Garmin - Enduro 3

Love my Enduro 3. Insane battery life and really impressive navigation features for hiking. Great strap too.

I went from an Instict 1 to a Enduro 3 and can confirm with other comments that the design for the Instinct is certainly the worst of the others for the UI. The Instinct is meant to be more like a Gshock, just smarter, so it is meant to be minimal. The watch face selection by Garmin was mind blowingly awful for me too. I found a lot better selection, and way better customization opportunities from garmin.watchfacebuilder.com. A lot of great pre made ones and it's rather easy to copy an existing watch face and make it what you want. 30 day free trial is a lot of time to create a few and load to your watch. For a 6 day battery life, that is incredibly short. You might have unnecessary tracking turned on maximum or other settings.

If you are willing to spend 800 on the Fenix 7 you should have a look at the Enduro 3. The Enduro has for 99% the same functionality as the Fenix 8 but much cheaper and better battery for hiking. I used to use a GPSMAP 64S for hiking but now I use the Enduro 3 for following the track and if I want to have a overview of the whole track and zoom in and out I use the Garmin Explore app. The app makes real time use of the GPS data of the watch so it saves battery consumption of the smartphone.

I went to Garmin a long time ago and haven’t looked back. Yes, Garmin has rolled out their own subscription service recently (which I don’t use or need) but all the core info is there for free and I feel for me at least, very accurate. I wear my Enduro 3 24/7 and routinely get 3-4 weeks of charge from it. Fuck Whoop.

Money no object then just get the flagship Fenix 8. Enduro 3 is amazing but only comes in 51mm size where Fenix have 3 sizes.

I had the Ultra 1. Just switched to an Enduro 3. Why? 1. Found the Ultras to be pretty uncomfortable. The design is more for fashion than functionality 2. The battery life is not good enough for an outdoors watch. You want at least 7 days, to cover camping trips, and cycling trips, and hiking trips. Otherwise you're carrying around a power bank with you. And all the time you're charging it, you're not wearing it, so you're losing sleep data/steps data etc. 3. And if it's not an outdoors watch, then you should buy the regular Apple Watch 10 - which is better at almost everything else. Not against Apple at all. As above, I'm a big fan of the regular series 10. I just don't understand what the Ultras are for - other than they look cool, and are a bit of a status symbol. If you want the best smart/sports watch that Apple makes, get the series 10. It does almost everything the Ultra does, is lighter, more comfortable, and has a better screen. If you want the best sports/outdoors/battery life watch, get a Garmin

Enduro 3 here, I somewhat agree with the battery. It was extremely disappointing, I didn't really get my advertised battery life and it's really freaking annoying. I've gotten close to the advertised life (I don't observe my battery life anymore and I stick to 20%-80% charge only) by just turning off the backlight completely. There are some theories that Garmin got lazy and now all native watch faces are using Garmin IQ or the C Monkey language instead of a lower level language that allows the watch faces to be super optimized like before. I found I don't need backlight so it works out for the most part. On the reliability front, I have had some weird crashes but never during a run (which is the only thing I record). Some days my watch will stop tracking during sleep which is annoying af, it will say I slept 6 hours (when I slept 7 or 8) because it randomly stopped tracking during the night. Perhaps it's related to me being on the beta versions. It's really bittersweet. I wish Garmin would get their shit together when it came to software. There's just so much lacking even when it comes to sleep accuracy, etc. Hopefully the unification of all front ends in the new line is the start of something good, but when you are paying so much for a watch, these things should have been great by now...

Garmin enduro 3. Dumbed down watch that prioritizes fitness/battery over flashy apps or screen display

I got a enduro 3 for both of those things and it works ok. My complaints are that when I do a workout I can’t seem to do the exercises out of order if someone is using a machine and I need to come back to it later, it doesn’t seem to be able to figure out when I’m doing leg based exercises ( and count reps) Other than that it’s cool, you can make custom workouts and it gives you good info during. You can customize what info you get For running it’s great you can set it to speed or heart rate, there’s a cool return route feature and it makes cool routes.

Surprised your list doesn’t have the enduro 3. I moved from an ultra to enduro 3 and it is just the perfect watch. I am into hiking, backpacking, racquet sports and occasional run. The battery life is excellent. If you don’t care about a smart watch, probably why you are looking at garmin, then enduro is as good as it gets without all the un-necessary features like mic.

Even though I've got an Enduro 3 I really enjoy, I got a bit stupid last night and ordered a 45mm AMOLED Instinct 3. I'm a big fan of the Instinct series and, as much as I love my MIP displays, I'm not averse to a nice AMOLED display. I have to say that one of my FAVORITE features that I feel nobody talks about for the Instinct series is how darned recessed the screen is. Sure it isn't sapphire but you'd have to get PRETTY unlucky for anything to accidentally scratch the display on the 2X. The 3 seems similarly protected. When I first started getting into the wacky world of wearables I'll never forget I was trying out a Kospet Rock. Supposedly the thing was a real tank. Nearly indestructible. And then one day I brushed against a wall or doorway, and boom. Deep scratch on the screen. I've been sensitive to non-recessed screens ever since. One of my issues with the Enduro 3. There's a millimeter or two of a lip, but not much. Looking forward to getting a modern, AMOLED Instinct.

I use my Enduro 3 in saltwater all the time (sea kayaker). I rinse it in fresh water after each paddle.

I've got an Enduro 3, the newer version and a Fenix 6X. Both are as good/bad as my form for swimming. The Enduro is much better in rest detection, but it still misses a lap from time to time if I change the tempo or the underwaters during the same set. Sometimes it misses when I take a rest and stops a few seconds later, adding time to a set. It is great if you start and stop manually though. I always need an after-workout analysis, but in general they are both great. In reality the best way to know how your actual time is the pool clock or a friend with a chronometre.

Garmin ecosystem is chocked full of goodness. Since I run and cycle, it’s great for multi sport. A lot of folks who only run seem to love Coros watches and their environment. I think either of those (with Strava integration) would be an improvement over your Apple Watch.

People have to stop comparing these. These are for two different people. I would never wear an Apple Watch based on battery life alone. I specifically got the Garmin for a wrist based gps and mapping tool to track and orient myself. You buy an Apple Watch to use smart features and be connected to your phone. Garmin has never been in that market. It’s a whole company based on gps systems for outdoor activities . You buy an Apple Watch to have Apple ecosystem. you can’t use half the feature of the fenix on an iPhone bc they only want you to use their watch… Garmin are all specifically made for their audience even down the the model . Apple watches are just to keep you plugged into your phone and have no bearing on actual outdoor activities despite calling it ultra. The Millitary has been orienteering with Garmin wrist based gps systems forever. You’d never catch an Apple Watch on patrol in Afghanistan. 😂