The Connect IQ Store is getting worse by the day by a few developers who dump a shitload of *** watch faces

What do you mean on software side? All the devices relevant to this forum have software on it. It's buggy, many are fed up with it. That software - the firmware - is part of the package you pay for. In theory it could be argued whether new features are adding to the value (i.e people know/expect new features will be added after their purchase or they'll buy their next device at Garmin because of this) but at least they should fix bugs.

If you mean the $ from the store purchases, than that was 0 in 2024, but it looks like they work hard on earning more on that. Frankly from Garmin's point if view they'd be happier with only VIP devs would stay (some done by Garmin) like YouTube, Spotify, komoot, and I guess the new crap watchfaces like Disney, Porsche, Marvel, etc... and maybe some of the indi developers that have a few apps used by many users (and if they are paid apps using Garmin Pay, then better).

The rest (I guess 95+%) of devs are a pain in the ... for most involved:

- Garmin (get complaints from the devs, from the users of the dev's apps)

- other devs (why are their apps higher than mine...)

- most users (I can't find any quality app in the store...)

except the handful of users who use these apps.

I'll also add, that to me it looks like most of the quality/spam/junk complaints are about watch faces, not other types.

I meant that Garmin is a hardware company. They make money by selling hardware. I’m not including the in-house software they develop for their hardware. I’m just talking about the revenue they get from 3rd party devs in the IQ store. It’s probably a tiny tiny portion of their overall revenue. Which is why I said they don’t care and won’t do anything. 

flocsy🤠 said:

But once some competitors will have their own version then maybe things will change.

Which competitors? The ones that still make “traditional” sports watches, like Suunto, which used to have a limited version of apps (more like excel formulas), but they scuttled the whole app platform? Polar? COROS?

All of those competitors are a drop in the bucket compared to Garmin afaik. Every time someone asks DCR if those guys will ever support Spotify, the answer is always “it’s too late for them, and they’re too small anyway”. Garmin was the only old school sports watch maker which was big enough to make a deal with Spotify years ago, and apparently even they wouldn’t be able to make that deal today.

How about the “competitors” in the other direction: Apple Watch and Wear OS. Obviously those are real smartwatches with real apps that Connect IQ will never be able to touch. Those platforms are built around 3rd party apps, whereas 3rd party apps are an afterthought for Garmin.

Everyone knows that if you contact Garmin support and complain about battery life issues or crashes, the first thing they tell you to do is to delete all CIQ apps.

Imagine if you contacted Apple about problems with your Apple Watch and they told you to delete all apps?

btw the garmin subreddit has 230k members. The subreddits for suunto, coros and polar have 9k-13k members. r/applewatch has 900k members. Tbf r/wearos only has 100k members. That should give you a rough idea where all of those brands stand in terms of general public interest (I’m too lazy to look up actual market shares)

flocsy🤠 said:

If they would close Connect IQ now, than although there would be some shouting, users won't go away (well maybe some, that use iPhone)

Not sure what you’re trying to imply here, but I doubt there’s a positive correlation between using iPhone and using Connect IQ. I would guess the opposite: ppl who use both iPhone and Garmin are probably even less likely than Android+Garmin users to use even one Connect IQ app (other than Spotify or anything that’s preinstalled on the device).

Anecdotally, I don’t know a single runner irl who knows or cares about CIQ. And I don’t know anyone other than “serious” runners, cyclists or triathletes who knows or cares about Garmin. Most of my casual runner friends and acquaintances switched to Apple Watch long ago. I don’t blame em, as it’s a far superior general purpose smartwatch. (I already outlined a couple of reasons above for why I personally stick with Garmin.) 

Also, I don’t think Garmin could get rid of Connect IQ altogether, since Spotify is a CIQ app that “normal ppl” use. But maybe they could close the existing store and just have their own tightly curated collection of apps (Strava relative effort, Spotify, Youtube Music, maybe a handful of watchfaces.)

