4d ago

I am looking for a new sports watch/replacement for my Garmin fenix 6 Pro

My Garmin fenix 6 Pro, which is about 3.5 years old, seems to be dying. It got hot during the last charge and hasn't charged at all since then. I replaced the battery, then the cable and the power adapter, but nothing happened. To be honest, I'm very disappointed about this, but otherwise I was very happy with the watch.

I am now looking for a replacement from Europe, although it doesn't have to be a 1:1 replacement for the fenix.

What is important to me...

It should be robust
Accurate measurements for indoor sports (heart rate, oxygen saturation, etc.)
Accurate sleep analysis
I don't want to have to charge the battery every day or even every three days; it should last a little longer.
Water drinking tracker
A pedometer that is as accurate as possible

GPS and map functions would be important to me if they are responsive and intuitive and easy to use. Unfortunately, I didn't find this to be the case with my Garmin fenix 6 Pro.

I have looked at watches from Suunto (Switzerland) and Polar (Finland). If there are other good European manufacturers, I am open to suggestions. I would be very grateful for specific model recommendations.

10 comments

Sorry about your 6 Pro. It's a great watch.
Polar is the only European one focused on sports. Suunto is Chinese-owned. Maybe you were thinking of Garmin which has some legal structures in Switzerland.
Withings is probably not what you're looking for but it's French.
Decathlon (French) also has a sportswatch line but it's developed by/with Coros (Chinese/USA). Not optimal but I thought I'd mention it because there aren't that many alternatives.
Have you looked at reviews by "the quantified scientist" on Youtube?
- Oh, that's good to know about Suunto. Withings looks interesting, I'll take a closer look at that. And I wasn't familiar with the "quantified scientist" either, but he seems to make very interesting videos on the subject. Thanks! :)
  
  Withings has barely better than a guess heart rate correlation during activity sadly, so not great for sports. But they look nice!
  What you can also do (that many people do) is get whatever fitness watch that has the features that you want, then get the Polar H10 chest strap for working out, which is the gold standard for heart rate measurement and much more accurate than PPG measurement.
I've had a Polar Pace Pro for 2 years now, pretty happy with it in general though it does have a few minor flaws. In relation to what you're after:
It's fairly robust, I've managed to scratch the screen a little recently, but I have whacked it a fair few times.
Heart rate is pretty accurate, though sometimes it doesn't detect properly during a workout and shows 80odd when I know that's not true. Needs a twist or tightening then shows correctly, but can be annoying.
Sleep analysis is good. It's helped me realise how much even 1 drink hinders sleep. HRV, heart rate, breathing rate etc.
I charge about once a week with 3/4 workouts.
No drinking tracker that I'm aware of, but you could set alarms up.
Pedometer seems good, though doesn't cancel during a workout, so after a cycle it tells me I've done 20k steps.
I had a Garmin before too and I'm happy with the switch.
- If you have a lot of hair on your wrist, it can mess with the heart rate sensor. Try to shave it down a bit to improve accuracy.
- Thank you very much.
  I sometimes had the same problem with my heart rate on my Fenix 6, although not often. I replaced the silicone strap with a nylon one. When I was sweating heavily – which I can do quickly and very well – and the strap wasn't tight enough, the heart rate measurement was also inaccurate.
Suunto is actually Finnish. Now it's been bought by some Chinese holding.
Last time I checked I had not found any proof that this has really caused anything to move over to china (that wasn't already there anyway) but it may worth a second check.
For some people the property is enough to immediately disqualify the company.
Polar seems to even offer to repair or replace the battery on some models. I suspect that won't be cheap, but it shows they may not conceive their devices as disposable trash. Maybe.
- The battery repair service is very interesting, which speaks well for Polar, in my opinion. Thanks for the tip!

10 comments