Has Garmin always developed substandard & unreliable products? How have they lasted this long, with so many missing features?

Understand that the Venu is a "Health and Wellness" device - basically a general purpose device.  As you move into the Forerunner products and the the Fenix devices, you get more features.

First, we would like to thank you for taking the time to put together your feedback on your experience so far. We of course wish that you had a more positive experience, but we value all feedback as this helps us improve moving forward. Not just with our products, but also with how we support our customers here in the forums as well as in our online Support Center (support.garmin.com). I have tried to pull out the issue-specific feedback from your post to provide some information and answers below, but I realize this does not address each individual point you brought up. If we can help you further we are happy to hear from you to see if there’s anything else we can do to improve your experience and make sure that your current devices meet all of your needs.

• The Venu does only broadcast via ANT+ and more information can be found in our FAQ here. We do not advertise that it can broadcast information via BT.
• The Connect IQ developer community can be found here in our forums and has great participation from both internal and external developers.
• I cannot speak to how you would rate the quality of the existing Connect IQ content because this is of course subjective, but we are proud of what the CIQ community has developed and we continue to work to improve this ecosystem. In regards to larger companies creating CIQ apps, we do our best to work with all developers that are interested, but we cannot force an external company to add functionality via CIQ.
• You listed multiple concerns with your HRM Dual that lead me to believe it may need a replacement, but we would need more specifics to make sure.
• The Venu series is not compatible with trainers or power meters. These features are found on the cycling-specific devices like our Edge series and some multisport Forerunners/outdoor wearables. We do not advertise this as a feature.
• You mentioned multiple issues with Bluetooth connectivity, and we have some helpful FAQs available here and here.
• I cannot speak to third party accessories which I believe are what you mentioned, but it is true that we do not make screen protectors for the Venu series. We currently have almost 50 different watch bands that are compatible with the Venu however, all of which can be found at garmin.com
• We take any concerns of skin irritation very seriously and need to be in direct contact with users that have seen this as we cannot escalate a complaint like this via the forums.
• Information on the animated workouts can be found here.

If there is anything else you would like to discuss, please feel free to mention me on the forum and I will be happy to answer any of your questions or comments you may have. 

I've used pretty much every platform besides Apple Watch (I'm an Android user). When it comes to fitness features, non of the other platforms come close.

Wear OS is good as a smartwatch but the battery life is terrible and the app support isn't much better than Garmin. I returned my Wear OS watch after a few weeks.

Fitbit's smartwatches are pretty decent, but their only model with GPS built-in is like three years old and very laggy. I had one and liked it, but I gave up hope that they were going to release a new model.

My Venu does everything I need it to do. It reliably tracks my activities and sends them to Strava. It displays my text messages and shows who is calling me. And, most importantly, I only have to charge it every three days or so. I paid less than $300 for it, which I think is fair. If I wanted more Pro features, I would upgrade to one of the higher end models.

I don't know anyone who paid $500 for a Venu. Is that Canadian prices or something?

RunBayou said:

I've used pretty much every platform besides Apple Watch (I'm an Android user). When it comes to fitness features, non of the other platforms come close.

Wear OS is good as a smartwatch but the battery life is terrible and the app support isn't much better than Garmin. I returned my Wear OS watch after a few weeks.

Fitbit's smartwatches are pretty decent, but their only model with GPS built-in is like three years old and very laggy. I had one and liked it, but I gave up hope that they were going to release a new model.

My Venu does everything I need it to do. It reliably tracks my activities and sends them to Strava. It displays my text messages and shows who is calling me. And, most importantly, I only have to charge it every three days or so. I paid less than $300 for it, which I think is fair. If I wanted more Pro features, I would upgrade to one of the higher end models.

I don't know anyone who paid $500 for a Venu. Is that Canadian prices or something?

Hello! Thank you for that feed back! Its great to hear your experience with your Venu. We hope you continue to enjoy it! 

Forgot about the Samsung watch. I had one about four years ago, one of the earlier ones.

They are good watches. Much better than Wear OS. But they don't integrate with much of anything. You are pretty locked into using Samsung's apps. I don't think they integrate with Strava, which is a must for me. And like Wear OS, they are good smartwatches but not very good fitness watches for anything more than the most amateur athlete.

Arguing that the Garmin Venu doesn't have any of the more Pro fitness features and then recommending people buy devices that also don't have those features is kind of odd.

At the same price point, the only thing that comes close to Garmin is the Apple Watch. But I think Apple Watch might also not support Strava, so that would rule it out for me.

