Cannot sync Forerunner 35 via Bluetooth with app

This FAQ link has some troubleshooting recommendations if you are having connection or syncing issues. If these don't resolve the issue, it is recommended that you contact your local Product Support team for direct assistance.

I am also having problems. FR35 can no longer pair with my android phone since android update on Sunday. I reinstalled app, factory reset phone and watch. Cleared cache, switched bluetooth on and off several times but no success.
Garmin have responded with general Bluetooth troubleshooting guide but nothing works.. FR35 syncs fine with tablet and phone connects headphones with no issues but the phone can't seem to communicate with the watch.

Any ideas?

Also having this issue since around 28/02. Try syncing watch with application, application states watch is connected but when I press sync, it thinks about it for a while but sync clearly fails. I checked the device sync audit (on the app) and saw sync results thus:

Upload Status: SUCCESSFUL (No item to process)
Download status: FAILED (ERROR SENDING SOFTWARE)
Update file to device: FILE_DATA_TRANSFER_FAILED
Time Sync Status: SUCCESSFUL
Overall Sync Status: FAILED
Origin: 5037_1

Yesterday I got the same error and managed to get the watch and application sync correctly by deleting the app from my phone, reinstalling and then pairing my watch again. I don't really want to do this every time I want to sync! I don't have bluetooth turned on much, only when I want to upload step/heart rate data (once, maybe twice a day) or when I run/cycle.

Device: Sony XZ1 Compact
O/S: Android 8.0.0
Garmin Connect v 4.3
Forerunner 35 using v 3.20

Garmin are being awfully quiet about this issue.......

We would recommend that contacting Product Support if the suggestions in Post #12 do not resolve the issue. Directly working with Product Support teams will allow us to further investigate this by collecting more specific information from the app and phone.

Hi all. I know this is an old post but I've just experienced the same thing and have found a fix so if anyone stumbles upon this thread, hopefully this will help.

I went for a run two days ago and the sync failed. I was getting notifications as normal. I tried un-pairing, re-pairing, Android and iOS. Others I ran with had uploaded normally so I knew it wasn't a problem with Garmin.

I concluded that it was the watch that was at fault rather than servers or the app.

I plugged my FR35 in to my laptop (Windows) and opened it as a drive. Then went into ACTIVITIES and found the .FIT file from the run. I downloaded it onto my desktop and tried to manually import it to Garmin Connect. I got an error message to say the file was corrupt so I ran it through the autofix on http://garmin.kiesewetter.nl/ and downloaded the fixed FIT file. I imported the fixed file and got most of the data (important stuff like time/distance/hr etc), although the map was broken.

I then went back to my watch and tried to sync again but it still wouldn't work. The reason for this in my case was that it was trying to upload a corrupted file so it couldn't get past that.

I've now deleted the corrupted file from my watch itself (history/activities/discard) and everything is working normally again.

I hope this helps somebody, let me know!

I was having the same problem for the last few weeks where my device suddenly stopped syncing via bluetooth with the app. However I could still sync via USB cable with Garmin connect.

While looking for a solution I stumbled upon the post above. The solution for my sync problems was solved by deleting all activities from history on my watch except the latest that had not synced. This can be done from the watch itself (well i did) without having to open it as a drive on you PC. Obviously one of the activities in my history was causing the problem and once it was gone my device synced again without any issues.

Hope this helps someone. Thanks for the post @amyelizabethbradl

I was having the same issue and deleting the last activity solved it.

Thanks a lot @amyelizabethbradley!