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I'm a runner, so obviously biased, but I implore everyone (to the point of annoyance) to check out some of the cheaper Garmin smart watches. They use MIP displa

I'm a runner, so obviously biased, but I implore everyone (to the point of annoyance) to check out some of the cheaper Garmin smart watches. They use MIP displays so the battery life runs about 2 weeks, you get phone notifications, the ability to find your phone, sleep scoring, step counting, heart rate monitoring. Then there's the obvious GPS run recording which you don't have to use. There's more stuff as well but I don't really use that like NFC card payments, music controls, but overall it hits a nice balance of features versus battery life. For the sake of fair comparison, my wife had an Apple watch, which looked better and had way more features, but the 1 day battery life became such a frustration it sat in a dresser drawer. My last Garmin lasted 5 years with daily use and sports, and only died because I took it into the sea on vacation after the waterproof seal failed on the screen. I replaced it the day I got back with the successor model and couldn't be happier. I'm not shilling for Garmin (or at least not being paid to), I love the Pebbles and I'm very much looking forward to the launch as I want a more fashionable smartwatch. Apple, Samsung et al have kinda tainted the smartphone market with feature vomit, when in fact there's a lot of good stuff out there, it's just not as hip.

1bpp 9mo ago
Seconding the Garmin watches, been using a Forerunner for years and the battery still lasts over a week with an always-on display. Does about as much as a Pebble and even has a documented SDK with sideloading. The refresh rate is very low but totally fine for a watch, I think newer models have much better displays. The only thing I wish were better is exporting all the tracked health data in a format I can use myself. Using the official tool for that I couldn't even get heart rate data.
- mkesper 9mo ago
  Maybe the (partial) support of Gadgetbridge is sufficient: https://gadgetbridge.org/gadgets/wearables/garmin-watches/ https://gadgetbridge.org/gadgets/wearables/garmin-watches/
apparent 9mo ago
I find the Garmin UI to be awful, and the Pebble UI to be a breeze. Also, Garmins are pretty bulky compared to Pebbles, and many of them don't have buttons that can be used to control music, for those of us who find touchscreen interfaces to be lacking.
- majesticmerc 9mo ago
  Granted, the UI for Garmins is pretty clunky compared to the Pebble interface :(
- tw04 9mo ago
  Huh? Are you sure you aren’t thinking of another brand? Literally every garmin watch I can find on their site has buttons. The size is also very much watch specific. They will all be thicker than a pebble, but they’ll also all have far more features. Like pulse ox, which is one of the main drivers of thickness.
  - apparent 9mo ago
    When I was looking a couple years ago, most Garmins had at least 2 buttons, but only those with 5 supported music control via buttons. I think I have used the pulse oximeter maybe 1x/year, and that's counting during COVID shutdowns, when people talked about pulse ox more than in normal times. I will keep my Garmin and will use it when exercising. But I would never buy another one as long as I can get Pebbles instead.
  - ramses0 9mo ago
    Nope, some are touch screen only or with only 1-2 buttons. The Garmin's with 5 buttons (eg: Forerunner 55 at ~$170) are decent once you get used to the button-mechanisms, but pebble's UX for "productivity notifications" has always been top-tier.
    - tw04 9mo ago
      > Nope, some are touch screen only Which ones are touch screen only?
jsheard 9mo ago
> They use MIP displays so the battery life runs about 2 weeks Double-check this because they have a lot of OLED models now alongside their MIP ones. Battery life is more or less the same either way with AOD off, but with AOD enabled the OLEDs fall behind the MIPs.
- AshamedCaptain 9mo ago
  Yes, and they are outright removing the LCD displays from some of their major lines, (e.g. Fenix 8 Pro). The writing is on the wall.
  - deleted 9mo ago
    [deleted]
- Groxx 9mo ago
  OLED is also a heck of a lot less readable in sunlight. They're constantly improving, but the brightness they need to pump out to actually compete is extreme and they're still nowhere near that.
stevage 9mo ago
As a reluctant runner, I still don't see any value in a smartwatch. I just use my phone and it does everything I want, which is basically, play podcasts and record my run for Strava. I did previously have a smartwatch which did heart rate monitoring, but really, once I'd confirmed that when I exercised harder my heart rate went up, I lost interest in it.
- gofreddygo 9mo ago
  I dont see the point of smart watches either. I wear a casio / gshock with the backlight button that sticks right up on the front of the watch. i am on my second watch now cz my sister gifted it to me. the first is ticking away happy with 0 charging , battery changes to date. 0 reasons to change. my sister otoh has an apple watch that she never charges, lies in a drawer which i hear about when she's trying to find her phone. conversation ends with "eh i should charge it maybe" if i ever buy a smart watch, will likely be the pebble
mrinterweb 9mo ago
