The “surf-edition” simply doesn’t work while surfing. Can Garmin fix this problem?

No joke, it’s on their support page here too:

https://support.garmin.com/en-US/?faq=YqeSg7y0KE0983A25fu5cA&partNumber=010-02293-17&tab=topics&topicTag=region_surfing

can you imagine telling a sprinter to run slower for the watch to work? Because this is on the same level...

I’m debating getting a refund or waiting for an update, because outside of surfing it is a phenomenal watch.

I wouldn't expect too much from Garmin or the Instinct, they can't record activities on dry land properly!

They put the baro/altimeter sensor port on the underside of the watch corner so as soon as you start sweating the port gets clogged and elevation recordings are skewed.  I noticed this when running and hiking and it's easy to recreate the sweat problem by recording a Cardio activity staying at the same elevation preferably in the same room and as soon as your heart rate increase and you start to sweat the readings are skewed. 

The GPS on the Instinct is also poor, bad antenna design/placement which leads to significant under recording of distance, and awful and unusable pace metrics.

The only way I can get accurate GPS tracks when running and hiking is to have the watch face pointing towards the sky on the side of the wrist which is impractical and uncomfortable.

Same problem on the Fenix. People have even resorted to wearing the watch in this way as a 'fix'!

forums.garmin.com/.../simple-but-awkward-hack-to-boost-fenix-6-gps-accuracy-and-proof-of-flawed-design---updated

I am here to join everyone that paid a good price for a special surf edition watch that flat out fails in that regard. 

Garmin, please contact the dev for the SurfTracker 2 app ( Surf Tracker2 | Garmin Connect IQ ) it is far more accurate at wave counts, speeds, paddling distance, basically everything.

There cannot be one person who bought this watch for surfing that is satisfied, it's not at all possible as this watch does not track surfing correctly.

This can be fixed as it is a software problem, so Garmin please get on it.

KP said:

Garmin please get on it.

I am afraid that the only way to get Garmin react, would be if all unsatisfied surfers masively started to ask for a refund. Asking them on the user forum, that they do not even monitor, to fix the problems, won't bring you anywhere. People are complaining about it since the release of the model half a year ago, and apparently Garmin does not care, since they sell the watch anyway. So unless they see the model is unsellable in the current state, they won't be stressed to fix any existing issues.

If you like the watch (aside from the surfing features), get the refund anyway, wait till they fix it, and then buy it again (if you do not change your mind in the meantime).

It's terrible. I got it because the interface with the Ripcurl GPS is so buggy without an iPhone but at least it actually records your waves. This watch will not be worn on surf days and I would love my money back at this point

Same here, bought the watch to surf and the accuracy is ridiculously wrong. When I watched the summary of the session, got 39 waves reaching 50km/h.

Even the software is wrong! The summary said maximum speed 40km/h and in the individual wave information there was a wave reaching the 50km/h recorded. Again in the totals shows that I had a total distance of 6120m, which even if it is with the paddling is pretty much impossible. Also sums up my max speed of every wave ( don't know what for ) which is 430.114km/h. 

I can only find everything I just wrote ridiculous for a 400€ watch.

Bought it because had really good review from a friend from the forerunner 245, but this one is simply useless to surf.

Very old Thread, but I installed 16.5 and went for a surf this morning. It is far more accurate with this update. I do wish like the surf Tracker 2 app that we could tweak conditions to fit our local breaks. I surf a shorebreak so most waves don't count. Better than every movement counting, so a vast improvement.

I think Garmin might now be able to say they have a Surf Watch, with the v 16.5 update.

There are still issues with inaccurate tide times - there are a couple of active discussion threads on this. 

Hello, the number of waves measures them well, the problem is that they are not well represented on the map, in that it is still inaccurate. The wavestracker application lets you adjust parameters, but by default, it reads the same number of waves as garmin, but poorly positioned on the map, it can still be improved, they have very little left, I hope they don't abandon it.

I had a 92km/h wave!! World record!