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Garmin Vivoactive 3 Battery Drain

Former Member over 5 years ago

OK. Done with Garmin. Buying Samsung Galaxy. I paid $350 to preorder the Vivoactive 3 14 months ago. After the last software upgrade my watch battery drains in about 3 hours. This is after interacting with Garmin CS 3 times including a watch reset and also deleting files in my Garmin app and sending my Garmin folder to CS. Only made things worse!! Garmin CS told me this was an issue with the Vivoactive 3 but because my watch is 14 months old and past the warranty period they offered to replace for $99. What a deal. I get to buy another potentially defective watch for another $99. I told them I will buy another watch on Black Friday or Cyber Monday and it WON'T be a Garmin. Lousy company that tells you it is their issue but you can pay for it. $350 for around a year's use? I think not. Please post your Vivoactive 3 battery issues and bring this company back to its senses. The only thing they'll understand is loss of profit.

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0 Hervandil over 5 years ago

I'm having similar issue with VA3M.

After last update (SW 4.90), battery last at most 2 days, with lucky.

They have released a beta firmware, which some users are telling that corrected this (despite change log doesn't mention any battery improvement). But I'm afraid installing any beta SW. Imagine: if current releases have problems, what can I expect from a beta one...

Garmin never once again!!!

0 Former Member over 5 years ago

I have the same issue , VA3 is draining teh battery after 6.9 Update ! This is an old story with Garmin! every update is a nightmere! How can I avoid the update at all????

0 hhasert over 5 years ago in reply to Hervandil

The Beta is not *cough* as well tested as the 4.90, but I wonder how much difference there is based on the bugs in 4.90. Anyway, you can install 5.13 and if you are dissatisfied go back to 4.90, it is included in the zip file. (Same goes for 6.94, the old 6.90 is included so you can revert if needed)

0 hhasert over 5 years ago

Just a question, did you check if you have 'old' widgets running ? There were some issues mentioned on the forum with widgets or apps based on the older IQ SDK with background activities eating battery. I noticed some extra drain on my VA3M with 4.90, but not that extreme ever. Anyway perhaps the 6.94 beta will solve some of it, give it a spin, I have seen positive results on the forum.

0 Former Member over 5 years ago in reply to hhasert

I may try. Nothing to lose

0 hhasert over 5 years ago in reply to Former Member

That's the spirit ;-) Check for old widgets as well and you can try a hard reset (press the button until it shuts down) since that seems to be a miracle that Garmin was selling me (did not help me, but you never know).

0 Former Member over 5 years ago in reply to hhasert

Did full reset of watch. Then did file removal using pc and sent old garmin folder to company for analysis I assume. Did well over 99 dollars of their work for them

0 hhasert over 5 years ago in reply to Former Member

Indeed, you should get paid for the work instead of paying for a crappy device. I hope the 6.94 helps a bit, otherwise it is back to nagging them on a lower price for exchange. Oh, and charge it with a PC just for good measure since some people reported issues when using power banks or some adapters.

0 Former Member over 5 years ago in reply to hhasert

In all fairness on 4th call they offered a one time "deal" of $49. I won't bite as they caused this issue. Contrast that to LG who this week replaced my g7 because the camera stopped working. After 17 months.

0 hhasert over 5 years ago in reply to Former Member

Yeah, I think a battery running flat after 14 months should get a free replacement, I mean we will not expect 5 years full battery life on this equipment, but since you charge it every 5 days it should last a lot longer than 14 months. I mean my tablet lasted 5 years being charged every day before getting a dip in capacity.