Devices with magnets

Good question, I'd be curious to hear what Garmin engineers would say.

I work in loudspeaker manufacturing, and am frequently handing VERY powerful magnets (much, MUCH bigger than the magnets in your laptop), and haven't noticed any issues yet.

Obviously, the compass accuracy will be wrong when you're near a magnetic source, but I have no idea if there would be any long-term problems caused by it. So far my Fenix 6 (and the Vivoactive 3 I used for a year before it) haven't had any noticeable problems from it. But if Garmin thinkis I should be taking off my watch when handling magnets, I'd rather find out sooner than later!

There is potentially an issue with the metal inside the watch getting magnetized, and throwing the compass readings off. However, 316 stainless is almost entirely non-magnetic, as is titanium, so at least the biggest metal components shouldn't get magnetized... but I don't know about internal parts. And I also don't know if compass re-calibration would resolve it if it happened.

This is for a smartphone, but close enough.  Similar stuff.

http://blog.first4magnets.com/will-a-magnet-damage-my-smartphone/

Pretty much no to damage.  But, I formerly had a 5x with stainless steel band and noted I had to recalibrate the compass often before I needed to rely on it.  I surmised that since I am around stronger magnetic fields often it would partially magnetize the steel in different ways, throwing it off cal.  Even when recalibrating I needed to take off the band to keep the motion from distorting the calibration, it would fail otherwise.

Switched to a 6 pro titanium model partially for that reason...also weight of course.  Now I notice my compass hasn't needed to be recalibrated, and only when I am near sources indoors that the bearing would be thrown off.

Different alloys of Stainless Steel have different magnetic properties, some is very magnetic while others are not magnetic at all. 316 stainless (what our non-titanium Fenix 6's are made of) is not really magnetic at all, I just touched a neodymium magnet to mine to verify that, and it isn't attracted to my watch at all. I seriously large neodymium magnet will be attracted to 316 SS slightly, but it's so weak that you can easily pull the steel part off the magnet without any difficulty.

I suspect your previous stainless steel band was a different alloy with higher magnetic properties.

Anyways, my compass hasn't needed to be recalibrated in my 316SS fenix 6x, despite definitely handling many powerful magnet while wearing it. If I stand anywhere within about 8ft of a subwoofer, though, I can watch my compass reading go astray, but it returns to normal when I move away from the speaker.

I don't know if there is any magnetic steel inside the watch or not, but waving a neo magnet over the watch makes it seem like there isn't any, or at least there's such a small amount that it doesn't seem to attract a magnet. In any case, whatever magnetic steel may (or may not) be inside the watch case would be the same regardless of what the outer case and band are made of.

It's work noting that there is for sure an actual magnet inside of our watches, as part of the speaker that allows the watch to beep at us. Using a magnetometer, I can actually see the magnetism of the watch itself (though, it's quite weak)

Thank you so much for the helpful responses!