Garmin - fēnix 8 Solar 47mm

Fenix 8 47 Solar owner here. I'm mostly pleased, no issues with reliability, it finds GPS in seconds and I haven't had a single crash or reboot. My two biggest issues are heart rate and battery. Heart Rate: It seems to lag behind or measure so infrequently that it completely misses stops at intersections or intervals, even 2min long ones. It even showed my heart rate decrease during my third 2min interval. I went as far as doubling up and wearing my 945 at the same time and it handled this far better. It also doesn't pick up heart rate early in work outside well, and then spikes. Battery: I'm doing 7 hours of activity a week and getting 12 days per charge. Far lower than the claimed 21 days. Fine if I'm using GPS more than what they consider "typical" but based on their GPS battery claims I should be getting 17-18 days. So far their support has sucked. I've been told to wear it on my other wrist. Wear it upside down on my wrist. Don't start the activity until after warming up. Stop and wipe off the sensor since I must be sweating. The claimed battery is Max with everything shut down(it literally says typical not max in their documents). Basically everything except acknowledging that these are actual issues.

Love mine as well. This review mimics my own experience except the GPS issues. Battery has gotten better with FW updates but still under stated times, but long enough for me. I hope it continues to improve for sure. Overall glad I got it and returned the AMOLED. I genuinely love the mip screen.

I am obviously biased since I bought my Fenix 8 solar 2.5 weeks ago and I’m super happy about it. It’s awesome for running, provides tons of data and looks great (sorry but that’s also important to me) To be honest it’s one of most expensive versions and you can get better price/value options, especially older Fenix models. But in my personal opinion that’s the best watch. Also the Fenix watches are typically long lasting. My old watch - Fenix 5 worked for 6.5 years and it’s is still working fine. I just wanted to do the upgrade

I have a fenix 8 and previously forerunner 645 and in both I have the smart part turned off. I don’t like reading or seeing or being notified in my watch. So you just turn it off

Garmin really isn't that good for the gym, as they outright refuse to sync with ANY lifting apps, such as Hevy. I have a Fenix 8 and I went ahead and manually made lifting routines in the app on the phone, which then carries them onto the watch. It isn't that hard to do, but it does annoy me that they refuse to allow third party lifting apps to work as if they actually have a good lifting platform. I personally alternate between two different lifting workouts, so I just select the one I'm doing and go from there. I hate rep detection, so I have it set to where I click a button on the watch to start a set and then when I finish the set to start a rest period, unless I have something set as a superset. I still use Hevy while also running this, as I just find the interface and tracking as a whole to be superior, especially if you want to modify something mid-workout. My main reason for still bothering to also do it on my Garmin is so that it factors my lifting sessions into the overall health picture. My Fitness Pal and Strava are the only apps it sync with.

Another vote for the Garmin Fenix 7 or 8. You get the surfr app with the 7.

A few things. One is battery life. Some Garmin's have solar charging. But for the one's that don't you can get at least a week of charge if not more depending on the mode it is set in and how infrequently you use GPS. Two is that Garmin's are still fully functional without using the app or connecting to your phone. Sure, you won't get messages pushed to the watch or have the ability to sync metrics, but still it is more of a watch first and connected device second. You can use the Ultra without a phone, too, but this kinda defeats the purpose of the iWatch series and smart watches in general where there are meant to be connection to your phone first and then a watch second. Sleep tracking, if it matters to you, is generally better with Gamin watches. Garmin has also been doing GPS for a really long time. But probably the biggest advantage is that Garmin watches, well nearly all of them, are designed to be used while the user is wearing gloves. Meaning, you can navigate to and do everything by clicking the buttons on the sides even if the model has a touch screen. There is a slight learning curve to this, but once you figure it out it seems rather intuitive. And I dunno. Some of us want something more than a fitness tracker but also not a full-blown, app-centric, always-connected device. This might sound weird, but if you need to use timers, one right after the other, then Gramins win hands down. Some Garmin watches are actually built for the out-of-doors based on the premise that you will scrape the watch on a tree trunk, rock, side of a cliff, on sandy, rocky, bottom if surfing, etc. I have the first model of the Instinct that I still use. It was run over by a semi truck and barely got scratched on the outer casing. Still works like a charm. But probably the biggest benefit is that Garmin is pretty good so far with updating older watches every so often, even though they don't have to. There is no real need to update the watch every 2 - 3 years (I suppose you don't really need to either, with the iWatches, but you know what I mean) other than if you simply want to. If you bought a Fenix 8 today it would still be functional going into 2035 assuming the battery can still hold a decent charge.

