10 Best Garmin Watches 2024 in the US

Since 1996, Garmin has been making consumer electronics, specializing in GPS (=Global Positioning System) products. Besides making GPS products for automobiles and boats, they have an extensive line of wearable electronics for athletes, children, and even pets! They have several versions of fitness tracking smartwatches, in six stunning series. They can be grouped into three categories: Some allow you to choose the appropriate apps for a particular sport. Some are “multisport”, for several sports at once (biathlon or triathlon athletes). Still others are specialized for particular sports--for example, their Approach line, with maps of thousands of golf courses and tips on how to play particular holes. And some come with particular features to make your exercise routines more pleasant, such as music streaming, and allowing you to send and receive text messages.

We’ve composed this buyer’s guide to help you make the right decision when selecting a Garmin watch. It'll help you:

• Choose the right type of Garmin watch,

• See useful tips about that type of Garmin watch,

• Read reviews of some of the best Garmin watches, and what customers are saying, and

• Compare prices and find the best deals.

• Fitness tracking for individual sports: The Vivoactive series combines fitness and activity tracking with Verizon connectivity. That lets you download and listen to music, send text messages, and make credit card payments. You can adjust the fitness tracking for the particular activity you’ll engage in now: skiing, snowboarding, golf, biking, running, and more.

Vivoactive 3 Music with Verizon connectivity

• Multisport:  These are Garmin watches primarily for runners and triathlon athletes. They measure distance traveled, speed, heart rate, time, altitude, and pace. The watch is suitable for swimming, bicycling, and running. The Forerunner series, such as the Garmin Forerunner 735XT, are some of the best Garmin watches for cycling.

Garmin Forerunner Watch

• For golfers: Garmin makes smartwatches expressly for golfers. Their Approach line of watches has stored maps of 41,000 golf courses around the world. They also will tell you how far you are from the green, your distance from hazards, and allows you to perform a post-game analysis. These smartwatches will even help you improve your golf skills, giving you pointers on your swing, depending on whether you’re golfing on an uphill or downhill slope.

Approach S60 Watch, with a golf course displayed

We can also describe what each of the 7 lines of Garmin smartwatches is best for:

• Vivo series: This includes the Vivosmart HR and the Vivofit. The Vivosmart is a fitness tracker that is suited for training, pilates, running, jogging, and yoga. It offers heart rate (=HR) tracking just from your wrist, without any sort of chest strap. It also allows for playing music and sending and receiving messages. The Vivofit has a sleep quality tracker, and counts steps and number of stairs climbed.

• Fenix series: This is a multisport watch, measuring heart rate, providing maps and navigation for runners and cyclists, providing measurements of altitude for hikers and climbers, with special apps for measuring your pace and vertical oscillation.

• Tactix series: This is a sturdily-built, tactical GPS watch with mapping and navigation, along with an altimeter, barometer, and compass. This is all besides the fitness and heart rate tracking. There are even apps for skydiving, such as the Jumpmaster.

• Approach series: As mentioned above, this line is special for golfers, providing information about golf courses, and adjusting yardage according to whether you’re making a shot uphill or downhill. There is also a TruSwing app, that analyzes your swing and trains you to swing properly.

• Forerunner series: This is a multisport watch for triathletes engaging in running, bicycling, and swimming. It is also suitable for cross-country skiing, paddle sports, hiking, and sprinting.

• Instinct series: This is a military-standard GPS watch made for rugged environments, being thermal, shock, and water resistant to a depth of 100 meters.

• D2 series: This is an aviator watch, with GPS, color maps, weather reports, together with heart rate monitoring, smart notifications, and Garmin Pay in some models, for making credit card payments.

• Able to change the watch face: There are a number of watch faces available on each device. If you want an even bigger selection, there is the Connect IQ and Face It stores, which will allow you access to custom watch faces, as well as other apps and widgets.

• Wristbands: The wristbands on most Garmin watches are easy to replace. You don’t need to go to a watchmaker, or even to get a screwdriver! The wristbands will just snap on with a little pressure.

• Get phone alerts: It’s not news that a Garmin smartwatch will alert you when you receive a phone call. But people are pleased with the fact that they can turn off their phone’s ringtone, and just rely on the watch’s alert. This spares you from getting disturbed from unwanted phone calls.

• Battery life: The Garmin watches have a memory-in-pixel (= MIP) display. This means that only some of the pixels change on the LCD screen, while the others remain the same color. This conserves battery life. As a result, the smartwatch can actively track you for 15 hours, and remain 8 weeks in watch mode on a single charge!

• VIRB: One useful device that pairs up with the Vivosmart Garmin watch is the VIRB action camera. It records what you’re doing in HD 1080p, and allows you to play it back in slow motion. There is also a special case to enclose the VIRB so that you can film action underwater.

Garmin VIRB camera

• Garmin Connect: Garmin Connect is Garmin’s mobile app. If you have a compatible Android or Apple smartphone, you can install Garmin Connect, which will expand the device’s activity tracking ability considerably. It will allow you to plan workouts and courses for yourself, compare your progress with other users, and check your progress over time. Check Garmin’s website to see if your device can run Garmin Connect.

• Connectivity: Some smartwatches will be hooked up to an Internet provider, such as Verizon, allowing you to download music and apps, as well as receive emails and text notifications.

• Stats offered: The Garmin Forerunner will give some very technical data as well, such as your maximal oxygen consumption, called “V02 max”. This is a good indicator of cardiorespiratory fitness in general. It also can tell you the lactate threshold, the point where lactic acid builds up in your muscles and your performance will be affected. This will help prepare your pace when exercising. Garmin smartwatches also a function to vibrate to remind you if you’re slacking off from your exercise goals.

Garmin is a maker of wearable electronics for sports and fitness, such as activity trackers and smartwatches, as well as GPS devices, heart rate metes, altimeters, cameras, and more. They were founded in 1996 in Kansas City, Kansas.  They also make GPS devices for marine use and automobiles.