Can anyone else confirm that when navigating to a waypoint, the compass bearing to that waypoint is incorrect when the north reference is set to magnetic north on the Inreach mini 2 and the Garmin explore app.

I can't actually tell. My location is on the agonic line.

Are sure that the navigation itself is wrong? It would not be entirely unexpected if the device adjusted the displayed bearing to account for declination - while still "pointing" in the correct direction...

I would need help from someone that's east or west of the agonic line to confirm my finding. Someone in Maine or Washington state with 20 degrees of declination may notice it more easily.

I've based this observation only on the navigation info shown on the Garmin mini 2's compass. I have no idea if this applies when navigating courses or using tracback or using the other navigation pages.

I've verified using my Brunton compass that when I switch the mini 2's north reference from true to magnetic that north moves 9 degrees on the mini 2's compass. So it follows that if north has moved 9 degrees then the direction to the waypoint must move 9 degrees also. When you are navigating to a waypoint, the mini 2 shows two numbers on the compass. The top number is the direction your mini's antenna is pointing to in degrees. The bottom number  is how many degrees off you are from your bearing to the waypoint. When it gets to 0, you are pointing at the waypoint. This bottom number is the one that is wrong when the bearing setting is set to magnetic. I've confirmed this using my Garmin Etrex Venture HC GPS. When I navigate to the same waypoint on the Etrex and change from true north to magnetic in the Etrex settings, the bearing to the waypoint changes 9 degrees from 197 to 206. When I make the change on the mini 2, it stays at 197. The Garmin Explore app map page on my phone also shows a bearing to the waypoint in degrees at the page bottom. There is a map settings page in the app to change from true to magnetic north (M or T following the compass degrees). This field stays at 197M (magnetic north) or 197T (true north) when the north reference is changed.  I'm going to try doing a "device reset" on the mini 2 to see if that fixes the issue. 

I’m in Vancouver BC Canada. Declination 15.7 degrees east or 15’40” east. I have the same issue. It seems to be the explore app. The bearing to a waypoint is the same for true or magnetic declination. Using a Nexus compass I  can confirm my mini 2 displays the same  bearing as my compass when they are placed near each other. The bottom number will read 0 degrees when pointing to the waypoint. But it gets the same bearing from the explore app regardless of the true or magnetic setting. So one of the bearings is wrong. Have you determined which one is wrong? I’ve noticed changing from true to magnetic on the mini2 makes no difference in the displayed bearing to the waypoint on my mini, but on my 67i I will get the correct bearings displayed for true and magnetic settings even though the explore app is doesn’t change. I am going to look for a paper map to see which bearing on the explore app is the correct one to a given waypoint. I’ll let you know my findings. 

Can you confirm this. On the explore app, with your mini turned off, if I pan the map and then select a waypoint, then check the bearing to it I can see a different bearing when I select magnetic or true. The difference is my current declination. But as soon as I turn my mini on and it connects to the explore app, and try to navigate to the waypoint, it gives the true bearing whether I select true or magnetic. It displays T after the bearing or M after it, but the number is still the true number. eg: 290T or 290M , but the value is the true bearing. Obviously an issue.

Very observant. I can confirm that I get the same results as you. The explore app is working correctly as regards to the navigation bearing to a saved waypoint when switching from true to magnetic in the app's settings as long as its not connected to the inreach mini 2. The true and magnetic bearings differ by the declination in my area. It agrees with the navigation results I get from my Garmin Etrex Venture HC handheld GPS. And like you, when I connect the app to the mini navigating to the same waypoint, the true and magnetic bearings to the waypoint are now the same. I contacted Garmin support a week ago and they said they haven't heard about this issue before. They suggested that I do a device reset and see if that fixes it. I tried it and the results are the same. Maybe I will follow up with them again. 

It seems to me the the inreach mini 2 works correctly as long as you leave the north reference set to true north. The problem is when the bearing setting is changed to magnetic the mini 2 doesn't adjust navigation to reflect the magnet declination. And the app just mirrors the problem.

After further testing I can confirm that both my 67i and mini 2  both work the same with regard to this issue. If you are in the explore app and choose a true bearing to a waypoint, and choose to navigate to it, as soon as you press “GO” in the app everything will work fine with your unit turned on. But if you choose a magnetic bearing, now the app will show the correct magnetic declination, but as soon as you press “GO” to navigate, that numeric value will revert to the true value with an M after it. It doesn’t matter if your device is set to true or magnetic. Another thing it’s not the device, you can choose true or magnetic and the device will still point in the correct direction and show the correct bearing in T or M. I’ve checked both devices against my Suunto compass and they are working correctly. Seems like an explore app bug to me.

I still think there is a device issue on the mini 2 with the compass page. As I mentioned in a previous post, when you are navigating to a waypoint, the mini 2 shows two numbers on the compass. The top number is the direction your mini's antenna is pointing to in degrees (heading). The bottom number is how many degrees off you are from your bearing to the waypoint. When the bottom number gets to 0, you should be pointing at the waypoint. I get the same results no matter if I set the north reference to true or magnetic north. I added a screen shot of my waypoint navigation below. When set to magnetic north this screen should be showing 206 when the bottom number is 000 but instead it showed the same bearing to the waypoint as when the mini was set to true north, 197.

I looked at the other navigation pages on the mini 2 and they seem to be working correctly as you noted. Also I took a look at the navigation widget while still navigating to the same waypoint as I did with the above screenshot with the north reference still set to magnetic on the mini 2. The navigation widget shows the distance to the waypoint and also shows degrees similar to the compass in that when they get to zero you are pointed directly at the waypoint. Here's a screenshot of the widget with the mini pointed at the waypoint.

So while the widget was still saying 0 degrees, I carefully, with the mini 2 sitting on a table, trying not to move it, switched back to the compass and what do you know, the compass is showing the correct bearing to the waypoint, 206, but the lower display degrees and pointer say I am 9 degrees off which is exactly my magnetic declination. Screenshot below. 

So again, to me, all of this appears to confirm that there is a problem with the compass not adjusting for the magnetic declination when set to magnetic north and I feel somehow this is bleeding over when connected to the app.

I talked to someone at Garmin Tech support again and they were able to recreate the app issue that we experienced and they said they were going to look into this. In the meantime, I'm going to leave my mini 2's north reference set to true north since everything seems to work correctly when set there and we'll see if they find a fix for this problem in a future software update.

Yes I can confirm I get the same results, now that I see the photos I can see I must have not clearly understood  your previous post. Thanks for reporting it to Garmin. It seems to be both the app and the mini 2. The compass on my  mini seems to work fine without being fed navigational info from the app. Without being fed information from the app my compass points to true north and shows 000 in the bottom number or points  to magnet north and shows 000 in the bottom number. When I use my 67i, it works fine, but the app still has the same issue.

Hi.   I literally found this thread because of searching for this issue!!! I can confirm that I am having strange issues with my Inreach 2 Mini as well.  I set up for astronomy knowing where true north is for alignment purposes.  I am in SoCal at approx 12E deviation where I am.  I know one thing......when I set my InReach to TRU and walk true north, it does not match up.  It also seemed like it was showing  MAG bearing when I did. It was very bizarre. My friend and I are both Rocket Scientists.  He was confused as to what was happening.  If someone asked me to walk a heading with no visual reference I would not trust my device. I was shocked to see this issue in this post because I thought, "NAH, it is the basic function of this device to know TRU or MAG heading"..I thoughts I was nuts.  But, there IS AN ISSUE with an ESSENTIAL  function of the INREACH 2 Mini that Garmin needs to take a serious look at.