I had two pebble watches, and I used them daily for years. I rarely use my pixel watch 3, mainly because of charging. I only have one proprietary charger for the watch and sometime it is on my desk, sometimes near my bed, sometimes somewhere I can't find. I don't need my watch, but I do need my phone, so I charge the phone, and forget that my watch exists for a few months at a time. I think the biggest hurdle for me and watches is daily charging. I will not buy another smartwatch unless the battery is at least a week. Pebble round 2 having two week battery is great!
ValentineC 9mo ago
> For the sake of fair comparison, my wife had an Apple watch, which looked better and had way more features, but the 1 day battery life became such a frustration it sat in a dresser drawer. To each their own, but it sounds like your wife just couldn't get into the "happy path" routine of an Apple Watch user. I've been using an Apple Watch since Series 5 introduced the always-on display. I wear it for roughly 23 hours a day, and charge it whenever I'm in the bathroom. I'm fine with this routine 99% of the time, but I'm also not someone who'd camp or stay outdoors for more than a night. Before that, I was using a Amazfit Bip and was really proud of its 30+ day battery life. I very much prefer the features the Apple Watch has.
- ewoodrich 9mo ago
  That happy path works okay for a while but provides very little margin for when the battery inevitably starts to degrade. I’m a few years in and now every few days it’s started to die at around 8pm (yet claims the battery health is still just barely outside replacement range which is … quite convenient for Apple).
- chrneu 9mo ago
  as someone who only recharges their garmin watch maybe once a month(with dozens of hours of activity tracking), lol at daily recharging of a watch. that completely eliminates it as a possible product for me. even after a few years with battery degradation I rarely recharge my watch more than once every 2-3 weeks. it's kind of wild to me that folks would daily recharge a watch.
ListenLinda 9mo ago
The problem I have with Garmin is lack of support for older devices. They practically bricked my old bike computer. Unfortunately it's been awhile and I can't recall the details of the issue. I have since switched to Wahoo but have only had it for about 3-4 years now.
Larrikin 9mo ago
I've waited for years to get a Garmin, ever since Google started removing features from FitBit. The specs are great for many of the models. But they were all ass ugly, too big, or both. I ended up buying a Pebble because Garmin just never made anything I actually wanted to put on my wrist.
jolmg 9mo ago
> check out some of the cheaper Garmin smart watches. They use MIP displays so the battery life runs about 2 weeks Same deal with the watch of the article. It uses the same display: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46471292 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46471292 The difference between such Garmin watches and Pebble Round 2 seems to be trading off hardware like built-in GPS and NFC for open source software and thinness. 100% worthwhile trade IMO.
- gbil 9mo ago
  No HRM on the pebble which makes it a totally separate use case and can't be compared at all with the Garmin ones.
  - faitswulff 9mo ago
    The Pebble Time 2 has a heart rate monitor
    - gbil 9mo ago
      Isn’t this thread about the pebble round 2 which is the closest from form factor to a garmin ? Moreover, GPS is lacking on any pebble anyhow which is also a major use case and again therefore, garmin’s and pebble’s can’t be compared, 2 different use cases for me.
      - lawn 9mo ago
        The round 2 is round similar to a Garmin but the Garmin watches are significantly thicker,.more similar to the time 2.
        apparent 9mo ago
        Even the PT2 is significantly thinner than Garmins, roughly 2mm. That's about 15% thinner, which is a big deal in my book. Not as thin as AWs though, but not off by too much. Based on photos, it looks like the PR2 will be 2mm thinner than the PR2, which would make it thinner than AWs.
XenophileJKO 9mo ago
I've looked at Garmin, because I have the fitbit sense 2 and was looking for something with a reasonable battery life. However, I think Garmin has made the flaw of overcomplicating their product offerings. I ended up pre-ordering a pebble because I implicitly don't like a company that tries to segment their market that hard on smart watches.
have_faith 9mo ago
I tried a Garmin for a while but the UI bugs/inconsistencies/onboarding process put me off a lot so I eventually got rid of it. Using an old Apple watch SE at the moment and apart from the minor inconvenience of charging it overnight (no need for sleep tracking) it does everything better.
- chrneu 9mo ago
  not defending garmin, but they completely redid the onboarding process last year. watch data and everything transfers right over to new devices now. I took me like 10 minutes to setup my new fenix a few months ago.
odiroot 9mo ago
Can you get turn-by-turn navigation with Google Maps on these watches?
Groxx 9mo ago
Every Garmin I've tried has been a complete mess, laggy, and deeply unstable in its connection and what notifications it supported (if any), whether it was cheap or expensive. I'd love an alternative, but from the models I've tried I don't think Garmin is anywhere near what I liked about Pebbles. Closer than some brands, but not anywhere near what I'd consider "close". Bangle.js is closer, for all its (many) flaws.
- jsbisviewtiful 9mo ago
  I switched over to Coros devices and have been fairly impressed with the performance over the last 5 months. Excellent battery life on the APEX series.

