Fenix 7 Sapphire Solar (button issues, mainly the "Back" button)

Mineral blue is the color watch I have

I suggest to take it back to the distributor, they should replace it without any question, and go for a different color. Mine got replaced to the black one and have no issues with that. 

Hello, I bought my Fenix 7 Sapphire Solar 13 months ago. This holiday, I went to sea and now the back button doesn't work anymore. Also the backlight goes on sometimes by its own and doesn't go off, even after the configurated delay. This drops the battery. I'm going to contact the Garmin Support.

I just got my Fenix 7X and after 1-2 months of pool swimming the button started to not work very reliably. Some minutes it was working and some is was going a bit haywire. It seemed like the button was stuck or just working on its own. Garmin did replace it and so far so good after one week. I did have a Forerunner 245 I used for lap swimming 5x a week before I upgraded after 2 years. Never had an issue with that model. I’m sure Garmin can make watch that can go in the pool , just need some better quality control for these models, it appears. 

I'm disappointed with the build quality of my Fenix 7 Sapphire Solar.  I've been using it for 10 months (since Feb '23). The back button was wonky right from the beginning with no clicky feeling but was working so I didn't bother too much about it.  Last week after the upgrade to firmware 15.74, I restarted the watch and got the dreaded "Reset factory Default" error. 

Searching the forums, I discovered that it is due to stuck back button and the advice was to soak the watch in warm water to unstuck it and if that doesn't work then to get it replaced.  Tried the water soak twice but that didn't work.  The problem is that I live in a country where there is no local Garmin support and I was advised to contact the regional support in Taiwan.  I haven't contacted them yet but even if they decide to replace my watch, shipping cost to send the watch to Taiwan and the custom duties for the new watch would run in hundreds of Dollars plus it will take weeks or even months to receive the new watch.  Getting desperate, I turned it off for about a day and turned it back on and on the "Reset factory default" screen, I repeatedly kept pressing the back button until suddenly the Fenix booted up.  But now I'm afraid to press the back button fearing that it will get stuck again and the Fenix will die.

I've been using Garmin watches since 2008 and my 305 and 310XT are still functional and they cost only $250.  I'm dismayed that the Fenix which looks like it is built like a tank is so fragile and costs $1,000.  I know people who still use their $20 Casio digital watch after four decades without a fault.  Garmin needs to step up their QC standards ASAP.

This is what I discovered after my predicament.with the stuck back button.  The watch thinks that the button is still depressed so all the rest of the long press functions of the buttons also stop working.  I had my back button stuck and all of the other start/stop, light and up arrow long presses also did not work.  The backlight timer also did not work which meant I had to manually turn it off every time the back light was used.  This meant that my battery usage went up to 20-30% on a daily basis.  In case of a restart, the "reset default settings" screen would come up and I had to repeatedly press Back button (sometimes it took about 5-10 minutes) before it got unstuck.

Luckily for me, after soaking it in water for the 4th or 5th time and leaving it off for a day to completely dry it, the button got unstuck.  The watch has been working ok for the last 2 weeks but I worry that the problem will come back soon.  By the way, I do not swim and only use the watch during running, walking and hiking, so I don't think the problem is solely due to water damage.  This is more a case of poor quality and design.

Nothing nee to add, but echoing the same issue as others. Love the tech in this watch but the hardware feels poorly built, which is quite disappointing for my first foray into Garmin products as a long time Apple user.

Incredibly bad quality on the 7 Series.
My first F7 broke down after a couple of surf sessions.
Got a replacement after 2 months.
2nd watch just died after its first surf sessions, exactly the same problem as before. Back button stuck, light is on for no reason. And battery getting drained very quickly.

Very happy on F7 features for running and cycling. but I bought for surfing as well.
And I'm totally disappointed about Garmin quality on this one.
I would go for a refund if this is possibility.

I was lucky I bought on a different website and they offered a refund. Didn't want to be stuck into a loop of receiving replacement which break down continuously like other users have experienced.