BTW, the UX for Spotify is absolutely terrible, and I put the blame on both Garmin and Spotify here. The process of selecting music to sync is a tedious nightmare (you can only select and sync one playlist at a time, and it takes forever to both select a playlist and to sync a playlist), and basic functionality is missing such as selecting an individual song to play (you can only select a playlist to play and manually skip tracks within that list).

Spotify is the one CIQ app that will be used by a large number of regular Garmin users, and there’s apparently no desire to make it user friendly or fully functional. They expect ppl to just put up with its limitations because that’s what ppl do — bc they don’t know better or expect more.

It’s just another example of how everything related to software / UX with Garmin is a disappointment, including the device firmware, 3rd party CIQ apps (including collabs with gigantic corps) from the user’s POV, the CIQ ecosystem from the dev’s POV, and these forums.

I think we're saying the same: if suddenly there wasn't a Garmin appstore then most users wouldn't change to another watch because of that, only a few of the Android users (to wear os) and probably some bigger percentage of iPhone users (to apple watch)

flocsy🤠 said:

I think we're saying the same:

flocsy🤠 said:

if suddenly there wasn't a Garmin appstore then most users wouldn't change to another watch because of that

I agree.

flocsy🤠 said:

only a few of the Android users (to wear os) and probably some bigger percentage of iPhone users (to apple watch)

I disagree.

To restate what I said above, I don't think iPhone users are more likely than Android users to stick with Garmin solely because of Connect IQ (again, not counting apps like Spotify). If anything, I think the opposite would be true.

I don't know why you think so, other than the fact that you are an Android user [right?] and you think that iPhone users have different app usage habits? I mean, the stuff that's in the CIQ store barely qualifies as "apps" when you compare them to anything on iPhone, Android, Apple Watch or Wear OS.

Any iPhone user who truly cares about apps on their wrist already owns an Apple Watch. I know a guy who wears both an apple watch and a Fenix (mostly because AW allows him to make calls and send texts without his phone tho). Then again, ppl don't buy Apple Watch because of "apps", they buy it (primarily) because it's cool, because it works well with their iPhone (since Apple purposely locks the competition out of certain features and bc Apple users are used to being locked into Apple's walled garden), and because it has a decent UX (better than Garmin for sure). (Ofc one of the ways Apple gives you a better UX is by locking you into their walled garden.)

Either way, the proportion of Garmin users who stick with Garmin only bc of Connect IQ compared to Garmin users as a whole has got to be infinitesimal (I'd guess less than 0.01%.)

Speaking of whether normal users care (or know) about Connect IQ: why do you think people regularly post generic Garmin topics in Connect IQ > Discussion or Connect IQ > Bug Reports by accident? Obviously the term "Connect IQ" has no meaning to them and is easily confused with "Connect".

flocsy🤠 said:

only a few of the Android users (to wear os) and probably some bigger percentage of iPhone users (to apple watch)

I guess what you're trying to say is that, relatively speaking, Apple Watch is a more attractive alternative to Garmin than Wear OS. Or perhaps you are referring to devs who only own and use a Garmin so they can develop Connect IQ apps? I don't really count those as regular users, and I doubt their numbers would be significant.

I still think the number of regular users (not devs) who would switch away from Garmin solely because of the loss of Connect IQ is so negligible that this kind of comparison isn't really useful. If someone would switch away if Connect IQ was cancelled (*), that would imply they're only using Garmin because of CIQ, which is really hard to imagine.

(* Again, in this scenario, apps like Spotify would still exist.)

just reacting to part of your post, and I'm not saying it's the majority of Garmin users, but...

FlowState said:

that would imply they're only using Garmin because of CIQ, which is really hard to imagine

I have several users that have asked me whether my watch face is compatible with the watch they were planning to buy. If it wasn't compatible they may not have gone ahead with the purchase of the new Garmin watch. (I've had similar requests for some of my data fields, but the number of those requests is much lower.)

Same for me.  I've had users thinking about getting a new watch ask if one of my apps is compatible or could be made to be compatible.  Not real often, but for different app types and not just watch faces..