Don’t know why, but my 830 and Samsung Galaxy S8 have suddenly got themselves working perfectly together. I’ve had the Edge for four months and like many others posting here, the Edge could be paired with the phone and it would connect to the phone (or not) quickly, at least for a day or two whether or not Garmin Connect was open and on screen. Then it would not connect unless GC was on screen and sometimes it would all stop and I’d have to forget the phone and re-pair.
Even before the firmware update to 5.00 and when on the last general release 4.10, and even with no phone firmware update that I’ve seen, a forget phone and re-pair over a week ago seems to have nailed it. So long as the phone is powered on, even if asleep, even after a boot from power off, with Garmin Connect inactive, the Edge jumps onto the phone every time as soon as it’s booted. Even weirder, under the phone’s Bluetooth setting there is only one Edge 830 device shown, not two as occurred previously and have been said to be required. Not so. One Edge 830 device Bluetooth connection is working just fine, even when Wi-Fi disabled.
I’m posting this to confirm what has not been clear to me before, that the Edge can connect to the phone without having to have the Garmin Connect app open. If people are still having phone Bluetooth connection problems, yet another forget phone and re-pair just might do it. I have no idea whether Garmin (or Samsung) has quietly sent thru some code recently but after a week I’m hoping this particular annoyance is over for me.