Don't understand why there is a wifi capability. from the manual it seems to be just to sync. My watch syncs just fine with my phone via bluetooth so presumably for me wifi is a pointless feature?
Activities sync so much faster over wifi as opposed to BT in my experiences... but they largely do the same thing. Just gives you another option if you don't have a smartphone/etc perhaps
Not sure about the speed difference as I find my activities uplink just fine over Bluetooth. But yes, wireless provides another option that some folk find faster. I have it available on my 920, but not aware that it gets used as it seem my phone gets to it first.
Transferring updates via Bluetooth takes long long time. But via WiFi it takes seconds... Also good for auto sync feature after returning from a run but anyway it's not important a lot. You can connect to Internet via WiFi. :D
But it's good practice to do so to remove stored activities to a backup on your computer. Unless of course you fully trust an online service with all your data...
The watch also updates via WiFi, in practice you never have to connect it to the laptop/pc again.
I could be wrong, but I think the updated EPO data for quicker satellite fixes is only transferred when you connect physically, at least that seemed to be the way with my fenix 3. I've gone non-wifi with my fenix 5 and was worried I'd regret it, but so far Bluetooth syncing hasn't been an issue for me.
WiFi syncing is a god send. Especially for long runs with 1 sec recording. Take ages over BT. Also, syncing Strava segments take forever over BT and fail sometimes they take that long. But the best bit is the rapid auto sync on returning from a run, even syncs outside my house hahaha.
Thanks all,
Presumably this is only for syncing the watch with a laptop? When I go to the wifi settings on the watch it asks to setup garmin express (which is a computer app).
I do all my syncing to the garmin connect app on my phone. If I was to benefit from the faster wifi syncing does this then mean I have to open up my laptop overtime I want to sync if I use wifi? Think i might be missing something here.
Thanks all,
Presumably this is only for syncing the watch with a laptop? When I go to the wifi settings on the watch it asks to setup garmin express (which is a computer app).
I do all my syncing to the garmin connect app on my phone. If I was to benefit from the faster wifi syncing does this then mean I have to open up my laptop overtime I want to sync if I use wifi? Think i might be missing something here.
No, you only use the Garmin app once to setup the WiFi on your watch to your WiFi. Then it just connects to your WiFi and you don't need the computer/laptop even on.
Thanks all,
Presumably this is only for syncing the watch with a laptop? When I go to the wifi settings on the watch it asks to setup garmin express (which is a computer app).
I do all my syncing to the garmin connect app on my phone. If I was to benefit from the faster wifi syncing does this then mean I have to open up my laptop overtime I want to sync if I use wifi? Think i might be missing something here.
Although you initially have to set up the wifi on your watch by using Garmin Connect on your computer, the fenix does not sync directly with your computer over wifi; it syncs over your wifi network and the Internet directly to Garmin's servers. So your computer doesn't need to be on when you sync over wifi as it doesn't get anything directly from the watch, it just pulls the data down from Garmin over the Internet.
