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Heart Rate Accuracy

Former Member
Former Member 10 months ago

I am seriously so fed up of the HR accuracy and lag of my 265, spending so much on a watch and its not doing the main thing that its supposed to do.

I was riding my spin bike, I thought of comparing the HR with oximeter, as I was feeling the watch seems to lag. To my surprise the oximeter HR reached 145bpm when I went to 300 watts and the watch was stuck at 80bpm and slowly slowly it  went to 125 then came down...

Garmin really needs to work on the HR thing through its software update coz if HR is inaccurate then the purpose of this watch is defeated coz all sleep data, HRV, RR is related to it.

Please sort this or there is no point spending 5-600$ on a watch just for amoled n gps...

  • 0 10 months ago

    You're concern about heart rate tracking is valid, but I hope you didn't pay that much for the watch. I think it was $450 when it launched. A lot of money yes, but not what you stated. My Venu 3 can be slow to catchup sometimes but seem pretty good after I warm up.  

  • Former Member
    0 Former Member 10 months ago in reply to Scott

    I paid around 470$ for it as a friend of mine got it for me from Singapore, whereas in my country FR265 costs 600$. Secondly, your Venue 3 has the latest heart rate sensor, which was not launched at that time. But my query is the accuracy more than the lag, every detail for which this watch is purchased is related to the heart rate. Sometimes it gets stuck at a particular heart rate for 5-10 seconds, sometimes it takes so much time to go from 80 to 140. Do not expect such latency from such expensive watches.

  • 0 10 months ago

    This is happening to me too with my F265 - I did a 2 hr ride/2500-ft climb on the bike today, and it gave me an avg heart rate of 51 (and only included 31 “intensity minutes” despite counting the “workout intervals” correctly). Ready to throw it in the trash - this has happened on my last 3 rides. It worked fine up until about a month ago, no correlation with software updates. I think I’m just going to get an Apple Watch…

  • Former Member
    0 Former Member 10 months ago in reply to 9183431

    I have been trying few watch positions and tweaks to get better readings, not perfect but still getting more reasonable than before. Try the following: during workouts, turn the display to always on mode, secondly try to wear the watch a bit tight on the forearm, the sensor should be facing the forearm. When the watch is on always on mode, readings seem a bit consistent...try it and lemme know if there is any difference 

  • 0 10 months ago

    Unfortunately, my 265 also has significant delays in showing the heart rate. My previous instinct 2, compared to fr265, had no lag in showing HR. :/

  • Former Member
    0 Former Member 10 months ago in reply to Whatever

    that's really weird, I wonder if the 965 users are facing the same or not..

  • +1 10 months ago

    All, 

    I'm sorry to hear about your experiences with inaccurate heart rate. We are currently tracking an issue where heart rate data is suddenly spiking or dropping, but that report does not including cycling activities (it's for walk/run/hike activities). 

    If this is happening mainly for cycling activities, please view The Heart Rate Sensor on My Garmin Watch Is Not Accurate. It could be that the grip on the handle bars are tight, which has a risk of reducing blood flow. It can help to wear the watch slightly further up your wrist. Please also make sure you are performing an actual activity on the watch as well, so the device can use the proper algorithm for your specific activity type. 

    If you have read through the FAQ, made adjustments, and are still seeing inaccurate date- please reach out to one of our Product Support agents so they can take a look into your activities and further assist. 

  • 0 9 months ago in reply to Garmin-Sierra

    What is the current status with the tracking? My Garmin 265 seems to get off on heart rate even within the first mile or two of a run with the random spike ups or downs in heart rate. Has made the feature totally unusable. 

  • +1 9 months ago in reply to 2518204

    All, 

    Thank you so much for your patience as we've worked on improvements regarding erratic HR data (sudden drops/spikes) during for certain activity profiles. I deeply apologize for the understandable frustration during this time as well. 

    This improvement is available in beta 18.20 which was released today. It's currently at a 20% phased rollout. If you do not automatically receive the update, you can manually download it from: Main menu > Settings > System > Software Update > Check For Updates. If you do not wish to download beta, feel free to wait until the live update is released. 

    If you are experiencing any new or continued wrist heart-rate issues during activities after 18.20, please start a new thread or reach out to Product Support.

    I am locking this thread so we have the best visibility for heart rate data after 18.20.