Altitude

Hi, i'm agree with you about the poor accuracy of this device with his barometer.

You can change your activities to show GPS elevation 'by default' instead of your device information.

But if you need elevation informatrion during activity, i haven't found this setting on the device.

Barometer was one the principal features to bought this device :-(

Ok how do i set GPS elevation by default?

On VA3 you cannot. If equipped with barometer it uses that metric by default. You must go to Garmin Connect web and opt for correction data at each activity. It sucks but that's a limitation.

Barometric altitude is the most accurate but what people need to understand that it needs to be constantly calibrated using MSLP or equivalent from a nearby weather station. Given that garmin watches are using barometer for its altitude values I expect that it should also be doing the calibration otherwise the result is useless. Could anyone know if it is using any weather station updates to do this calibration?

Under Garmin Connect

support.garmin.com/.../

I changed the watch to GPS only yesterday and my altitude error disappeared. Has anyone else seen this? 

In my case it was approx -350M out and driving me mad. With the GPS only setting it seems to have correctly calibrated now and it is within 2M of the map contours.

Maybe the altitude calculations aren't working well with a combination of GPS + GLONASS enabled.

I tried to use the 'elevation corrections' options on some activities by Garmin Connect account as described on
support.garmin.com/.../
It works.

I can not find this option on mobile Garmin Connect application.   Do you know where this option is (or not) hidden.

I'd like to turn this option 'ON' for all my past and future activities.  Is it possible?

The barrometric altitude in VA3 is useless :(

(p.s. I compared altitude on VA3 to my old VA2 (HR)  smartwatch - still have it - and the VA2 is much more accurate)

That works indeed, in the portal, but still not working in the app, there I did a cycle today again under sealevel.btrier different settings in the past with gps or combi with glonass but still the same.

Garmin, as a big manufacturer with lots of very nice devices , please fix this or bring the calibration back which was there in the past. Watch is still very nice but height is rubish please fix.

Even the much cheaper vivosport is superaccurate , think based on gps only.

I am OVER Garmin not fixing this issue! I have gone up my stairs once today. It says I've done 6 flights! It's counting elevation climbs that are ridiculous. 

My vivoactive HR never had this problem.

The barometer is badly impacted when the temperature changes. A calibration of the barometer at the start of the activity doesn't help since after you started the activity your temperature will increase (not to mention if you are exposed to sun rays).

Therefore the only acceptable solutions are SOFTWARE FIXES:

- compensate the barometric reading with the temperature fluctuation

or

- use GPS altimeter instead

It's not acceptable Garmin says that such watches are "recreational" and this "concern" is within their tolerance, refusing to address it with a permanent fix.

Meanwhile I also support introducing an option to Always set to ON the Elevation Correction. It's a pain in the @$$ to do it manually after each outdoor activity.