Garmin 935 vs 945 GPS Testing

"It was strange to see the 945 hold 5:05 as ..." .. did you mean to say the 935 here?

I think the consensus was the GPS on the 945 wasn't as good as on the 935 but the switch to a new chip and tradeoff was made for better battery life. I'm sure someone else can chime in on this to correct me or confirm.

Levon said:

I think the consensus

by the majority of people who post in this forum (who probably do not represent the wider population of Garmin watch users)

Levon said:

was the GPS on the 945 wasn't as good as on the 935

However, the few dissenting voices who dare to suggest otherwise are drowned out. I, and others, have posted plenty of comparison tracks to suggest the Sony chip is as good as the Mediatek GPS. As for instant pace? I've never had any joy with instant pace since the days of the FR305. For me it's been a fact of life with wrist-worn GPS watches that instant pace does not work. There needs to be some form of averaging similar to 3s/5s cycle power averaging for running pace.

All this has been debated ad nauseam with (mostly) the same people arguing backwards and forwards, and occasionally someone new chipping in to reinvent the wheel, every time a new watch is released and throughout the life of the watch. Until the next watch, which then becomes the bad boy.

Yes sorry fixed it. I think better GPS is more important it's more useful than battery life unless you're doing ultra marathons.

I don't agree. It CAN be as good yes but it's not consistently as good, it has bad days like today for example and it happens too often. The 935 is more consistently accurate I can trust it to use it as a training aid as I could my FR10. The Sony GPS is inferior the 935 can even get a signal in my house downstairs whilst the 945 only upstairs and it takes longer. I know it's been debated but this is my personal anecdote. Whilst using the 935 and FR10 the instant pace stays stable whilst the 945 struggles in tougher environments and reports 10-30 seconds per K slower but somehow the laps are the same so I guess it knows it messes up then recalculates you can see that in the pace graph as a big spike drop followed by a big spike increase showing it recalculates the time/position. That's fine for 1km laps but not for instant pace or shorter intervals.

I agree, forum members are hardly a representative sample of the wider population. I've used Garmin FRs since 2013 (the FR201?) and the watches have gotten smaller and better each generation (305, 310xt, 230 etc)

I didn't have a 935, so my statement was just based on my impression of having read the forum. My watch before the 945 was the 230 and I feel its GPS was more accurate, but this is my impression looking at the tracks of my run, not side by side comparisons (which is why I call it an impression).

People will rarely be satisfied with any tech product (cell phones, watches, etc) on any forum I've seen. I'm happy with my 945, sure it can be improved, but it has served me very well since May of 2019.

I use a 935 and 945 and switch them out regularly.  Prior to that I used a 235.  I've seen no major differences between pace or GPS tracks among the three.  Each have had great days and each have had bad days, but none have stood out more than another where I can say this one is superior to that one.  People hate change.  I think the Sony chip gets a bad name because of change and people run with it.  I've almost bought into the hype about the Sony chipset being garbage and I started recording my runs wearing both my 935 on one wrist and my 945 on the other wrist.  No major differences after doing this several times.   Pace (as expected with wrist paced GPS) always performed on the down side with all three and I use a Stryd now, but the tracks are all similar. 

Interesting, thanks for sharing.

If you really want a good instant pace you should buy a STRYD, not a second watch. 945+ STRYD is the best combo :)

Well said friend, and if you don't have the money for Stryd just a simple 40/50 euro foot pod and everything will be fine

Well, I am using Adidas MiCoach footpod that costs 9 EUR and works quite well