Garmin Vivoactive

The Vivoactive is a new wearable device from Garmin that is part smartwatch and component health tracker. This GPS watch directs calls, texts and different notifications out of your cellphone on your wrist and captures distinctive data about runs, motorbike rides, swims or even golf games. At $250, the Vivoactive is about the same fee because the Fitbit Surge, some other GPS-enabled fitness watch that has smartwatch functions. however not like the Surge, the Vivoactive would not have a built-in heart-price screen. if you want to tune your pulse with Garmin's new smartwatch, you may want to purchase a well suited coronary heart-rate strap for approximately $50. I wore the Vivoactive for every week to peer how nicely it executed every of its many functions. The device stayed on my wrist day and night, accompanying me on runs, motorcycle rides, walks and swims. here's what i discovered:

The Vivoactive is lightweight, fashionable and a laugh to apply, with a very good blend of smartwatch and fitness-monitoring capabilities. The tool is waterproof and may tune indoor swimming (some thing few smartwatches can do), and you may customise the watch's settings the usage of Garmin's new app platform, join IQ.

The watch is missing an open-water swim mode (which can be disappointing for triathletes) and advanced walking metrics, which might be key capabilities on maximum multisport GPS watches presently available on the market. And even though you can get hold of notifications out of your cellphone on the watch, you cannot respond to texts the way you could with extra function-rich smartwatches.

the primary component I observed about the Vivoactive was its slender layout. The watch is simplest zero.32 inches (eight millimeters) thick. as compared to most GPS watches i have tested, it is definitely tiny. The watch's slenderness is balanced with a huge, square face it truly is clean to study at the same time as you're working out however no longer so wide that the watch feels uncomfortable on your wrist. The Vivoactive didn't bother me when I kept it on all night time, which is right when you consider that this tool is ready to song sleep duration.

just like the Fitbit Surge, the Vivoactive combines a hint display screen with traditional buttons. It took some time to determine out a way to navigate the watch, however as soon as I got the cling of it, it changed into easy. You press the button at the proper of the watch to tug up the principle menu, which includes icons for all the sports you may tune (indoor and outdoor strolling, walking, biking, golfing, and indoor swimming). you may then swipe thru the menu to peer your workout records, alternate your tool's settings or maybe play a brief recreation of tic-tac-toe.

inside the dark, it became difficult to look the Vivoactive's display screen, but the watch has a backlight button to remedy that hassle. I also wanted the backlight while looking on the watch thru my tinted goggles inside the pool. however ordinary, the display was brilliant sufficient to study indoors and outdoor throughout the day.

putting in place the Vivoactive is easy. First, you want to download the Garmin specific software from the organization's website and join up for a Garmin join account on-line. to start receiving clever notifications (like textual content messages and fb alerts), you may want to down load the Garmin join mobile app and pair the Vivoactive together with your telephone.

To manipulate the notifications you receive at the watch, you tap on the Settings button, or widget, inside the predominant menu and then swipe via till you get to the Bluetooth screen. From there, you could flip notifications on and off. If you're like me and also you'd alternatively not receive signals whilst you're running out, you can turn off notifications when the watch is in its exercise-monitoring mode.

The Vivoactive robotically syncs records from your workout routines and every day sports (i.e., steps taken and calories burned) to the Garmin join mobile app via Bluetooth. in case you need to sync statistics right away, you could open the app and click the refresh buttons on the top right of every widget, or you could plug the watch into your laptop and sync through the Garmin explicit software program. I tried syncing records all 3 methods and by no means encountered any problems. I also in no way had to re-establish the Bluetooth connection between my cellphone and the watch, which became surely a massive plus, due to the fact a few health trackers i've tested constantly need to be manually reconnected with my telephone.

one of the exceptional functions of the Vivoactive is its potential to function as a standalone tool. you may see your each day step count number, distance traveled and calories burned proper on the watch itself. however greater importantly, you may also see information about your workouts on the watch via tapping on the records widget inside the essential menu. The capability to look targeted exercise information proper in your wrist is some thing it truly is lacking from the Fitbit Surge, which doesn't store your exercising records. to look information about a run you took with the Surge, you want to open the Fitbit cellular app or view the stats to your on-line dashboard.

The Vivoactive's battery is meant to closing 3 weeks on a single rate, the Garmin website states. possibly it virtually can final that lengthy in case you don't use the watch's GPS or receive notifications thru Bluetooth. however in case you're using loads of the watch's functions, you could locate the battery lasts best approximately 5 days. it really is commonly how lengthy I went between costs whilst Bluetooth notifications were turned on 24/7 and the tool's GPS mode become enabled for about half-hour every day.

