GPS accuracy very bad !!

I own an ambit2 and I lost it :-(

After some research with the new Suunto models, and the Fenix 5, I was about to buy the Fenix 5x plus, which is now 825€ in Amazon. I was impressed by the watch honestly.

After reading this post, and several others in this forum, reddit and other places, I was even more impressed, but not in the good way. How is possible that a watch designed for sports, and with the impressive capabilities of the fenix 5x plus, fails in the basic? For me this is a no-go situation. I can't spent so much money and expect worse results in one of the most valuable metrics when training or hiking. I use the ambit2 a lot in the mountains, and you never know when the accuracy makes the difference between a nice day or a miserable one. I expect always the best accuracy possible.

I hope this is fixed in the next models, but I have decided to buy an used ambit2, because I'm happy with the things that just work.

I wish I had read something from Garmin in this regard, but I couldn't find anything, which doesn't give me much confidence.

Thank you all for this information!

hello everyone. i m a proud owner of a Garmin Fenix 5x plus and i ve also noticed that when i count my steps like 1,2,3 (for testing reasons) my Garmin in the beginning seems to be ok. But after that i notice a huge gap between the real ones and the ones that have been counted in my Garmin. I ve done the measurements and i ve filled in the pace size (i cant remember how its is been mentioned in my watch). Is it cause i ve used the GPS only setting?

I'm copying what I posted on another thread about the distance pb :

I have a question guys. Most of you must sync your activities with Strava. Did you try to fix the distance with the option there, and see if it looks better ? If you export your Fenix GPX file and import it anywhere, it will show a longer distance. Sometimes the difference is very small (mostly for clean tracks, no buildings or trees), sometimes it's significant. Even on Garmin Connect, reimport your GPX, and you will see a longer distance. So the pure GPS distance is always longer than what the watch is showing.

I suspect that Garmin is maybe doing what Suunto is doing, they are mixing the GPS data with the accelerometer data (the Fenix has one, right ?), and smoothing the GPS results. The GPS is not perfect, when there are obstacles, it's waving too much left and right. The accelerometer data must be different, and Garmin could be using that to say "ok, the GPS reception isn't that great right now, let's calculate the distance a bit differently". That's why the watch is showing X and the actual GPS data is showing X+something. The idea is not bad, but it seems to be a bit heavy on correction. On my activities, it doesn't seem too far from the reality, since I'm often preparing my runs on a map and following the route. So I know what should be the perfect distance, and often the Fenix is not far. Others devices may show more, but if it takes into account all the little errors of the GPS, it's not actual distance I'm running. So I prefer that it underestimates a bit, rather than the opposite. I still think it's too heavy on the correction, there are cases when it's too low, for sure. I'm not mad at Garmin for that, in my situation it doesn't seem like a huge issue at all, the watch is doing a terrific job in many other domains.

Did others of you try what I did with Strava (or any other solution to measure the distance of a GPX) ?