The Smartwatch for Super Athletes

Garmin Fenix 8 Review: Design

Let’s start with the hardware. There are a few different models of the Fenix 8, but all share some basic features. There are three physical buttons on the left and two on the right, and the buttons are now fully sealed and leak-proof, further supporting its newly added dive capabilities. A touchscreen is upfront, so there are multiple ways to navigate through screens, menus, and maps (which is good because touchscreens don’t work well when wet or underwater). On the right side of the watch, there is now a speaker and a microphone, which add to its smart capabilities. Up top is an LED flashlight, and underneath is Garmin’s sensor suite, featuring a heart rate monitor, pulse oximeter, thermometer, etc. It can also take ECG readings (a feature currently only available in the U.S.).

Quickly, it might seem like a small thing, but I have to shout out how wonderful the flashlight feature is. The white LED has three intensity levels, and at its brightest, it’s enough to find your way on a trail in pitch darkness. It also has a red-light mode, which doesn’t blast your eyeballs, which I found really helpful when trying to fumble my way to the bathroom in the unfamiliar hotel room I was in last week.

There are some differences between models; the most significant is you get to choose between a bright, colorful, and sharp AMOLED display and a reflective MIPS display that not only increases battery life but also has an integrated solar panel to boost it even further. There are 43mm, 47mm, and 51mm versions of the AMOLED watch, with the two larger ones utilizing sapphire crystal glass and titanium bezels (the smaller version has Gorilla Glass and stainless steel). The Solar version only comes in the 47mm and 51mm sizes and features Solar Sapphire glass and titanium. Aside from that, the watches are effectively identical, though the larger versions last longer per charge (more on that in a second).

Garmin Fenix 8 Review: Features and Battery Life

Let’s have a quick In Memorium for the Epix line and, to some extent, the Descent. The Epix, which debuted a few years ago, was identical to the Fenix but with an AMOLED screen, so merging these two makes sense. RIP Epix. Pulling features from the Descent line—most significantly, adding a depth gauge—is massive for casual divers. The Fenix 8 has just about all the features a recreation diver needs from a dive computer, including dive planning, auto-start (when you dive past four feet), air and nitrox modes, GPS for entry/exit, descent/ascent alerts, safety stop warnings, no decompression limit (NDL), a compass, dive time, depth, a compass, and more. It has modes for SCUBA, apnea (i.e., freediving), and snorkeling. If you really dive a ton and want advanced features like integrated wireless tank monitoring, then the Descent is probably the watch you want; for most folks, the more svelte Fenix 8 will integrate better into your daily life.

Speaking of integrating it, I have barely taken this watch off for the month I’ve been testing it. I opted for the 47mm AMOLED version, which is the Goldilocks of size and functionality to me. While it doesn’t last as long as the solar version, it gets a whopping 15 days per charge. If you’re coming from an Apple or Android Wear smartwatch (which averages about 36 hours per charge), that’s huge, especially considering it only takes an hour to recharge, and you’re back at it. Of course, using more GPS-intensive activities will drain it a bit faster, but it’s still stellar. I just did four full days of snowboarding (with it using GPS to track every run), plus pulse oximetry tracking at night, and by the end of it, I still had two days of battery life left. Of course, if I’d gone with the 47mm Solar version, it would start with 21 days of battery (up to 28 with a hefty dose of sunlight), or the 51mm Solar version for an insane 30 days (up to 48 with sunlight), but two-plus weeks is plenty for me. I’d rather have the lower-profile watch and the super crisp AMOLED display for reading data and notifications.

Garmin Fenix 8 Review: Performance

For activity tracking, it’s absolutely superb. I used it for tracking runs, hikes, cardio, strength training, swimming, surfing, snowboarding, a pilates class, and freediving. Not only does it provide a ton of data during workouts, but Garmin’s data fields are more customizable than any other sports watches out there, so you can really get it to display exactly what you want if it isn’t already in there by default (which it probably is, because most sport modes seem well thought out). While freediving, I could read exactly how deep I was, how long I’d been underwater, and how long it recommended that I stay at the surface to allow my blood to reoxygenate between dives. For hiking, it comes pre-installed with colorful topographic maps that are easy to navigate using the buttons and touchscreen, and I could use features like TrackBack to guide me back to my car. The running mode uses the altimeter to understand when you’re going uphill, so it doesn’t scold you for being slower than usual. Surfing not only counts and measures my waves ridden (though it doesn’t display this in real-time, unfortunately), but it integrates with Surfline to make it easy to download videos of my rides from breaks where they have webcams set up. This watch covers virtually any sport or activity.

