Forerunner 101

I've been using Garmin since their Forerunner 101 (which still works BTW), Forerunner 305, Forerunner 910XT, VivoActive HR (one of their first forays into touch screens), and now their Forerunner 935 (which I bought new in 2020, but it was released in 2017). All of these still work, except for the VivoActive HR. I used to use Fitbit and started with some of the earliest releases - EVERY SINGLE Fitbit has died on me. I had a graveyard of dead fitbits. it was ridiculous. I've been using the Apple Watch since series 7 (which just died recently) and switched to the Ultra 2 to give Apple one more chance. My perspective is that Apple puts in too powerful of a processor for a smartwatch, hence the shorter battery life. The Garmin processors are generally barebones by comparison. They also must use some better charging algorithm on the newer Forerunners because my 935 ends the day at almost the same exact SOC for the past 5 years. I'm at 88% at the end of a full day, that includes 1 hour of GPS workouts. I'm getting an estimated 5-6 days from the Ultra 2. My Series 7 really dropped battery health after WatchOS 10.2, something caused the battery health to go from 100% rapidly down to 86% ever since 10.2 as it used to consume 1.7%/hr and then to 3%/hr before it died. But the Apple watches are much better as smart watches. The Garmin are much better as fitness watches. The Precision Start on Ultra at least fixed the issue I had with regular Apple Watch where it'd start the activity but without GPS or HR data for the first 30 seconds - which is idiotic. Precision Start tells me when GPS and HR data are good to go, just like on a Garmin. I have not used the newer Garmins like Forerunner 970 or Fenix/Epix 8 or whatever but Garmin does have their own slew of issues. They often switch GPS chipsets and some generations are extremely problematic in urban environments.

I’ve been with Garmin forerunner 101–virtually a brick on your wrist that only connected to your pc via serial port. I’ve had just about every edition, or every other forerunner or fenix, since then. https://preview.redd.it/9y3djmlqs2wf1.jpeg?width=447&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=8970e4e3b30a7ac16290c35ee5912fd8935f3b7f Garmin does excellent running/hiking/exploring watches but it’s only nominally in that other smartwatch or lifestyle market segment since other brands do that much better. Though there is a lot of competition with Coros & even Apple Watch Ultra in some cases, most people I know like Garmin for their ecosystem and I don’t think for that specific athlete market it’s even close. So I think one ought to think of it like that rather than Garmin as a smartwatch brand So affordable is a subjective term. For me, I wouldn’t part with my Garmin because there’s always a compromise with “lifestyle” type watches passing for a training device. Plus I have Garmin edge for cycling and Garmin power meter pedals as well.

Get an older model if your concerned about budget. The new features are usually not that compelling. Only go 970 if you have to have a torch and 965 if you need maps. 265 is a great watch and sounds like it will do what you want along with the 100 series too. Great MIP options out there as well because...MIP is better!

i second that. wrist HR with F8 is also faulty for me like 30% of the times, could be because of a wrist or a strap. But i did not see any with F8 improvement compared to F6 or older forerunners

Garmin Forerunnner has several models in that range. Work like a charm.

Garmin Venu 1, 2, or even one of the newer Vivoactives would be great. You can get a Venu 2 for probably about $100-$130 on Facebook Marketplace right now. You can also get one of the older Garmin Forerunners for about the same price as well, if not a little cheaper

Use forerunner for swimming and it works great. So happy I no longer have to count my laps and I can just swim.