Shift in GPS track depending on wrist

As an avid heatmapper / run every street I'm particularly interested in more accurate GPS tracks.  I've been perplexed by why has appeared to be a shift of my GPS tracks to the left of where I run no matter what direction I run in.  So if I run an out and back on a road it looks like I've practically run a loop because its shifts it off the road on both sides.  In general my tracks are off the road and sometimes its more egregious than others.  I took to running on the wrong side of the road (with traffic instead of against) to get it more centered.  I then did an experiment and changed my watch to my right hand.  Low and behold my tracks started looking significantly better!  I figured there must be some sort of setting I was missing.  I found the wrist setting in my Fenix 6 and changed it from "left" (the correct setting) to "right" and it made no difference.  


Wearing the watch on my right wrist example here:

https://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/4692022516  - I ran on the side of the road against traffic and its shifted to the right, which is closer to the middle of the road

Wearing the watch on my left wrist example:

https://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/4488678027 - notice how all the tracks are to the left where you would be running against traffic off the road

Really neither of these examples are very accurate as they don't capture where I really ran but at least with wearing it on the right hand it will actually show on the road I was running on.   I don't know if this is an intentional shift or not.  Also I'm not a fan of wearing it on my right hand (again wrist setting seem to make no difference in my tests).  Does anyone have any info on this?  

Also this isnt a one off test. All my runs with my Fenix 6 are like this and I found many with my Fenix 5 as well.  Additionally I have done several runs with it on my right wrist and they consistently produce better results every time.

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  • I agree, it shouldn’t be worn in a different way as it is intended. That is why people wear their watches in different positions for testing purposes, so that the Garmin devs have more data to find out what the issues could be. The problem isn’t only with fenix 6 watches. I have a friend with a Forerunner 945, he has the same issue.

  • Such negativity here... Why do you care if some people are curious about the influence of the angle of the watch ? Maybe it can't fix anything with the watch indeed, but then what? I find that positive to see people being curious and studying the influence of difference factors. It's much better than having people whining and complaining all the time, about the GPS being craps, or about other people doing this or that. I think that is using his (or her) time much better than the bunch of complainers here. People being curious and testing things are learning something at least. It takes time to gather data and it's good to share with others to try to see what is valuable and what is not. Good approach and attitude in my view. Even if it won't make the watch better, or if it cannot translate in something user friendly.

  • OK, guys! Here it is! I finally had the chance to do the ultimate test and compare results.

    Route is around 2km under lift line in dense forest.

    Blue: wearing normally on left wrist(outside of the wrist). FW 8:10 (route taken around month ago, but I have 10+ older example of this route with the same result)

    Orange: wearing on left wrist, but watch on the inside of the wrist. Route taken yesterday. FW 8.78 (beta)

    I alsways observe this tipical shift to the left on this route, no matter if wear it on left or right wrist. Now for firts time I tried on this route with the watch on the inner side.Magic.

    Location: Vitosha mountain, Sofia, Bulgaria, Southeast Europe

    GPS+GLONASS, every second

    It`s a bit inconvenient to wear the watch like that, but improvement is obviouse, so I`ll apply this "fix" regularly from now on.

  • That does look like a massive improvement! Are you from Sofia originally? That's my home town- small world!

  • This makes sense.

    The antenna is behind the bezel. But it's only a short section of the bezel at 12 o'clock, not round about as the picture shows

    www.google.com/search

    By wearing the watch outside at the wrist at running the antenna points downwards to the ground. If you wear the watch inside of the wrist the antenna points upwards to the sky.

  • Wait wait wait. Are you serious? They put the antenna at the worse possible place on the watch? The antenna on the Ambit were at the BOTTOM of the watch (the famous "bump"). 
    The photo is for the Fenix 3. Is it still the same for the Fenix 6? who will dare opening its watch to see ? :) 

  • wear the watch inside of the wrist the antenna points upwards to the sky

    Do you all commenting on this, put you watch up-side-down when moving to inside of wrist? I thought you meant 12 o'clock up, but on inside. I can see differences with that. 

  • Since it seems like everybody is mostly Europe-based, I just wanted to add that I'm seeing the same results (outer wrist = wobbly shifted tracks, inner wrist = clean tracks) over here across the Atlantic. I'm using GPS-only in the southern US, so it appears this isn't region-specific.

  • They put the antenna at the worse possible place on the watch?

    It's the worst place for running, but not for cycling or some other activities.

    The photo is for the Fenix 3. Is it still the same for the Fenix 6? who will dare opening its watch to see ? :) 

    Before you opening your watch, I recommend to make a running test using the watch inside of the wrist so that the number 12 points to the sky.