Skin irritation

My wrist after ~2 weeks of 24/7 (outside of showers) usage. I don't feel the irritation but it's definitely not pretty...

I could have posted the exact same picture of my wrist after using the Fenix 5 for a month 24/7. I am not sure if it's the lights from the OHR or moisture being trapped under the watch, or if I was allergic to the metal. I assume it's not the latter.

Try this:

Wash off watch in sink. Make sure you clean the under side and the buttons. Put watch aside so that it can air dry.

Hop in shower and do your shower thing. Dry off, get dressed, let your arm air dry also.

Now, put your watch back on.

That's what I do after every workout/shower

Take off watch, wash watch in sink, dry watch off, take shower, dry off, put on watch

I never had any issue besides a tan line when I wore my FitBit HR 24/7, but I wore that loose enough to slip around more on my wrist. The 935 is heavier and stays pretty much in the same place all the time. Hopefully my wrist gets used to it

Just wanted to weigh in on this. I have the exact same skin irritation from my Fenix 3. I've literally worn stainless steel watches without any problems since I was maybe 12 years old (I'm 43 now). This is the first watch that has irritated my skin.

The only way to get rid of it is to stop wearing the watch, and instead put some Neosporin on your wrist and cover it with a bandaid. Took me about 30 days for it to go away. Then when I put the watch back on, it immediately came back, even though I cleaned the watch thoroughly. Took another 30 days for it to go away. Two months without wearing a watch after wearing one for 30+ years was a tough thing to swallow, especially given my line of work requires me to be very accurate minute to minute all day (pro photographer/videographer with lots of appointments, many of which depend on the time of day and position of the sun).

A few things that didn't work for me, or made things worse:

• Liquid bandage painted on my wrist, or painted on the back of the watch - this made things worse.
  
• Putting a band-aid (the adhesive side) on the back of the watch back - didn't seem to work at all - I seem to need the white cotton part between me and the metal
  
• Cleaning the watch, cleaning myself, not wearing the watch at night or in the shower - This never worked. After 30-45 days of not wearing the watch at all, the irritation almost disappeared.
  
• Wearing a NATO strap - This didn't seem to work I think because the recharge port might be part of the problem causing irritation, which my NATO bands didn't cover - A larger NATO band that covers the charging port would probably help if you can find one.
  

So now I'm totally allergic to the back of my fenix 3, which sucks. I will say that it took more than a year for this allergy to crop up. I wore it every day, silicon band, rubber band, leather band, etc. with no problems for about 13 months. It's almost like the metal had a coating on it that wore off after a year of constant use. Then one day, I am totally allergic to that watch.

The reason I am suspicious of the back of the watch or the charge port is because the metal on the back of the fenix 3 is a strange color and texture, i.e. not smooth and polished but rough and dark and deeply engraved with the name and CE, bluetooth and other logos which I can see might cause irritation. Also, the edges of the charge port are pretty sharp which I can see causing problems.

I haven't tried wearing another stainless steel watch since I've started having problems to see if it's specifically the stainless steel that Garmin uses or if it's all stainless steel watches. I'll write back with an update after I do this. I've been having this problem for about 3-4 months now and am currently just dealing with it.

BTW, my wrist looked/looks exactly like the above photo too. I now wear the watch with a bandaid on my wrist but this is not a long term solution.

TLDR: I have the same problem. Stop wearing the watch for a month-45 days and treat your wrist with Neosporin and cover it with a band-aid that you change every day. After that, you can wear the watch as long as you wear a bandaid underneath. Get the big box of band-aids or change watches or wear a NATO band that covers the charge port AFTER your wrist heals.

UPDATE: I started wearing my old Suunto Core with a more traditional polished stainless steel back and my wrist is fine and even looks better now that I'm not wearing the band-aid. If I try to wear the Fenix 3 for even a few hours, my wrist gets irritated. So it's definitely the material on the back of the Fenix 3 that's causing the problem for me.

literally worn stainless steel watches without any problems since I was maybe 12 years old (I'm 43 now). This is the first watch that has irritated my skin.

But how many have you worn as tight as these have to be worn to get heart rate? I’d suggest your watches have been worn a lot looser in the past allowing air to circulate. Easy to avoid this is not to wear them 24/7 or wear it looser and accept your HR won’t be monitored 24/7.

Just because you can track HR 24/7 doesn’t mean you have to.

But how many have you worn as tight as these have to be worn to get heart rate? I’d suggest your watches have been worn a lot looser in the past allowing air to circulate. Easy to avoid this is not to wear them 24/7 or wear it looser and accept your HR won’t be monitored 24/7.

Just because you can track HR 24/7 doesn’t mean you have to.

Thanks for the suggestion but I have the non HR Fenix 3 and my watches are almost never tight. That's just not the cause of this issue.

I loosen might one notch when I'm not working out, then I also change wrists at night to let my left wrist breathe some. I notice if I don't change wrists at night then I'll get irritation after a couple of days. Also the cleaning and drying suggestions after an exercise are a must.

Hi,

I am wearing the Forerunner 935 almost constantly for 3 days now and notice red skin irritation on the place where I wear the watch.
It is plastic, maybe that is the reason. I had it too with my Forerunner 630...
I never had this with my V800, but that was metal.

I have a 935 and have had a similar irritation. Initially I had wore the watch pretty much all the time and eventually the redness/irritation started under the watch, about where the HR sensor is started, very similar to what is pictured later in this thread.

So I switched wrists and was wearing it much less, perhaps a few days a week which helped for a while. Lately, however I am now getting irritation from the band, I keep loosening it up and get some relief but the only thing that work is not wearing the watch.

I had a 235 and never any issues and I wore that a lot more, the 935 band feels stickier... bummer something like this stops me from using it.

I've had my ForeAthlete 935 (Japan version of FR) for four days now and last night I noticed these marks on my wrist caused by the strap and not by the sensor. I've read suggestions in this thread on what I can do and I've tried mostly all i.e loosen strap a notch, change wrists, etc. I even clean my watch every now and then (no soap just under running cold water) but these marks keep coming back. The red is slightly lighter than usual as I've just finished washing my hand. Hoping my skin adjusts to the strap material in the coming days or soonerciq.forums.garmin.com/.../1333682.jpg

TONYH155 As per one of the other posters above try swapping wrists for a while. I find I occasionally get similar patch to you but much smaller. As soon as I see it develop I wash and dry the watch and swap wrists usually loosening it a notch when I have swapped. I always drop my watch and chest strap in the bath after a run or open water swim and dry them after. If metal straps are better for you then you could get one of Garmin's metal straps or a 3rd party equivalent. I bought a metal strap but as I have quite a slim wrist it was way too loose even after removing the adjusting links and adjusting to minimum diameter

Seeing this discussion popping up again.. I realized I have not had any skin irritation after my FR935 was replaced (because of a broken USB port). The epoxy over the OHR sensor on the back of the new watch feels almost a little rough, and it does not stick to the skin as the old one did.
So if you have irritation swapping wrists obviously helps, but contacting Garmin support may also be worth a try, perhaps there is a difference between production batches or something.