1bpp 9mo ago

Seconding the Garmin watches, been using a Forerunner for years and the battery still lasts over a week with an always-on display. Does about as much as a Pebble and even has a documented SDK with sideloading. The refresh rate is very low but totally fine for a watch, I think newer models have much better displays. The only thing I wish were better is exporting all the tracked health data in a format I can use myself. Using the official tool for that I couldn't even get heart rate data.

mkesper 9mo ago
Maybe the (partial) support of Gadgetbridge is sufficient: https://gadgetbridge.org/gadgets/wearables/garmin-watches/ https://gadgetbridge.org/gadgets/wearables/garmin-watches/

apparent 9mo ago

I find the Garmin UI to be awful, and the Pebble UI to be a breeze. Also, Garmins are pretty bulky compared to Pebbles, and many of them don't have buttons that can be used to control music, for those of us who find touchscreen interfaces to be lacking.

majesticmerc 9mo ago
Granted, the UI for Garmins is pretty clunky compared to the Pebble interface :(
tw04 9mo ago
Huh? Are you sure you aren’t thinking of another brand? Literally every garmin watch I can find on their site has buttons. The size is also very much watch specific. They will all be thicker than a pebble, but they’ll also all have far more features. Like pulse ox, which is one of the main drivers of thickness.
- apparent 9mo ago
  When I was looking a couple years ago, most Garmins had at least 2 buttons, but only those with 5 supported music control via buttons. I think I have used the pulse oximeter maybe 1x/year, and that's counting during COVID shutdowns, when people talked about pulse ox more than in normal times. I will keep my Garmin and will use it when exercising. But I would never buy another one as long as I can get Pebbles instead.
- ramses0 9mo ago
  Nope, some are touch screen only or with only 1-2 buttons. The Garmin's with 5 buttons (eg: Forerunner 55 at ~$170) are decent once you get used to the button-mechanisms, but pebble's UX for "productivity notifications" has always been top-tier.
  - tw04 9mo ago
    > Nope, some are touch screen only Which ones are touch screen only?

jsheard 9mo ago

> They use MIP displays so the battery life runs about 2 weeks Double-check this because they have a lot of OLED models now alongside their MIP ones. Battery life is more or less the same either way with AOD off, but with AOD enabled the OLEDs fall behind the MIPs.

AshamedCaptain 9mo ago
Yes, and they are outright removing the LCD displays from some of their major lines, (e.g. Fenix 8 Pro). The writing is on the wall.
- deleted 9mo ago
  [deleted]
Groxx 9mo ago
OLED is also a heck of a lot less readable in sunlight. They're constantly improving, but the brightness they need to pump out to actually compete is extreme and they're still nowhere near that.

stevage 9mo ago

As a reluctant runner, I still don't see any value in a smartwatch. I just use my phone and it does everything I want, which is basically, play podcasts and record my run for Strava. I did previously have a smartwatch which did heart rate monitoring, but really, once I'd confirmed that when I exercised harder my heart rate went up, I lost interest in it.

gofreddygo 9mo ago
I dont see the point of smart watches either. I wear a casio / gshock with the backlight button that sticks right up on the front of the watch. i am on my second watch now cz my sister gifted it to me. the first is ticking away happy with 0 charging , battery changes to date. 0 reasons to change. my sister otoh has an apple watch that she never charges, lies in a drawer which i hear about when she's trying to find her phone. conversation ends with "eh i should charge it maybe" if i ever buy a smart watch, will likely be the pebble

mrinterweb 9mo ago

I had two pebble watches, and I used them daily for years. I rarely use my pixel watch 3, mainly because of charging. I only have one proprietary charger for the watch and sometime it is on my desk, sometimes near my bed, sometimes somewhere I can't find. I don't need my watch, but I do need my phone, so I charge the phone, and forget that my watch exists for a few months at a time. I think the biggest hurdle for me and watches is daily charging. I will not buy another smartwatch unless the battery is at least a week. Pebble round 2 having two week battery is great!

