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Heart rate too high and too low; workarounds

6340692
over 1 year ago

I have managed to find cases where the heart rate is implausibly high and implausibly low. I have also found some workarounds while Garmin figures out what is going on.

Too high:

In this case, the heart rate implausibly ramps up very high, them suddenly drops down to the correct heart rate.

Workaround: I have found success in forcing the heart rate to reset back to the correct heart rate by either loosening the watch and retightening, or otherwise temporarily blocking the sensor, such as with a gloved finger.

Too low:

In this case, the heart rate is implausibly low and seems to stay low. In this case, the heart rate seems to approximately 40% lower than actual heart rate.

Workaround: I have found success in stopping the activity and then resuming it. Done quickly, this makes a barely visible dropout in the data, but it is worth it to get the heart rate data back to a plausible value.

If anyone has any other workarounds that have been successful in forcing the heart rate sensor to reset, please share.

This is with 14.20, although I have also observed this with some other recent releases as well as on a Garmin 255.

  • +1 over 1 year ago

    Hi !

    I encourage you to review The Heart Rate Sensor on My Garmin Watch Is Not Accurate. If you have any further questions or would like someone to review your data more in depth, please reach out to Garmin Product Support.

  • 0 over 1 year ago

    Garmin-Sierra's link to the article was helpful and I recommend that everyone take a look.

    I took extra care with the watch band tightness, and made sure to get my heart rate higher than usual before starting my run. It also helps that it has been a bit warmer outside.

    It's entirely possible that the software upgrade was simply a coincidence with the onset of colder weather. By that theory, the next software upgrade will be perceived to fix the problem when it's the warming temperature that is the major contributor. We'll see.

  • 0 over 1 year ago

    The article linked by Garmin-Sierra is proving to be quite a good explanation of the problem.

    I've had a few days where it has been 40-55 degrees F and have not noticed any heart rate problems. Today, it got chilly and I ran in 35 degree F weather without too much warmup and the heart rate increase and sudden decline showed up again.

    In short, the article explains a lot and might explain many of the heart rate issues being posted about here.

  • 0 over 1 year ago

    I did not want to disappoint you, but I live in Brazil and had several problems with sensor in the winter. I opened several protocols and Garmin said that the problem would be my h10 polar heart strap, but I wore it with other devices and it was normal. You know when that tidied up? Now in the summer, so wait for summer to arrive because this equipment has problems with cold. After that I sold my 955 and today I'm with apple watch and I don't regret it because it has fewer bugs.