• I agree it is not advertised. A novice mistake on my behalf. Friends with Apple watches and even $60 Amazfit Bip's have been able to, and I never thought of the feature as a smartwatch-specific feature.I assumed that given the Venu's bluetooth connectivity, price point, and history of being a fitness users watch - this must be a feature. The fact that it doesn't have this specific capability in 2020 strikes me as surprising. I didn't think it would be such a difficult feature to implement. There are $60 watches that have this feature.
• There is definitely a community of Connect IQ/Monkey C users. It stinks that Garmin doesn't use a language like Java, where we could use other libraries. By using Monkey C, it automatically limits the community and discussion.  Monkey C is less popular than COBOL. Monkey C doesn't even register on Tiobe's list of the top 100 programming languages.  https://www.tiobe.com/tiobe-index/  
• I don't believe it needs a replacement per se. Other users have had this identical problem and received replacements. But I am always willing to try something out.
• The lack of trainer support is a bummer. I thought that with a fitness specific watch, I would have the ability to pull all my data together and be able to see HR/Cadence/Watts. There is a 'Indoor Bike' exercise mode that even asks you to connect it to an external sensor. If you were shopping at a large consumer electronics store, and you had a non-Garmin employee demonstrating the device to you; I would be willing to bet money they would not know that these menu screens are incorrectly suggesting or giving the impression that the device can talk to trainers/power meters. Once again, lesson learned. Don't assume. Ask lots of questions. FWIW - my friends who use Zwift have no issues with their Apple Watches. They can view heartrate/watts/cadence in one spot.
• Bluetooth connectivity is not the best on these devices. I will review the documentation
• It is great Garmin has some accessories. But consumers look for more than just watch bands. Screen protectors are extremely high margin, and your customers expect these to be available. I am guessing that due to the number of watch sizes across the Garmin lineup, plus not having Apple-esque popularity; consumers do not have established accessory brands (like Zagg) to rely on here. Garmin should fill this gap. It is money left on the table, and the absence of these products doesn't do the Garmin brand any service. Think of how you view less popular smartphone brands who lack accessories (many of these brands have left the business).Consumers see the lack of options available here, and subconsciously think the same of Garmin in the same way they see these defunct smartphone brands. Consumers want....Nike/Michael Kors/Kate Spade/Zagg branded accessories. They want to see these on BestBuy.com, and even in the store. 
• I will check out the documentation.

The big takeaway I have from the Garmin Venu and HRM-Dual fitness devices is a feeling of wonder and confusion.

I wonder, who is this product for? What is the target customer? The features, user experience and limitations make this audience exceptionally small. The features overlooked (or forgotten?) are getting to be inexcusable given the price point. What is really amazing to think of is how the Venu is not even close to the top-end of the Garmin ecosystem. There are $800-1500 watches. How does Garmin seriously expect to convert me from a mid-lineup customer to their premium lineup of products? Given my experience at what is the top-end of the majority of wearables on sale? I couldn't entertain buying a $1500 watch, out of fear for not asking the right questions about what is missing that Garmin overlooked? (I don't even know if these watches have the capabilities I am looking for)

Look at the competition. Garmin might not consider their watches smart, but Garmin watches are shopped against smartwatches. Overnight Apple has commanded over 55% of the industry. If Garmin doesn't believe their competition isn't the elephant in the room; then surely Garmin has to be uncomfortable with brands like Amazfit releasing sub-$100 watches with basic features that Garmin has overlooked. Yes, the Amazfit Bip can connect over bluetooth to trainers! This watch is a Venu SQ clone at 20% of the price. 

https://www.wareable.com/smartwatches/smartwatch-market-q1-2020-share-winners-7966

I wanted to be more impressed with Garmin. I wanted there to be a better alternative to Apple + the endless amount of startups in the wearables space. Naive of me, yes. I thought at these price points, the name Garmin, the fierce competition - I could have some of these features. Like in-app payments on Connect IQ, like broadcasting heart-rate over bluetooth, like connecting to trainers. I wasn't expected to play video games on my watch, but I would have loved to use these seemingly basic features. OH AND I FORGOT ABOUT GARMIN PAY....

Garmin Pay is sad. There is no support from Chase, American Express or other large credit card issuers. Dozens of credit unions, and hundreds of companies on the list - but not the elephants in the room? Why prioritize hundreds of small credit card issuers with a limited user base vs. (2) credit card companies that own the majority of the consumer credit market in the USA? I literally can't use it. 

All of these complaints are sent with the hope that Garmin recognizes the immense disconnect between customer expectations vs. what Garmin is delivering. I hope this message is a wake up call - for Garmin to use their cashflow wisely, to pick their battles wisely. Garmin absolutely has to step up and close these gaps. If not, consumers are going to stop buying the products.

I can't think of how a customer is going to fall in love with these products and recommend them with enthusiasm to their friends. Garmin doesn't have Apple Store like experiences. I won't be learning about their products from a qualified Garmin salesperson. I am going to learn about them from - at best, someone like DC Rainmaker, or at worst - a unfamiliar electronics sales associate at a big box retailer. As a first time wearables buyer, I didn't think I had to be so concerned about these features. I would never have thought these features could be missing from a wearables device, before finding out they were missing. This is how your potential customers are going to approach the brand. 

A customer cancels their gym membership due to covid, buys a Tacx (now owned by Garmin...) trainer, buys a cool looking Venu watch - they expect it to work together. They won't be reading the fine print.

