Moving from a 630, what justifies the price tag of the 955 ?

The watch has HRV and all-day stress tracking which help you create better habits that should improve recovery. The watch also has music, a huge battery, there are so many reasons it costs what it does. Is it a bit high? Sure. I love the sleeping HRV tracking as well as the morning report. I have an app for my intermittent fasting. If all you want is GPS, then just keep your old watch but you watched the review, to say zero difference is crazy.

Agree. There are a lot of differences. But all the training metrics like training readiness. Those may not be important to OP but there are a lot of differences. 

First off, hi and thanks for taking the time to answer !

Indeed, what I only care about is the GPS watch side of things.

I have a Withings Scanwatch as my main watch and I consider it way superior to the Forerunner series as a day to day watch in many ways.

I do understand that the 955 is newer and better than my 630. Still I don't see any killer feature or massive upgraves over what the 630 already is. Sure, there is a better battery life, a different HR sensor (which is convenient but less accurate than the HRM Strap I have) and a better altimeter. But is that worth $600 ?

I'll wait for other feedback before I make a decision, maybe I'm missing new running metrics or something that would convince me !

EDIT : also, if anyone with a 955 would mind sharing a pubic link to an activity recorded with it, that would be appreciated, thanks.

If you don't care about those features mentioned earlier, go for a cheaper FR255. I guess GPS should be more precise than on 630, but I arrived from Polar. I didn't have issues with OHR, not with Polar or Garmin, but I prefer chest strap, especially when wearing long sleeves/in colder weather.

V800 had an accuracy, after that, among all brands, the battery life that was priority, read Sony. Now GPS should be better I guess with F7/FR255/FR955/Epix2...

Background - I am am an older runner , 59, and have been running since the mid 1970's . I have had a Garmin device since the FR 201, in 2006 I believe it was, and have moved through the 4 and 6 series (610, 620 and 630) and now have a 955. I am mainly a fairly serious runner and enjoy the metrics etc. I swim a bit in an indoor pool.

I was actually surprised at how reasonable the 955 price was at release as the 945 / 945 LTE were substantially more at their release. My 630 was getting long in the tooth. I considered the 255 but settled on the 955 for two main reasons - the Touch screen and the Strava live segments, and additionally the thought that I may enjoy the better navigation options in the future.

I bought the 955 non solar in white in June 2022 and have enjoyed it since. There were a few niggles with the first few software versions and whilst there is definitely room for improvement still , it is largely working as I would expect.

The larger screen vs the 630 is great for me. The touch screen is a nice to have (i esp coming form the 630) and it works well and can be disabled where required. The buttons are also easy to use.

As to the OHR , Im not a big fan of those and I use a HRM-PRO and an OHR has never been a big selling point to me. It is of course useful for daytime and sleep time wear and all the additional metrics that brings.

I enjoy how the additional metrics work together and the morning report is a great summary of the situation. (HRV, Sleep, Training readiness etc)

I use structured and recommended workouts and they work well for my use case.

I am sure I could have managed with my 630 for a while longer but I do not regret getting the 955 at all. I use an aftermarket strap which makes it more snug and wearing it at night is fine. I dont notice the larger size at all.

There are things that could work better or could be improved , but that is the same with anything we use in our lives. 

If you are a serious runner , or an avid data lover , I wouldn't hesitate...

Addition - and of course the ability to setup and amend activity setting via the App is a great feature...

Also , do consider to use Runalyze as a tool , it presents the data from the .fit files in a different way than Garmin and in some cases you can see details that you dont see natively on the Connect app / web page.

I moved from a 645 to 955 and I'm totally disappointed.

955 is unusable with persistent major bugs (look on this forum about the LHTR issue)... And seems like they are not going to fix that.

All the new predictions added  are incorrect because of the LHTR bug 

All the fancy new features that they have added in the recent years (e.g. suggested workouts) are just half baked ideas poorly implemented . (Suggested workouts only offers you a minimal selection of different workouts and don't take into account your goals at all). It's a joke.

I have been a Garmin user for many many years .. and because of this 955 I think I won't buy anything else from this brand.

It is LTHR - lacatate treshold heart rate, I think.

Super interesting feedback. I also get the feeling that, just like in the smartphone space, the way Garmin addresses upgrades is now very incremental.

And the prices are rising like crazy. Just double checked and I was wrong with the 955 retailing around 600 euros. It's retailing for about 700 euros, that's 736 dollars. That's a 63% increase in price vs. the 630 I bought in 2015 that was then the high end model.

Still, I'll have to give Garmin credit for their ecosystem and I would never switch. Gave Polar and Suunto a try in the past and their whole UX is a joke to me.

I bought my 955 for $500 which should be very close what you paid for your watch way back when and that is a bargain considering the increase in features and battery. I do not know where you are getting your numbers from. The solar version is $600, I had a solar Fenix and I do not spend enough time in the sun for it to be worth it so I am happy I saved the $100. I am sure there are people who work outside or do long hikes, ultra marathons where it makes sense.

I think You are right. Estimated inflation from 2015 to 2023 in € zone is about 20%. According to DC Rainmaker in 2015 630 price tag was $399. So $500 for 955 is the same price level, but superior in hardware and software.