Frustrated about Venu 2 accuracy of indications. Is Venu 2 a toy?

hi, maybe first of all you are a bit tol emotional about all this, but this aside, yes: the sensors and data projections can in some case be quite wrong and need to be seen in context.

steps... I barely moved around the house... still somehow in not even 2h the watch showed more than 2000steps... wow
Floors climbed - this is something to be seen relatively... what is a floor? how many steps? is a floor in an European old building with superhigh ceilings the same as in a small cottage? Probably not... is it based on altitude? in any case - it is meant for orientational purpuses, should be motivating and not taken as scientific result of pure preciseness...
Pulseoximeter: yes, not quite the level of professional medical analysis gear, but it is not meant to be.
Pulse: seems to be better on the V2 but I really hate to wear the watch this tight on my wrist. anyway: i think it is quite precise. 

So in general: Probably watches are not yet as evolved in technology as the respective companies marketing department seems to make us believe.

Still the V2 offers a step up to the last gen and I guess it can serve quite well for giving people some orientation and motivation

Dear @rentagreement thank you for answer and for showing me that I'm not only one who thinks so. I'm sorry for my voice to sound a little bit emotional, But I just feel robbed. If the manufacturer delcares, that functions such as pulseoximeter, stress measurement, sleep tracking, body battery, tracking activities, floors climbed etc, barometer, termometer, work fine, then this is simply how it should be. It would be different if it was written in specification, that these are experimental function. Then I would have no regrets. But Garmin sells Venu 2 with full specification.
It's a pity, but I'll never be again Garmin customer.

I agree with some of your points like the SpO2 sensor, that i don't use at all due to the accuracy and the sleep could be a lot better.

Floors climbed: depends what you're considering..."floor climbed" is just a common terminology to make it more "easier" as a metric but it equals to 3m(10ft) change in elevation. If you're going for a hike, you will do a lot of "floors climbing" for example. When i check during real floor climbing i find it fairly accurate but i didn't check the real height between floors. www8.garmin.com/.../GUID-C6DD81FF-7367-484F-B117-0878495C4237.html

Stress indicator: also here, i find it fairly accurate. Whenever i'm in particular situations(stressful workday or other situations when i don't feel really comfortable) stress levels are shown as high. 

GPS and Heart rate, i find them accurate too.

For me Venu 2 has been pleasantly accurate. Well, everything else except SpO2 sensor which gives constantly lower values than Venu did. Also many times it cannot get a reading at all. Venu was much more reliable in this matter. Basically everyhing else I've been pleased with.

- HRM is way more accurate than in Venu. No same kind of drop outs that Venu did.

- Sleep tracking works very well. It detects my falling in sleep and waking accurately. Also in the middle of the night. I don't give much weight to sleep stages because they will always be a rough estimation without proper equipment made for just that.

- Body battery values resemble well my own feeling of my energy levels. If I wake up feeling I didn't sleep so well, I can always see the same in body battery and sleep score. Also if I've been drinking alcohol in the evening, it definitely shows as weak sleep score and body battery levels in the morning. :P

- One floor equals 3 m ascent/descent in Garmin watches. Not actual floors. This has been fairly accurate as long as coat sleeve does not cover the watch when climbing the stairs and the clock is firmly on my wrist. If the watch barometer notices elevation increase but not any heart rate elevation and steps taken, it won't count stairs. For example elevator ride does not gove any climbed stairs.

- Step count accuracy seems to be on same level as other Garmin watches. There's really no point in comparing step accuracy with other brand watches because the step detection algoritms vary a lot. Fitbits give you steps no matter what you do. Always overestimates hugely. Polars don't actually even count real steps but step equivalents. Polar convert all activity during a day to step equivalents. You could very well get 10000 Polar steps just by riding a bike for example. Samsung watches are all over the place with steps. So, according to my own unscientific tests and experiences Garmin has shown to be the most accurate so far.

- Venu 2 is my third Garmin watch and it has had significantly better gps accuracy than the other two (Venu and Vivoactive 3 Music). I have a dedicated handheld Garmin gps device and the results are usually very similar when I use them both simultaneously.

- I don't have anything to say about calorie count accuracy. No idea if it's accurate or not. Pretty much same thing with all watch brands.

To get the best results you should wear the watch above your wrist bone. Not on top of it. And watch band pretty tight, but not in pleasantly tight. If you wear any sports watch the same way as a normal watch (loosely on wrist and near near to your palm) you will surely get inaccurate metrics from HRM and SpO2 sensors.

So, all in all, I have been very satisfied with my Venu 2. In the past I have had many bad things to say about Garmin firmware update policy and various bugs but accurate data collection has kept me with Garmin all these years.

You make a lot of assumptions and many of them are quite wrong. Maybe you should consult the manual first.

(Pulseox is not medical grade, by the way. Take a look at the product page before buying an expensive watch.)

Maybe you'd be happier with Withings' Scanwatch.

Zoe,

I'm sorry that your experience has been such a disappointment.  Ironically I would say that the watch has exceeded my expectations.  My frame of mind when I bought the watch was a little sceptical, even cynical, about the various health and fitness features.  In fact, I have been very pleasantly surprised.

With the exception of the oximeter, I have found something useful in all the features.  Admittedly. in some instances, this is by looking at trends and relative figures rather than absolute figures, but this is not always the case,  The sleep function I find much more helpful and accurate than I expected, for instance, although I confess my expectations were low.

On a few of your criticisms, I'm afraid I just have to simply disagree.  The floors climbed, for instance I find pretty accurate far better than expected.....not perfect, f course, but still useful.  The same is true for steps, heart rate, respiration and so forth.

The GPS I find outstanding,and this is important to me.

All in all, whilst I agree there are are improvements to be made I find the watch very useful and far, far from being a toy.  Much more helpful and accurate than I ever expected.  However, I wish you success in finding something that better fits your needs and expectations.

do all of you actually keep the watch on the wrist 24/7? how acurate would the data be with noc sleep tracking and having the watch switched off at night?

Well, if you switch off the watch at nights then you won't get any sleep data obviously. Also the body battery won't show anything realistic.

I keep the watch always on me, except when showering. Garmin keeps interpreting my showering as running or something and count a lot of steps. More than thousand steps even. I don't want those fake steps so I take it off.

same here...the accuracy of this watch is poor

It just sounds like the Venu 2 or possibly Garmin watches are not for you. It’s worth trying other makes to compare and develop a balanced view. Many people think Apple Watches are brilliant with the most accurate HRMs. I had an AW 6 for 9 months until I couldn’t stand it any longer. HRM was dreadful in cold weather (common problem on AW but not Garmin). We’ve had Garmins for 10 years and for us there’s nothing else to touch them. Very happy with our Venu 2S watches for Ultra Marathon Running and find them very accurate. Unfortunately we’re never all gonna like the same things but at least you’ve tried it. Good luck with whatever you try next. Fortunately reselling Garmin watches is quite easy.