The Vivoactive collects nearly all the identical records as its extra high-priced opposite numbers, such as the Garmin Forerunner 920XT and the Suunto Ambit3 sport. these multisport GPS watches are designed for triathletes and may song jogging, cycling, and both indoor and out of doors swimming. The Vivoactive can not track open-water swims (it is no longer configured to pick out up a GPS signal underwater), however it does just about the entirety else that conventional multisport watches do.

Runners and cyclists can use the Vivoactive to music and examine metrics like velocity, tempo, distance, elevation and coronary heart rate (with a well matched heart-fee screen). however, runners may not be able to use the watch with Garmin's HRM-Run, a heart charge screen that lets you song superior strolling metrics. if you need to investigate your vertical oscillation (motion up and down, or "jump") and ground-contact time (the amount of time your foot remains on the ground with each step), you need to consider other Garmin watches, which includes the Forerunner 920XT, the Forerunner 620, or the Fenix 2 or three. but, thanks to its inner accelerometer, the Vivoactive can estimate your cadence (strides in step with minute).

one of the maximum novel functions of the Vivoactive is its capability to tune golf metrics. in step with Garmin, the watch measures shot distance; yardage to the front, middle and returned of inexperienced; and the yardage of layup arcs (a brief hit taken to keep away from an impediment) and doglegs (bends within the fairway).

all of the statistics the watch collects is displayed in an smooth-to-study layout on line and inside the Garmin join mobile app. whilst the Garmin app is not as smooth at the eyes as Fitbit's mobile app, it nonetheless provides all the data you need to research your exercising.

if you put on the Vivoactive to bed at night, the watch will automatically song your dozing styles without you desiring to press any buttons to place it into "sleep" mode. however the sleep facts you may see in the Garmin app while you awaken might not tell you a great deal greater beyond how many hours of rest you purchased that night time, followed via a graph of your motion over the route of the night. at the same time as I appreciated having a document of what number of hours I slept, I didn't locate it very useful to recognise when I had moved for the duration of the night time. And the app doesn't give any clues as to the way to interpret or use statistics approximately your nocturnal movements.

since the Vivoactive handiest tracks swims within the pool (and not in open water), it cannot absolutely take the place of a multisport GPS watch. furthermore, Garmin would not currently make a heart charge strap that may be worn whilst swimming, so you may not be able to accumulate heart price facts for the duration of your pool workout routines with the Vivoactive. but, you may use the watch to tune laps, overall distance, stroke rate, tempo and swimming performance (SWOLF).

in contrast to the Garmin Swim, an eye that only tracks indoor swimming, the Vivoactive would not routinely locate stroke type (freestyle, backstroke, breaststroke or butterfly). The watch also lacks a "drill mode," that's one of the Garmin Swim's first-class features. Drill mode lets you record the amount of time and range of laps you devoted to kickboard drills or other swimming exercises. anyways, the Vivoactive become accurate at counting laps and strokes, which can be the maximum critical metrics for any swim watch.

I honestly enjoyed carrying the Vivoactive. The watch is cozy sufficient to leave on day and night, but additionally has a sleek, cutting-edge appearance that I loved. This tool connects to Garmin's new app platform, the join IQ store, in which you could download custom show screens that alternate the appearance of the watch, in addition to widgets and apps for the Vivoactive. I downloaded a new display display screen that showed me how much battery electricity I had left at the device (some thing the default display display screen does not consist of).

The watch turned into very quick at selecting up a GPS signal, which without a doubt brought to my amusement while using the wearable. I hate status around on the sidewalk awaiting a GPS tool to gather a satellite lock, but the Vivoactive had no trouble with this — now not even if I examined it within the dense city neighborhoods of new york with lots of surrounding skyscrapers.

Like all of the trackers in Garmin's Vivo line, the Vivoactive features a "flow bar" — a picture on the display display that turns crimson while you've been inactive for extra than an hour. The watch will buzz your wrist in case you do not arise and pass round to reset it. even though I started to locate this humming annoying after a while, i can see how the circulate bar could be beneficial in case you're striving to be more lively every day, or in case your aim is to take a sure range of steps.

The mobile app that accompanies the Vivoactive seconds as a social network for Garmin customers. through the Garmin connect app (or internet site), you can look for humans you understand who even have a Garmin watch, request to connect with Garmin users all over the global, join health-associated companies and partake in fitness "challenges" with different customers.