. Garmin also seems best quality
I have a vivoactive 4s and it’s got all the features I want in a smartwatch while also being discreet and small. It doesn’t feel any different on my wrist than an analog watch and that’s what I love most
Been going through their product line now and this is the one I've landed on. Battery?
I can get mine to last 5-6 days depending on usage. The GPS function obviously drains it faster so if I’m going on bike rides multiple days in a row it’ll be about 4 days tops, but if I do stationary bike and weight lifting it’ll get 5 days easy, even going on GPS walks it usually doesn’t drain as bad as the bike tracking.
Also worth noting I don’t have any phone notifications on my watch because I just don’t need another device getting my attention. So I think that helps to extend my battery life.
Additionally, I disabled the Pulse Ox sensor by default as that thing drains juice so fast. My girlfriend had hers on 24/7 and was getting like maybe 2 days out of a full charge.
yeah that's the issue for me with choosing a watch. I like the Charge 4 because it's sorta small and doesn't have a huge face.
Waiting for the new garmin smartwatch to finally move away from fitbit.
I have this watch and can confirm it is excellent
Can you use apps with Garmin? I’m getting into weightlifting a bit and want to use the Strong app to record my lifting routine without needing to take out my phone. The only other features I really want are decent heart rate monitoring and good pairing with AirPods.
I’ve never had a smartwatch. I’ve been looking to get a used one. I was leaning towards a slightly older series Apple Watch but open to something different
It probably would not communicate directly with a smaller fitness app other than some major ones like Strava and my fitness pal. You CAN track weightlifting in the Garmin app, and I do, the watch can even auto track your sets and it attempts to auto detect the lift type but isn't always right so I correct them after I'm done. For lifting workout structuring, it probably won't be as good as your lifting specific phone app. Garmin is very good at running and other cardio activities, most smart watches struggle to measure weight lifting.
The watches can connect to a second Garmin app on your phone called Connect IQ which is their app store where they support third party developers to make apps, widget, ultra customizable watchfaces, integration of new connected sensors.
It does not support common phone apps or have incredible advanced phone integration like an apple or Google watch would have but we like that because we already get enough screen time. I'm able to see and reply to text messages though, see and interact with all notifications, control audio/media that is playing and more though so it's not devoid of features at all.
It seems like it has some great features. I think I saw the battery life is quite good which would be nice. I know next to nothing about smartwatches so I’m just trying to figure out what would work for me. I’m pretty sure I will end up getting something used, I just haven’t decided on what. Apps are an pretty important factor for me.
If you are an apple user, then the Apple watch is clear choice. As an Android user, Huawei could be a decent option but not in the United States. The Google watch is still first generation and might be ok for early adopters but I'm weary of it, and that's coming from a long time google phone user since the first one. I'm hoping they release more generations of it with improvements.
I have an iPhone. Apple Watch probably makes more sense for me, I think I'll try to get an old used one and see how I like it. I could see Garmin being really good for a lot of people though.