I could write a book about this topic, you have no idea how much time I've spent playing with both my Apple Watch Ultra and Garmin Fenix 8 and their respective software apps (Health and Connect). I own both. Long story short, neither are perfect. Here's my opinion per your categories: * Daily activity (steps, calories, heart rate) - Apple wins here. The HR sensor on the Apple Watch is just better. Apple Health does a MUCH better job of aggregating activities and accurately accounting for calories. * Sleep tracking. Garmin wins here, no question. Why? Battery life of the Fenix means I don't have to charge it overnight and therefore much more likely to wear it to sleep. I get 20 days of battery on my Fenix, and I ride my bike every single day. * Recovery metrics (Body Battery, HRV, etc.). Garmin superior here. * VO2Max and training guidance. Garmin blows away Apple. Apple does a poor job of tracking Vo2Max and doesn't have distinct running and cycling vo2 max like Garmin does. In fact, Apple Health won't even estimate your vo2 max unless you go for an outdoors run...it completely ignores any other activity including cycling. Clarity of data and presentation: Apple is just better. They understand UI and navigation, Garmin is piss-poor at this. Other apps to track: Yes, Strava. To me it is a ecosystem-agnostic tool that does a great job of tracking my long-term performance. Subscription not required but IMHO its worth it. Summary: the Garmin hardware is better, more premium-feeling, and its screens and metrics are tuned more for athletes. Apple's software (Health) is 100x better than Garmin's awful Connect, it also does a better job of tracking things like medications, and non-fitness related health aspects. The good news is that Garmin workouts/inputs captured on Garmin devices can feed to Apple Health as well as Connect so you can get the best of both worlds. The biggest drawback to Apple is that its ecosystem is much more closed, it doesn't like to share Apple Watch HR data for example, and it's really more of a smartwatch (still) than a true fitness watch like the Fenix, but Apple is definitely closing the gap each year.

Karoo 3 (“New Karoo” because K3 is apparently too close to KKK?) and a Garmin Fenix 8, keeping them completely separate because Garmin Connect only updates training status with activities tracked on Garmin devices but the Karoo is more useful when riding (physically can’t see my wrist when riding in winter) and has much better GPS than my watch

I have a Coros Pace pro and my wife a garmin fenix 8. My Coros GPS beats hers hands down every time. The GPS is unrivalled

If Garmin is just a sports watch, why doesn’t it stick to MIP displays with a cheaper price? MIP is obviously a much better option, widely recognized by most serious sports users. Why incorporate features like AMOLED, a touch screen, waiting on LTE, and Garmin Pay? It doesn’t really make sense, as a SPORTS WATCH, does it? I'm not going to lie either, I was a loyal Garmin Fenix user for over a decade, starting with the Fenix 1, 3, 5, and the last one of Epix Pro Gen 2. Now, I’ve switched to an AWU, and with the release of the Fenix 8, I doubt I’ll ever go back to Garmin. It’s true that the AW lagged behind Garmin in terms of sports functionality a decade ago, but things have changed dramatically since then. Every point made by OP is valid, as a SPORTS USER! In simple terms, Garmin seems to be stuck in the past, and while Garmin and its users may claim it’s a "sport watch," they don’t acknowledge that this has led to a growing divide with competitors like Apple. Last but not least, battery! That's the only thing Apple insists on, and Garmin can take pride in, even equipped with an AMOLED screen. With Epix Pro Gen2, 47mm, always on, all activities and GPS, 5 days guaranteed, which AWU can never reach.

I double watch. Garmin Fénix 8 on the right and an automatic on the left.

completely agree and would probably mark lower....having owned many Garmin's myself, I find the 8 buggy and unreliable. I hate the mapping...it looks good but, functionally, it's really slow and buggy. Garmin technical support example: (i) yes your ETA screen doesn't look right at all. At the moment we have no suggestions or fix. Me - "I am having lots of problems with reboots and other bugs and would love these to be ironed out soon or else I will have to return the watch". Garmin: "if you would like to return the watch that between you and the seller". Excellent (ii) Ive gone back to Suunto

Both Garmin and Coros make sport watches that are fine for what you need. I jumped from Garmin to Coros because of the crazy price jump of the Fenix 8, Connect+ subscription service and bad firmware updates for my Fenix 7 that Garmin has not addressed for more than a year now. The trust has been lost.

Mas isso não novidade o garmin sempre foi um aborto tipo ms dos quando comparado com o Apple Watch Ultra , entendo ser comprado por quem ou não sabe trabalhar com um awu ou acha que é mais desportivo ter o que os outros tem , menus horríveis , vários softwares  para quê, até agora o look horrível , sinceramente acho que nem com este 8 convence quem tem um ultra . O awu faz coisas fantásticas  , já tive corus vertix , suunto ambit 1,2,3 ,vector ,x10 etc etc inclusive garmin 310xt e nada se aproxima do awu.