Across all these modes, GPS acquisition was fast and accurate, and the built-in heart rate monitor was near lock-step with the chest strap I was testing it against. It also lets you download music from sources like Spotify, Amazon, and YouTube Music and play it through paired Bluetooth earbuds. Garmin Pay will enable you to store a credit card on the watch for tap payments so you can leave your phone at home. It also features weather forecasts, sunrise/sunset times, moon phases, barometric pressure, and tides. You can download GPX files from sites like AllTrails and install them on the watch to follow routes. It keeps track of your vitals 24/7, from heart rate, heart rate variability (HRV), skin temp, pulse oximetry, steps, flights climbed, sleep, and more. You can also manually check your ECG for atrial fibrillation (AFib) signs. However, that’s currently only available in the U.S. It’s hard to envision a more complete sports watch.

On the smartwatch side, I would say it’s as good as it gets… for a sports watch. But if you’re hoping for the same deep integration you get with an Apple Watch + iPhone or a Pixel Watch + Android phone, you’ll be frustrated, even more so if you’re on the Apple side. The watch does a nice job of displaying incoming notifications for iPhones and Androids, and the text is very easy to read on the AMOLED display (I’ve read full emails on this watch). It’s also easy to pick and choose which apps can/can’t display notifications on your watch, so you don’t get distracted by unimportant things.

The Fenix 8 now features a sort of very simple offline voice assistant. Long-pressing the upper-right button activates the microphone, and you can give it some very basic commands. Things like “Start a run,” “Start pool swim,” “Set alarm for 7:30 am,” “Show me the weather,” and “Set a timer for 15 minutes” usually work without a hitch, and that can be preferable to scrolling through long menus. That said, anything more advanced than that is met with silence. For example, “Change my alarm time to 8 am” does not compute like on an Apple Watch or Pixel Watch. You can press a button in the quick menu to talk to your phone’s digital assistant (e.g., Siri or Assistant), but if you’re asking it a question, you’ll get the answer on your phone’s display and/or speaker, not the speaker or display on your watch, which seems like a huge miss. I don’t know if that’s an API issue, but fixing it would make this watch a whole lot smarter.

Responding to messages is also a bit vexing. Apple doesn’t allow Garmin to access the APIs needed for sending messages, so if you’ve got an iPhone, you can’t reply to incoming messages unless you convince your friends to start a Garmin Messenger account, which will be a hard sell. Android is better in this department, as you can respond to texts and emails with some preset, short, quick replies (which you can customize in the app), and this is certainly better than nothing. Still, this watch has a microphone and is capable of speech recognition, so not being able to speak a reply feels like a missed opportunity.

The built-in mic and speaker let you answer and take phone calls on the watch (provided your phone is nearby), but the sound quality isn’t great, so you wouldn’t want to have a long call on it. That said, when I was in the shower and happened to get an important call, I was really glad to have this feature. This highlights another omission: There’s no option for cellular radio, so you can’t add it to your carrier plan and go truly phone-free. That’s pretty surprising for a watch of this caliber and with this level of sophistication, and it’s something I’d like to see, particularly as the smart features start to evolve.

Garmin Fenix 8 Review: Verdict

Of course, there’s the price. These watches are $1,000 for the 43mm version, $1,100 for the 47mm version, and $1,200 for the 51mm version, which means they are absolutely premium sports watches. The Fenix 8 is the most expensive model in the Fenix line. That said, it’s much cheaper than the Descent, so if diving is a big deal to you, this gets you most of those features at a significant discount.

Ultimately, despite my complaints on the smartwatch side of things, this is my favorite watch I’ve ever tested. To put that in context, the last watch I tested was a Pixel 3 with LTE, which was very smart and connected indeed, but once I started using the Fenix 8, I really didn’t have any urge to reach for the Pixel again. It’s so good at tracking so many things; I find it to have the most intuitive interface and user experience of any sports watch, with the most features and the highest level of customization. I can wear it for two weeks straight, and it looks good whether I wear running shorts or a suit. Once its smarts get smarter, it will be miles ahead of the competition (which it can track in great detail).