$399.99 is Venu MSRP price. The item didn't sit on store shelves at this price point for very long. It was quickly dropped to $349.99, where it sat most of 2020. For sales, it dropped to $299.99, before finally making its way to $249 this holiday season (where it now competes directly against the Venu SQ Music - a questionable move as these watches compete against each other and cannibalize sales).

Worth noting that Snapdragon has introduced a 4100 series processor, which is making its way into Wear OS watches. The Mobvoi TicWatch Pro 3 @ 299 has this processor, and is claimed to be able to make it 2 days on a single charge, or up to 45 days in 'Essentials Only' mode.

The older Snapdragon 3100 cpu/limited ram WearOS watches had their issues with battery life and performance - which is what kept me (in addition to the supposed poor heart rate accuracy) from buying one of them.

Apple + Strava work well together. My spouse has one. She is able to view her heart rate, cadence, power/watt data for her workouts in Strava. She doesn't even have a newer Apple Watch. I have never been able to view this. I have to upload the Garmin data as a separate activity. I only ever have watts/cadence from the Wahoo Kickr activity, or I have just heart rate data from the Garmin activity. I quit connecting the HRM-Dual to the Wahoo Kickr due to poor heart rate monitoring. It was misleading when I saw workouts posting a flat line for heart rate data (like my heartrate was a constant 82bpm). I basically can never trust the data coming from the Garmin devices - which is really odd, considering I spent this much money to try and get health data that I could trust.

In hindsight, the TicWatch Pro 3 is probably the better non-Apple watch for me. It comes with Google Pay support (Chase/Amex card support), Google Assistant support, Play Store ecosystem, WearOS support (which I will count as a positive, as that means you can write apps in Java. Java being one of the top 5 most common programming languages in the world), plenty of exercise tracking features for me. It even has pulse oxygen, sleep tracking, stress tracking, etc. I basically look at this watch and ask myself if there is any feature the Garmin watch has, that the TicWatch Pro 3 doesn't have? The answer is of course, yes. But the areas where the Garmin has an edge is limited. Like......you won't find a Body Battery feature on the TicWatch Pro 3.

Samsung is going to suffer from the same issue Garmin has with applications. A small ecosystem with a limited customer base is a very very tough sell for software developers. The juice isn't worth the squeeze. It doesn't make sense to pick up a new language, spend cycles writing apps - all for less than 10% of the wearables market. 

I had to look at Garmin's Github page to amuse myself. If you look at WearOS vs. ConnectIQ;

https://github.com/android/wear-os-samples

https://github.com/garmin/connectiq-apps

WearOS, despite its flaws, has a (comparatively) much more active community surrounding it. The Garmin repository is basically dead :( 

If I were Garmin, I would acquire a smaller watch company like Oppo or TicWatch. Bring their development + R&D staff into Garmin. Then either make significant investments in the Connect IQ ecosystem - so that it is a viable alternative to WearOS / Samsung / Apple / FitBit. If they don't make significant investments in Connect IQ, I believe it is best for Garmin to switch to Wear OS itself, and build their platform & apps on top of it. Without significant investment, it would be easier to use another ecosystem vs. try to half-heartedly build your own. It seems obvious that the way things are going - more affordable watches (with more features oddly enough) are going to eat Garmin alive at the entry level price points; while Apple will eat Garmin alive at the premium end of the market. The difference in sensor technology used by competing brands will continue to erode, and the edge Garmin has will be erased there. 

If this was pre-Apple Watch, it would be a different story. But now that Apple is in the market, the competition has to get real, or they are going to get annihilated. Many people I spoke with who have already tried different wearables out, insisted I just get an Apple watch. They were right. It is a no brainer. It is much easier to accept the weaknesses in the Apple/WearOS watch, than it is to accept the weaknesses in the Garmin ecosystem.

Totally agree. I had multiple Garmin's from 2013 to 2018. After the Fenix 6 I bought said my heart rate was 190 as soon as I started a workout and was still standing still, I switched to Apple and have never looked back. It also cost me a lot because I  had to buy a phone also because I  was  on Android. Don't regret it at all, very happy with Apple. There IS a reason they are the leaders and best selling by far.

Amen. Garmin has a lot of equity in their brand. If Garmin put a massive focus on wearables, and made the right choices - I think they could turn it around. Problem I fear is; will anyone do it? Will Garmin seriously approach the challenge? Could Garmin even pay someone enough to leave a position like product manager of wearables at Apple? If I were that Apple employee, I wouldn’t leave Apple for Garmin.

So not only do I doubt Garmin, I doubt they could poach any talent from a company like Apple.

I do feel bad for brands like Garmin. They are dinosaurs slowly moving about their industry. A titan like Apple comes in, and redefines their industry overnight, becomes the best selling product, and sets the standards. For examples of Garmin archaic thinking - just look at their forums. In your profile, you can still add contact info for AOL Instant Message & Windows Live* 

Why not add In ICQ while they at it?

*Moderator's note: AOL Instant Messenger and Windows Live Messenger were removed from the contact information section.