Fenix 8 and Edge 530 on my bike.

I am on day 2 of the exact same scenario. Fenix 8 and everything. 😂 There are some definite positives to the Whoop and some definite drawbacks. I’m still undecided but I’ve got 28 more days to figure it out. 😎

I've just got the Fenix 8 because I'm a diver. There's gonna be a better (= cheaper) pick for you I'm not too familiar with the Garmin line up. I can give you my personal experience on tracking strength training though. Regarding strength training, it is okay-ish. Weightlifting is no a priority for Garmin and frankly it is kinda hard tracking reps and exercises with only a device on your wrist. Can't track leg exercises. Very different exercises can have very similar arm movements, e.g. bench press and shoulder press. Personally, I've disabled rep counting and Auto Sets in the settings. I start the activity, then press the back button to go from Set to Pause and back to Set, that's it. No reps, no weights, no exercise tracking. I do that on my phone and want Garmin to only track my activity, heart rate and so on. It's actually quite convenient to have the pause timer on my watch instead of my workout app on the phone.

This depends on how you want to track your sessions. Some people prefer to start "strength training" when enter a gym and stop it at the end. I use my watch to follow my program like described here: [https://gelberhut.com/strength-training-with-a-garmin-in-a-gym/](https://gelberhut.com/strength-training-with-a-garmin-in-a-gym/) If you want to do the same - a watch which allows to adjust weight/rep number using the touch screen is handy. I know that venu3 and F8 support this, not sure about other models. PS: Not that long ago, Garmin released strength coach (https://gelberhut.com/garmin-strength-coach-what-is-it-and-what-can-it-do/), if you want it: check one of Garmin Venu 3, Garmin Fenix 8, Garmin Vivoactive 5, Forerunner 255, Forerunner 265, Forerunner 955, Forerunner 965.

Meanwhile I recently bought a fenix 8 and am letting my whoop membership expire. After 3 years, I'm over the analytics and I want more from my activity tracking as I recently got into triathalons. I personally feel like whoops sleep recommendations were pretty accurate but after 3 years I get the point. I like how whoop says you slept good, you had a good recovery, now GET AFTER IT. Meanwhile garmin is over here telling me my high aerobic training is low but your also over reaching? It's a mixed bag but as previously stated i want to track my distance on the road and in the pool more and I don't really listen to the whoop anymore.

I used to but with the Fenix 8 I don’t except for sprints and intervals and even then the data isn’t super off.

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 have been playing with the strength app on a fenix 8 and my FR 955. I am trying to figure out if Strength activity affects other metrics like training readiness, endurance, body battery, training status etc, differently than if you just select Cardio activity and track your sets reps weights elsewhere. Do you know the answer to that?

**My Fenix 8 has soooo many issues they are sending a replacement. I couldn’t believe how many problems it had. Was very disappointed in the watch. ** Watch would crash after activity and never saved it. Long hold start button for the voice command would just randomly turn into a compass/barometer. Touchscreen doesn’t work when in a call. Battery would go from 3 days to 20hr after a 30 min activity. Light turned on one time by pressing the speaker option on the phone screen . Also the speaker and mic are terrible… people can’t ever hear me and the speaker is so low it’s pretty much useless. Couldn’t even get a gps signal in the city of San Fran to save a location at all. ***I’ve also said the same exact thing as the OP that it would be an amazing watch …. if it worked properly but I don’t have one that does yet. And it’s been a terrible experience with it.***

With the exception of the Fenix 8, all of the garmin watches are 'water resistant.' This is good in general, but for salt water, yikes. I wouldn't trust the watch to last long. However the fenix 8 is completely sealed from the elements and is the best bet. But it ain't cheap, starting at $1k.

Thanks for sharing! I’ve been getting pretty frustrated with my bulky Garmin Fenix 8 — it’s just not comfortable for sleep or daily wear, and I still need to pair it with a Coros HRM to track BJJ. The Whoop subscription also feels like a money pit over time. The Fitbit Charge 6 looks really promising though, especially since all I care about is solid sleep and resting heart rate tracking. Are you still using all three devices? I just picked up a Charge 6 to test it out, and I also ordered a Whoop armband sleeve — hoping I can slip the Fitbit in there to track BJJ sessions more comfortably.

Garmin Fenix 8, first smartwatch in a long time so nothing to compare with, accurately tracks my swims at the beach, apart from it says I am slow when I don't think I am :)

I have and WEAR both. Garmin Fenix 8 with buttons for the win. And AW for calls, texts, reminders, calendar, and soon to come — Tesla Watch key!

