Skin damage from Fenix 6X Pro

agree.. wet / moisture / or even sweat does seems to make it worse

ok

Yes, it's the material the strap is made from. Every garmin owner I know suffers from this (5 so far) and has had to move to a different strap material (nylon or steel/Ti). The default Garmin response is to check that you're not forgetting to wash, then they blame cosmetics/moisturisers, then they offer you a free strap. 

The material is absolutely not hypoallergenic and it causes significant swelling and peeling with a range of users. I recently moved to a Ti band on my F6 Pro and the problem went away in 2 days and never came back. Same happened with my F5 - spent months with itchy burning skin and swelling, bought a cheapy stainless strap and it went away in a week - I wrote about it here https://www.bucklevision.co.uk/garmin-fenix-5-strap-and-skin-irritation-or-allergy/ 

I honestly find it odd that Garmin aren't taking this more seriously, on watches that are meant to be worn 24/7. 

9234773 said:

does anyone else have suffered this this sort of bad skin burn ? Does moving away to a different type of strap help ?

I know this as well - not as bad as yours but still light irritated skin.

What I did:

Loosen the strap so the watch can move and the skin gets some air under the strap. Clean the strap every 2 days just with water and get rid of dirt, sweat and skin grease.

Let your skin of your wrist breath a little and give it a rest for some hours - even 1 or 2 hours is fine.

I only tighten the strap for sports and have the same steps after an activity after practice.

That works for me quite well. If that all doesn't help get a fabric strap.

But in the current state you should get your skin cured first!

One thing that I didn't see mentioned here yet: If you are wearing the watch also at night, you could swap the watch to the other wrist when you go to sleep. Of course that's not necessary if washing the strap is enough to solve your problem.

For me, washing the strap makes it worse, as though you're just exposing the strap material more to your skin. I tried this, by washing the strap twice a day and it made it much much worse (blisters). Also this damage happens in hours, so switching overnight, which I tried, just gave me two very sore wrists.

It really is a reaction between strap and skin, it gets a bit tiring to be constantly told to clean stuff thanks, and it's very fast. I don't have to daily clean the nylon straps, or the Ti straps, it's not a cleanliness thing, it's a material thing. 

Thanks.. I'm looking at nylon or Ti straps.. Ti straps I take is going to be expensive ? 

I've to admit I wish Garmin can offer Nylon straps as replacement for people who can't take the Silicone ones...  

They do offer nylon, leather, ti and steel straps. I think they start from about 50 usd for leather/nylon and go up to about 250 for Ti. You can test it with cheapo 3rd party ones off amazon but the fitment is sometimes a bit poor. 

thanks... any idea on leather straps ?