Garmin - Fenix 6S Pro
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Reddit Reviews:
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Based on 1 year's data from Jan 25, 2026 How it works
Liked most:
634
109
"battery lasts me forever, I charge it once a week and I game every day."
"especially because of the battery life. ... The mouse I had right before this was the steelseries super light one, that was an every other day charge at minimum. Whereas this one is like once a week at most - and I work from home and game all night."
"Oh, and the battery lasts days even when exercising a lot (weeks without excercise)."
320
84
"I've used them for 1500 miles of multi-day hiking with no issues!"
"I forgot I had my fenix on and did a mud run. Didn’t even phase my watch. Literally dragged it through the mud and it just kept going."
"rugged outsole has held up amazingly well (just replacing them after >600 hard miles)"
18
1
"it has the flashlight, probably the most useful tool I’ve ever had in my life. You’ll use it daily and it’s so helpful in the most random times."
"Flashlight on my Fenix is worth A LOT of money to me. ... Having had it, I could not go back. ... I would happily pay 200 extra for it I use it so much. ... Having a flashlight on your wrist is incredibly handy."
"On my fenix 7, I love the flash light...totally unexpected top 3 feature. :)"
89
3
"There's a "Climb Indoor" activity that I use for both indoor/outdoor roped climbing and there's a bouldering activity for bouldering."
"it works perfectly for what you want!"
"my Instinct 3 works perfectly for cycling."
11
4
"use the map function ... I love being able to track my hikes and use the map function"
"Trail running so I can load the route onto my garmin and navigate without carrying phone for 50km"
"navigation in the mountains, which is really good ... if you hike, camp, trail run, cycle, or generally enjoy being out, you will love your Epic or Fenix."
Disliked most:
36
109
"sleep is a disaster ... I was watching TV and I was already asleep ... when I go to the bathroom in the evening, the venu didn't even notice that I was sleeping, or didn't even recognize that I went to the bathroom."
"Sleep tracking is great if you are an amazing sleeper who doesn’t have interrupted sleep or gets up in the night. I get up to pray and when I go back it doesn’t pick up that sleep again. It is an issue because sleep tracking was a major reason for me buying a fitness tracker."
"I also found the sleep tracking on the GW6 to be much more reliable. ... I have small kids so I wake up every now and then during the night and on the Garmin - it's so frustrating to be told in the morning that I had a great night of sleep with only 10 mins of time awake when I spent 40 mins trying to get my 2yo to fall back asleep."
5
42
"the muscular load, the cardio/muscular split, and the intensity didn’t match my perception at all ... and it doesn’t show history/trends per exercise or velocity ... I stopped using it completely, waiting for them to release improvements (which never came - then I cancelled my membership). ... Currently, I don't see how the whoop strength trainer would be *useful* for strength / hypertrophy."
"HRV isn’t a reliable metric of readiness for strength training, to adjust your strength training sessions on a daily basis, based on the current overall body of research ... that wouldn’t really work if the main goal was to maximize strength (and/or muscle growth). ... For my strength training, I'd basically ignore HRV (and whoop recovery / day strain recommendation)"
"wave tracking is shit anyway"
25
76
"wtf no time settings in a watch?"
"google's software features and fit-and-finish is lacking for their watch ... there is no option on a pixel watch to just automatically turn on the screen when a notification comes in to view the notification; you have to manually interact with it by either tapping the screen within a few seconds or lift-to-wake the watch, which is very unreliable ... that actually was a dealbreaker for me"
"it does not show new notifications as they come in without some sort of manual action ... unless you tap the screen or lift your wrist when you get the vibration, you don't get to see anything ... 75% of the time my pw2 wouldn't recognize a wrist-raise gesture, so I'd miss whatever the new notification was"
20
47
"I used to find that wrist HR sucked for rowing"
"the hr reading is incorrect. ... 20 dollars band from Samsung does a better job"
"The discrepancy is much higher for HR than running dynamics. ... I think it is straight up irresponsible to rely on wrist-based HR is you’re using HR as a part of training"
10
60
"chunky edges on my 4.5 inch wrist which is tiny"
"So much lighter and low profile than my Epix."
