A general conversation about the future of MIP for our watches..

Of course it's all just guesswork, but my personal take is that probably more product lines will move to amoled only, some will continue to offer both options. I understand that MIP is currently unbeatable in Florida sunshine, but amoled is catching up (with higher battery consumption, of course). I live in Finland and recently moved from Fenix 5+ to Forerunner 965. It's summer now, but the visibility of the 965 is better even in Finnish sunlight in the middle of the day (the sun is lower than in Florida). And in shade or when it's cloudy, there's no competition here.

I think the biggest difference is MIP's "true" always on display, no need to turn your wrist or tap the screen. But people are increasingly getting used to bright and vibrant amoled screens with wrist flips before they move to Garmin, so I'd guess it's more and more difficult to sell MIP with just the no-wrist-flip-needed argument (when the screen contrast and colours are worse than amoled's).

Jury's out on that one, since Garmin has done quite a lot of restrictions and new visual design to make burn-in less likely. And it's probably mainly going to be an issue with always-on mode, otherwise the screen is off the vast majority of the time (you hardly ever hear about burn-in with amoled phones these days, and you stare at them for hours).

Of course, ironically, the bright Florida sunshine (where MIP beats amoled anyway), is also the highest risk for amoled burn-in. Probably not a problem in Finland.

Excellent response.  Thank you!  Yes, all makes sense.  I am open to AMOLED, the 965 does look nice and is the same price as the 955 Solar I just bought.   I still have 3 weeks to make a change if I wanted, so I am going to look more and more at some review videos of the 965 to learn more about it.

Right, this was something I was scared about.  I tried to look up info on this in terms of if people have had issues or not with Garmin devices.  I found that the Venue (version 1) seemed to in fact suffer from this, but it appears like they changed something in the Venue 2 (and other AMOLED devices) and I cant seem to find many (any) reports of this since.   I admit, I would love the AOD feature if I had one, lol..  so I would in fact be wondering about burn in.

My main reason for I upgrading to 965 instead of 955 was that although I loved my Fenix 5+, looking at contour maps in a Finnish forest was just annoying (I do a lot of hiking). The contrast, colour, and brightness of MIP just wasn't enough for my use. The same maps in 965's bigger amoled just blew me away. But again, I still admit that MIPs black-on-white data screens are esthetically more pleasing than amoled's white-on-black (again, to prevent burn-in and reduce battery consumption).

(I never even considered 955 Solar, since - living in Finland - solar charging is a thing only during the midsummer (but then of course we get solar almost nonstop... ))

Yeah, that makes sense.  Funny, I just found DC Rainmakers full review of the 965 and part of that video he was here in Miami, (ironic) comparing the display outside with the 955 and said that it really works out to be about the same in terms of actual visibility.  Of course, you can't just glance down without a gesture to provoke the full brightness but mentioned that once you get used to that it wins in all the other conditions.

So, I think it's a matter of people being open to a new way of thinking.  The brain tickle I have now is that its the same price as the one I just bought last week, LOL.  So, now wondering if I should make a trip back to the Garmin store and take a hard look at the 965...

I had the 955 and changed to the 965. Here were some of my initial points. I'm used to gesturing now, found a nice watch face on IQ and am doing well with it now.

https://forums.garmin.com/sports-fitness/running-multisport/f/forerunner-965/329241/the-965-is-here-finally

I doubt I could go back to the 955 although I was hesitant on the 965 initially.

Oh please let them keep the MIP. I bought a functional watch, and not a bling bling watch

Yes.  The MIP is amazing, especially ones without the sapphire glass.  I was just walking my dog now with the 955 Solar...  Its bright and sunny here today and all I could think about was "Man, if I return this and exchange for the 965 or Epix.. would I regret that every time I go outside."   Having that MIP just there, taking no additional power, or gesture is so nice.    Perhaps I am watching too much YouTube, seems like all the big reviewers now all are favoring the AMOLED watches and its just got in my head that the end of MIP is here, and I feel some kind of pressure to not invest in something that is phasing out.   Its hard to tell with Garmin and what their plans are moving forward.  If I need to adapt, fine but I'd rather do it now and get it over with, lol.

EDIT - one big thing when looking at say the 955 (have now) or the 965, is the watch faces all look too "cartoony" with crazy mixed colors vs. the more "normal" and practical ones on the 955 (which I love many of).   I feel as if I would miss them on the 965, as I have seen videos of what the watch face selections are and they are kinda all over the top IMO.  I avoid connect IQ downloads, because of extra battery drain etc.