Garmin Swim 2

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Overall

#48 in

Fitness Trackers

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Sentiment score73% positive
37
7
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Top Pros

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Last updated: May 20, 2026

Reddit Reviews

Reddit IconAgreeable_Ad4156
8 months ago

Garmin swim 2. Gives you pretty accurate yards that you can see while swimming. My Fitbit charge wouldn’t show distance until I stopped and synchronized with my phone after. Also, wet touchscreen on the Fitbit is useless.

10 months ago

Using Garmin Swim 2. Happy with its function for tracking laps in indoor pool, took a little getting used to for accuracy. I have to be deliberate and smooth on my turns. Original band was tight on my large wrist, larger band was expensive, around $40.

Reddit IconBBorNot
11 months ago

I stopped using my Garmin Swim 2 because it would routinely add or subtract a lap or two on auto lap count. Maddening.

Reddit IconBilateral-drowning
10 months ago

Plus one for the swim 2.. It's a basic watch that really only does swimming but it does swimming well. Both in the pool and open water. I particularly like that there is no touch screen and it's all button operated. Touch screens in the water are the devil.

Reddit IconBlugrl21
10 months ago

I've had a Swim2 and upgraded to a 265 (which has a better accelerometer). Stroke detection probably won't get much better with an Apple. My watches sometimes confuse sprint free and fly, but otherwise it mostly gets it right. I find stroke detection matters a lot less than being able to count laps anyway. Auto lap counting on all watches is about the same.... all are 95%+ but if you want 100% you need manual stop/start and only Garmin has that

Reddit IconBrambleline
11 months ago

I've a Garmin swim 2 the battery lasts about a week. I only use it to swim, in the pool & open water plus to count steps.

Reddit IconCommercial_Coach_935
10 months ago

Don’t insult my push offs like that. Just kidding lol. I’m still getting used to the watch and absolutely use the auto interval feature. May just need to turn it off! Seems to be the advise

10 months ago

Ohhh yea I have that issue with the garmin 2. Meaning, I can’t go back in and edit it once it’s complete. I wish I could do that purely because I don’t know what workout I’m doing until I’m in the water and the coach tells me what to do

Reddit IconC_W_Stevens
12 months ago

Swim 2. It does pool and open water, and syncs with swim.com, Strava, and usms.com tracking sites. I've had mine for about 2 years.

Reddit IconDoodlebomb75
12 months ago

I will say that I had an older Series 6 and it was fine in the water for about 2 months swimming 3-4 times a week. Then it literally fell apart mid-swim. Face detached and battery fried. I ended up getting a swim 2 to replace and I’ve been happy with it, but will likely upgrade to a FR 265 when this dies. I’m sure a newer model AW would probably do fine, but I didn’t want to spend that much to test that theory. So yes there are some of us out here that would be hesitant to recommend an AW, but you also may not have any issues at all. I think the older the watch, you’ll already have some degradation of the seal, so likely why mine just fell apart after a couple months in the pool.

12 months ago

Same. I was so hesitant to get it at first as I was used to an AW but when my AW died in the pool I was scared to spend money on a new one. The Swim 2 was cheap enough that if it failed at least I wasn’t out $600+. I really like it overall.

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