Garmin has long been the first name in sport watches, but today it announced a fully capable smartwatch, the Garmin Vivoactive, which is poised to compete with giants like Samsung and Apple. The ultra-thin smartwatch is GPS-enabled and includes a number of apps for tracking sports and activities.
The Vivoactive will come pre-loaded with a number of apps for health and fitness, including golfing and swimming, and will be compatible with Android and iOS devices for smart notifications. The Vivoactive, which will sell for $249, is the first watch to use Garmin's new ConnectIQ platform. ConnectIQ devices will have their own app store in early March, around the time as Mobile World Congress, letting users customize their watches with different watch face designs, widgets, and other apps.
The device has an estimated battery life three weeks, or 10 hours when GPS is enabled. And while the Vivoactive does not have a built-in optical heart rate monitor (HRM) for taking heart rate through the wrist, it can pair with other HRMs.
When a Garmin representative recently brought one of the new devices to PCMag to show it off, I initially thought it was a dummy prototype, as it felt like it weighed hardly anything at all. It clocks in at just 1.34 ounces and is 0.3 inches thick, with a screen diagonal length of 1.4 inches.
The crisp screen also looked like a dummy, until I noticed the seconds ticking away. The sunlight-readable, high-resolution color touch screen is almost as impressive as the fact that the watch didn't look like a bulky men's watch on my wrist. Wearability is one of the toughest problem for wearable technology, and it's refreshing to see a first-generation device get it right.
Because Garmin has a unique focus on sports and activities, the Vivoactive is waterproof to 50 meters, and can compute your SWOLF score, which is a measure of swimming efficiency. Runners will appreciate that the running app displays pace, time, and distance, and tracks speed indoors and outdoors. An Auto Lap and Auto Pause feature are also included, as are vibration alerts for heart rate, pace, and run/walk intervals. Golfers can download course maps from more than 38,000 courses worldwide, which stay up to date automatically. When GPS is turned on, Vivoactive can measure layup and dogleg distances, as well as distances to the front, middle, and back of the green.
Garmin is showing off the new smartwatch at the 2015 International CES in Las Vegas. For related advice, see the best activity trackers for fitness, the five best smartwatches, and how to choose a fitness tracker.