Garmin - vivosmart 4 Activity Tracker + Heart Rate - Black

I had a few hesitations purchasing this device at first looking through online reviews and what not, and was mainly deciding between this device and the Fitbit Charge 3 that released around the same time. I didn't care much about the GPS factor as I almost always have my phone on me and the Garmin Connect app connects to Strava, which maps your runs anyways. Where this device really shines is that it is a fitness tracker. That's it. Nothing more, nothing less, but it does a very good job at doing just that, being a fitness tracker. It's extremely slim form factor makes it easy to forget that you even have it on. The battery life is awesome as well (I have yet to get close to empty, but I do take it off daily [not always] when I shower) and I've had this product for almost a month now! So A+ for design and battery life so far. In term's of usefulness, accuracy and metrics. This device comes with all the advanced sensors except for GPS as mentioned above, which may be a deal breaker for some. In terms of tracking heart rate, it has proven to be very accurate so far for myself though I've read certain variations if doing overhead activities (which makes sense because the blood is flowing away from your extremities here...) and something that I find acceptable. The HR tracker is all-day and I haven't looked for a way to turn it off, since I like continuous readings. This device can also be configured to detect when you are exercising based on your heart rate zones, which are automatically set based on your body dimensions and changed as your work out. This device also tracks your sleep extremely well and one of the most awesome features is the "Body Battery" tracker, which uses various data points to determine if you are exhausting your body and should rest/refuel, or if you have enough energy and are good to go. I have found this to be extremely accurate across various situations. Similarly to Fitbit, the Vivosmart 4 also checks your sp0(2) levels, or oxygen saturation levels. Many people might not care, but fitness junkies (and well, everyone) should, as it is a indicator of how efficient the cardiovascular and respiratory system are working. In summary, I love this device. I was choosing between this and the Fitbit Charge 3 as mentioned, but saw many and personally seen too much variation in HR readings from Fitbit devices. If HR cannot be accurately measured, it would alter all the other "metrics" that Fitbit claims to be accurately calculating. The Vivosmart 4 wins with being a pure fitness tracker (I rarely look at it or interact with it, which I think is the point), form factor, and overall price.

I have a sleep app on my phone where you have to put the phone by your pillow to track your sleep. But the problem was that it tracked movement only. I have a dog that constantly vibrates the bed with her heavy panting, jumping up and down from the bed, and moving around to get comfortable. So, my app would track her and not just me. I needed something to track me and me alone, but something basic. I already have a phone so I do not need a second "phone" on my wrist. This watch is basic but has more features than what I have seen in other watches. It tracks my steps, calories, distance, energy levels, oxygen levels, and stress levels. Other watches I have seen only do the steps, calories, and distance. Even though this watch does not have GPS, it is very accurate in tracking my steps. To test and see if it only tracked with arm movement, I held my arm up and walked. It still tracked my movement to the T. The display is the perfect size and I have no problem with getting it to light up by just holding up my wrist. If you put "do not disturb" on, you will have to tap the screen to get it to turn on. This is convenient when you're trying to sleep at night and don't want to be disturbed by a bright light. I have not tried the alarm yet, but I enjoyed the sleep tracker. It tracked only me and not my dog that on my head and breathing in my face. It was very accurate and I loved the graphs on the app. I was afraid that I would have to leave my phone on in order for the sleep tracker to work, but that was not the case. I can turn my phone off for the night, then turn it on in the morning and the watch uploads everything into the app. I love the stress detector. Sometimes I don't even notice that I am starting to stress out then my watch will beep and give me a breathing exercise. Also love the body energy levels. I can see how tired I am during the day and if I need to rest. Then lastly, I like the oxygen levels. I can check my levels before and after an exercise to make sure I am getting enough air. More importantly, I like it when I'm sleeping. I have a suspicion that I am not getting enough air at night due to my horrible teeth grinding. The watch showed my levels got slightly low, but it was a good night for me with little to no teeth grinding. I'll have to wait for a bad night to see if my oxygen levels drop and if the watch wakes me up.

I previously had a Garmin soft strap for my HR workouts and it worked great. The vivosmart 4 does all that and more. Even solves some issues, like no more stinky strap. I wanted it specifically for the pulse ox features, but my issue is its only setup to run at night while you sleep and not during your workout. It's geared for people with sleep apnea, not people trying to optimize Sprint efforts. I like the body battery feature and it's amazingly accurate. Recently got a bad virus and the battery closely matches how I felt over the week. It buzzes a lot with notifications that dont matter to me, not that they stay up long enough for me to see. It does broadcast ANT+. But it won't do anything else while broadcasting. The battery does last a week and charges in 2 hours or less. Heart rate seem pretty close to what I got with my strap.

I compared the Garmin Vivosmart 4 with the treadmill readings at my gym. When I am fast walking at 4.5 miles per hour my heart rate on the treadmill will be between 130 and 140. However, the Garmin will show at 65-75? I fast walked exactly 2 miles on the treadmill but the Garmin showed three miles. I have compared readings many times on different treadmills. I understand readings being a little off, but this is way off. Sleep seems to be over counted and even counts time I am in the bed watching TV. Recharging is needed every 3 days. Would prefer a battery that would need replacement once a year. Body battery, stress level, calories are nice features but I have no way of determining how accurate these features are. Body battery seems the most accurate.

This watch records over 2000 steps in my sleep and there was over a 4000 step discrepancy between what the app said and what the watch said. I want to enjoy this device more, but with this much inaccuracy in a basic metric I am deeply disappointed. My other complaint is that the screen is VERY small so you have to constantly scroll to see even basic metrics. Now on to the things I actually like about this watch. I like that it has pulse oximetry data and it gives much more detailed information on a walk than my old Fitbit did (ie average pace). I also appreciate that data export is easy and the device can be configured to broadcast heart rate data to anything with ANT+. The media player is also nice.

This unit worked well. It had good battery life and I liked the fact that it has pulsox, a feature that is lacking in most competing products. The main reasons I bought this were (1) to be able to track heart rate during exercise and rest and (2) to track sleep patterns. I especially like the ability to see reports on heart rate and oxygen levels during sleep. Ultimately I returned it because the screen was too small for me to read easily and I wanted to try something with a few more features, like text message and email notification. Since then I have tried a fitbit versa and an apple watch 4 but neither is as good for sleep tracking.

I really like the battery life and tracking provided by this fitness tracker; as well as how much information is provided in the companion app. My main issue with this device is the same issue people might have with the similar form factor of the Fitbit Alta. I find that for me there is too much of a deadzone when it comes to activating the display and how hard I have to tap the display to wake it up. Overall it functions well as a fitness tracker but my issues are really tough to deal with if using it as anything more than a casual companion to track data.

Are all of the reviews on here fake or something? I've never found any wrist monitor accurate with HR monitoring, which makes them all worthless. Seriously. I thought this one might be different, given the high reviews. Nope. First day weight lifting with P90x. It said I was inactive for 27 of the 30 minutes! Today 50 mins of Insanity - it said my HR ranged between 70-90!!! I'm 53 yo, and my HR with a chest strap doing Inanity is 120-150. Only thing good about this band compared with others is that's it's small and relatively unnoticeable while you're wearing it.