ValentineC 9mo ago

> For the sake of fair comparison, my wife had an Apple watch, which looked better and had way more features, but the 1 day battery life became such a frustration it sat in a dresser drawer. To each their own, but it sounds like your wife just couldn't get into the "happy path" routine of an Apple Watch user. I've been using an Apple Watch since Series 5 introduced the always-on display. I wear it for roughly 23 hours a day, and charge it whenever I'm in the bathroom. I'm fine with this routine 99% of the time, but I'm also not someone who'd camp or stay outdoors for more than a night. Before that, I was using a Amazfit Bip and was really proud of its 30+ day battery life. I very much prefer the features the Apple Watch has.

ewoodrich 9mo ago
That happy path works okay for a while but provides very little margin for when the battery inevitably starts to degrade. I’m a few years in and now every few days it’s started to die at around 8pm (yet claims the battery health is still just barely outside replacement range which is … quite convenient for Apple).
chrneu 9mo ago
as someone who only recharges their garmin watch maybe once a month(with dozens of hours of activity tracking), lol at daily recharging of a watch. that completely eliminates it as a possible product for me. even after a few years with battery degradation I rarely recharge my watch more than once every 2-3 weeks. it's kind of wild to me that folks would daily recharge a watch.

ListenLinda 9mo ago

The problem I have with Garmin is lack of support for older devices. They practically bricked my old bike computer. Unfortunately it's been awhile and I can't recall the details of the issue. I have since switched to Wahoo but have only had it for about 3-4 years now.

Larrikin 9mo ago

I've waited for years to get a Garmin, ever since Google started removing features from FitBit. The specs are great for many of the models. But they were all ass ugly, too big, or both. I ended up buying a Pebble because Garmin just never made anything I actually wanted to put on my wrist.

jolmg 9mo ago

> check out some of the cheaper Garmin smart watches. They use MIP displays so the battery life runs about 2 weeks Same deal with the watch of the article. It uses the same display: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46471292 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46471292 The difference between such Garmin watches and Pebble Round 2 seems to be trading off hardware like built-in GPS and NFC for open source software and thinness. 100% worthwhile trade IMO.

gbil 9mo ago
No HRM on the pebble which makes it a totally separate use case and can't be compared at all with the Garmin ones.
- faitswulff 9mo ago
  The Pebble Time 2 has a heart rate monitor
  - gbil 9mo ago
    Isn’t this thread about the pebble round 2 which is the closest from form factor to a garmin ? Moreover, GPS is lacking on any pebble anyhow which is also a major use case and again therefore, garmin’s and pebble’s can’t be compared, 2 different use cases for me.
    - lawn 9mo ago
      The round 2 is round similar to a Garmin but the Garmin watches are significantly thicker,.more similar to the time 2.
      - apparent 9mo ago
        Even the PT2 is significantly thinner than Garmins, roughly 2mm. That's about 15% thinner, which is a big deal in my book. Not as thin as AWs though, but not off by too much. Based on photos, it looks like the PR2 will be 2mm thinner than the PR2, which would make it thinner than AWs.

XenophileJKO 9mo ago

I've looked at Garmin, because I have the fitbit sense 2 and was looking for something with a reasonable battery life. However, I think Garmin has made the flaw of overcomplicating their product offerings. I ended up pre-ordering a pebble because I implicitly don't like a company that tries to segment their market that hard on smart watches.

have_faith 9mo ago

I tried a Garmin for a while but the UI bugs/inconsistencies/onboarding process put me off a lot so I eventually got rid of it. Using an old Apple watch SE at the moment and apart from the minor inconvenience of charging it overnight (no need for sleep tracking) it does everything better.

chrneu 9mo ago
not defending garmin, but they completely redid the onboarding process last year. watch data and everything transfers right over to new devices now. I took me like 10 minutes to setup my new fenix a few months ago.

odiroot 9mo ago

Can you get turn-by-turn navigation with Google Maps on these watches?

Groxx 9mo ago

Every Garmin I've tried has been a complete mess, laggy, and deeply unstable in its connection and what notifications it supported (if any), whether it was cheap or expensive. I'd love an alternative, but from the models I've tried I don't think Garmin is anywhere near what I liked about Pebbles. Closer than some brands, but not anywhere near what I'd consider "close". Bangle.js is closer, for all its (many) flaws.

jsbisviewtiful 9mo ago
I switched over to Coros devices and have been fairly impressed with the performance over the last 5 months. Excellent battery life on the APEX series.