Hi, I'm back to Watch Ultra after a short cheating with a Garmin Fenix 8, which is great for sports tracking and analysis but it's smart features sucks so much that I had to come back to my Apple ecosystem. Besides Athlytic - which I know pretty well since I've been subscribed for more than 1 year - and the mandatory WorkOutDoors, I'm trying to find the best companion App to manage health metrics, fitness and workouts, and a reliable and complete training metrics analysis which could be compared or excedd Garmin's one. In the screenshot you can see the apps I found as candidates, but I never tried the premium version of them, except for Welltory which is too expensive. Athlytic is very good but someway incomplete and sometimes unreliable. Do you have deep experience with the others and can you suggest something complete? What's your comments? Thanks!

Works well with my Garmin fenix 8

I switched to Fenix 8 from Apple Ultra. For the gym they’re much of a muchness. Garmin is better for running if you’re interested in more in depth metrics but Apple Ultra with Athlytic app was pretty good as well. I wouldn’t have bothered swapping if the Apple battery life was better but I find it disproportionally annoying having to charge it every 2 days. If Apple sorted out their battery issues even to get a week out of a full charge I’d most likely swap back as I prefer the functionality of the Apple over the Garmin.

Like you i have the F8 and Whoop. F8 is great for specific activities with granular detail when you record it. Whoop measures Strain all day long without you having to manually record it everything. E.g. a strenuous gardening activity, walking the dog all gets recorded (you have to assign these if it is not auto assigned by Whoop) without me having to consciously press record. F8 can't do that. So in every single day, Whoop records your daily wellness and activity levels. Far more useful information than metrics for a specific activity (F8 is great for training metrics so it has its place). I should add that assigning strain to a specific activity ain't important to me either. A day score is enough to tell me how active i have been. That and sleep data - much easier to understand. The HRV readings are not far off from each other (F8 vs Whoop). Will probably renew.

I was using Runna with my AWU2 until a few weeks ago when I switched to the Garmin Fenix 8 and I love the integration of planned runs in the Garmin native interface.

I was a Fenix 5 guy for 5 years, I was a whoop guy for 3 years, and now I’m a Fenix 8 guy for the next 5 years. :)

Haven’t seen Venu recommended. I’m running a Fenix 6x Pro right now, and we all love all of our options. Suggest this file https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/11FeOS8Gf26GO9Ewp3rGzBALk9EZgT3Xian3TYOe4fwg/edit And dcrainmaker reviews, but seems line the less expensive Garmin do everything you need, even though most of us point to the more expensive models. EDIT: missed OP doesn’t care about price. Yeah Fenix 8

Swim functions of Fenix 8 seem to be more of less the same as most somewhat more recent models, even with Swim 2 (honestly, it is fine for swimming. I swam with it for sure a while, but other functions are somewhat lacking). Fenix 8 supports diving but unless you dive, or otherwise do activities not supported by somewhat older models, I am not sure if it would be worth the extra money compared to older models because the swim functions seem to be essentially the same as the likes of Epix or earlier Fenix, more recent swim-compatible Forerunner etc. You should be able to pick up previous models somewhat cheaply, whereas Fenix 8 is quite expensive. I would have bought Fenix 8 if it was much better at swim tracking but it's not, so I did not spend the money to upgrade from Epix Gen 2 (which is annoyingly less accurate compared to Finnis goggles and Apple Watch but I digress)

Ive had the 945lte, Fenix 7x and now the Fenix 8 and i have NEVER had any bugs or problems. I might be lucky or the people complaining might be unlucky... Just remember this: if you enjoy a product and it just works flawlessly you would maybe recommend the product to 1-2 people. But if you had a really bad experience people tell 10+ about it and complain on forums.. If i could do one thing over i would go for the Fenix 8 Solar and not amoled. If you love long battery life go for Fenix 8 Solar or enduro 2 or 3. Especially if you plan to log long activities like hiking.

I've used either a Forerunner 9xx or a Fēnix for about 6 years. If you give it about 5 minutes before you swim to leatch onto as many satellites as possible after it says it has a GPS fix it's pretty good. If you dive in as soon as you get the tick, it's crap.

I've had Apple, Garmin and Samsung smart watches but only got "joy spark" from the Garmin Fenix/Epix. The Garmin Fenix/Epix have an intangible attraction that doesn't equate to any feature or activity. One aspect of wearing a Fenix/Epix that I have to admit is attractive to me is that it signifies that I'm a performance athlete.

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. 😂