"dancing with a fenix 8 will look & feel ridiculous."
deedeedeedee_ 1.0that sounds great, ive had a fenix 6s sapphire for a few years and it's a great watch but i don't honestly make the most of it (i got it used so im not mad about it haha, it's been a nice watch anyway). a thinner watch would be really nice. the 6s can be bulky under sleeves sometimes! the only thing id miss i think is the MIP screen, i do NOT miss having to do the wrist flick to make my old watch turn on lol, nor am i really that tempted by a bright always-on OLED screen... I'll see anyway. trying to make this one last as long as i can for now 😅 but i doubt ill bother getting another fenix when i do replace it!
Mrsmeowy 1.0I went from a fenix 6s sapphire to a venu 3s and it was the same experience for me. I much prefer the venu because I just didn’t use all of stuff the fenix had and I’m not a pro. The venu is more comfortable and does everything I need and is much easier to use
The vivoactive 6 wasn’t announced or released when I got it yet, but I picked the venu 3s because it was smaller and had a better HR sensor than the vivoactive 5. My fenix was just so heavy and bulky, I really wanted something lighter and more comfortable
Racacooonie 1.0Love my Fenix 6s Sapphire. I'm mildly tempted to try Coros but I dunno. Probs just stay with what I know!
Alpineice23 0.6Fenix 6s to Ultra 3. The F6 has always had terrible battery life and doesn't hold water to the U3 as a daily driver. I average about 20+ miles of road running per week and the U3 has been great, though I think Garmin's native workout apps are a little better than Apple's native workout app. So far, the U3 is lightyears ahead of my F6, but, in due fairness, the F6 is a 5+ year old watch. We'll see how things go this winter with he U3 for backcountry hiking, climbing and skiing.
I dumped my 6s for an AWU3 - zero regrets. The only thing I miss is native, on-board mapping.
Asprilla500 0.6I've got a Fenix 6s Pro and I'm looking for a replacement now. Top of the list at the moment Forerunners 970, 965 and 570. I got the Fenix for Triathlon and now it seems that the Forerunners have caught up. I don't really use the music or maps I always have my phone. Same goes for most of the sports. I just want running, cycling and swimming, DSW, sleep tacking and training readiness.
Basic_Barnacle4719 0.6Definitely keep the Fenix 6X. My wife is still using a 6S and happy with it, I'm using an Instinct with a 7X for hiking. Apple Watch is just way too distracting. The biggest problem isn't even the horrible battery life and having to charge every day, it's the feeling of being a complete slave to your phone. Having a phone on your wrist just isn't good for your mental health with all the constant buzzing and notifications. It creates so much stress. Sure you can turn off most of the notifications but at that point you're just using a worse Garmin.
Burgundy_Corgi 0.6I am happy with my Garmin Fenix 6S. It's almost 4 years. Battery still lasts about a week depending on how much I use the GPS. Bought it on sale back then for 300€ I record my commute to track kms, wear on "gear" like wheels and chain. I still don't have the need to replace it, but if so, I would probably get a venu 3s... The fenix 6s has tons of cool features that I don't really use, so I think the venu or vivostyle are enough.
DryRaspberry4114 0.6I would get the 265 for 1 reason only: The dual band GPS tracking. I have the 6s Pro and sometimes it shows the wrong pace and is extremely annoying.
FarAdvertising3125 0.6I have an Epix Pro, aka the AMOLED version of the Fenix 7 Pro. It is not a perfect watch, but it is good. However, there are some long lasting bugs in the firmware and the last major version has been release by Garmin despite multiple beta testers reporting bugs. That is something that kills the experience. I had a Fenix 6S Pro and a Vivoactive 4 before. Both good watches with their strengths and flaws, but never that buggy. So, unless you want diving, I wouldn't go with the Fenix 8. Get a used/refurbished Fenix 7 Pro or an Epix Pro and have almost the same watch and features for a lot less money.
Fit_Low1374 0.6Generally speaking the 9 series have pretty much all the same features as their respective fenix models. They're just lighter and look more sporty, compared to the Fenix which is more rugged and outdoorsy looking. That being said the 6s Pro was released in August 2019, whereas the 965 was released in March 2023, so the 965 hardware and software is more comparable to the F7 Pro which was released in May 2023. Price wise I imagine the 965 is considerably cheaper than the F7 Pro though.
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