Innacurate GPS on all modes

I'll copy/paste my response to someone who literally just asked exactly this same question a couple hours ago.

As far as GPS track accuracy is concerned, this largely comes down to what you're expecting it to be able to do. Two people can try on the exact same watch, and one person will say the track is great, and the other will say it's garbage.

So, to be able to answer your question - what is your expectation for track accuracy, and in what way is it falling short of your expectations?

If you're expecting it to always show precisely which side of the sidewalk you're on, and never stray off the sidewalk a little, you'll be disappointed.

If you're just expecting it to show a representation of which paths you took, and a good overall distance measurement, then the watch should be able to do that with no problem. If it isn't, then possibly something is wrong with your watch.

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ETA: since you actually posted a screenshot (thanks for that; the other guy didn't), I can conclusively say that your watch is fine, it is your expectations that are the issue. Your track doesn't appear to be wrong by more than about 5 meters. That is plenty good enough by most people's standards. I'm not sure why you would need to it be more accurate than that. Are you marking locations of buried treasure to dig up later?

Perhaps i was unclear, so i added a 2nd image to that link (with red lines as to where the track should be). Based on garmins own scale in the image is about 30m off. The tracks should overlap (i turned around, but did not cross the street).

Also I tried to make a big red dot where that turnaround should be. Based on the scale garmin provides on the map, that is roughly 30m off. These tracks should also both be on the same side of the road since i doubled back, They should roughly overlap each other but instead one of them is all the way off across 4 lanes and a median.

So you could say that HALF of this GPS track is okay, but the other half is way off on the other side of the road (where it shouldnt be). Again, these should be on the same side of the road. I think lanes are roughly 3m ? Which would be 3x4 = 12m off at least PLUS the median so we'll round up and say 15m off. This doesnt match garmins scale but thats still more than it should be, right?

Is your GPS running in 1 second or smart mode ?

Which wrist is the watch on. (right is meant to be better).

was your watch covered with a jacket.

Was it raining.

Also you cant really compare a F6 to an Iphone as the Iphone uses the GPS satellites AND it uses phone masts to triangulate its position and as phone masts are static their position information is totally accurate.

Garmin state their GPS receivers are accurate to 10m, so some people are very happy with that (me included), and some people want to know which side of the pavement they are on.

Have you tried doing the same run several times and see if the tracks are better or worse ?. You should run the same route several times to be sure as each time you run the weather conditions and the satellites will be different.

I hike and I find the GPS is perfectly ok for what I do. I don't really care if its 10m out, most of the time its much better than that, and for navigation in the hills its perfect to cross ref the OS grid reference to a physical map.

Running in 1s mode, all up to date. I added another image, this is about 30m off for half of the run (shows me on wrong side of 4 lane street plus the median).

Its not raining, its not covered by a jacket, left wrist (why is right better?).

I have done this same run several times and the tracks are more or less the same. I'd be happy with 10m, but these tracks should overlap. They were on the same sidewalk since i doubled back. Its just alarming that it can be this off for a majority of the run when other devices iphone/fitbit ionic have never displayed this issue in the years i've used them. Seems like either the watch is a dud, or cant perform to the same level as my other devices even though i'd expect it to be about the same

what every time you run, the homeward track is on the other side of the road ?. If its that consistent it suggests the watch aerial is being shielded maybe.

Try on your right wrist.

Its supposed to be better for the aerial positioning. I am a right wrist and it seems to be ok for me.

Yes every time the "outward" track is on the wrong side. The homeward is actually the more correct of the 2 but i'll try the other wrist and see if that works. I guess i could also swap wrists halfway through if its a shielding thing?

I also added an image of a stryd run, which is roughly the accuracy i would have expected from the fenix 6. While its not the most perfect down to the foot path, it shows me on the right side of the road within a "fair" tolerance of basically the sidewalk to the median which fits into the standard 10m accuracy i think.

Its interesting the track is consistently the same and on the wrong side of the road.

The stryd pod does not contain a gps therefore cannot give you positional information and a location track as shown, it uses accelerometers and the watch or other GPS based device can combine the information. So maybe some other sensor in your watch is not as accurate as it could be.

So what GPS enabled device did you pair with the stryd ?.

My iPhone 12.

Done - not from the same day, but added a picture of the same section on the fitbit ionic (which does not use phone GPS, uses its own). I actually go back a slightly different way and diverge at a different point. The turnaround point and side of the road are the same though, the track pretty much overlaps

Its a much older device, its like 4 or 5 years old and that actually seems to be the best out of the bunch for GPS surprisingly. I've started comparing it now and I think i'm in a rabbit hole so i'll stop.