Customer Ratings & Reviews

I had my eye out for this for months, ever since I decided to get a fitness smart watch. I first got a Fitbit Blaze, which wasn't bad except notifications weren't coming in consistently. I ended up with the Aple Watch Sport, which I love for countless reasons. But last week I found myself at this website, eyeing the Vivoactive HR. It has ALL the features I want in a fitness watch! I use it for cycling, and it works great....I especially love the HR feature. It gives awesome details about my rides...from all the heart rate data you can think of as well as sped, average speed, distance, how long your heart rate was in each zone. A lot of info I didn't even realize I was missing! I would knock off a half a star due to the dim screen, but I use it mostly outside where it is easily visible.

This is a great device. Ordered it and it arrived in one day. Has a great design and is very useful for someone who is active. I have not tried the waterproof feature yet but have heard it works. It is definetly a better device then the fitbit surge because it is not as bulky and is waterproof which comes with a lot of additional features like swimming. Great display and the touch screen is great. Easy to use and maneuver around. My only complaint is that after constant wear it gets uncomfortable because of the heart rate sensor, but that is one of the good features about this device. I also really, really enjoy the connect iq store. It allows you to download applications and watch faces.

I bought the vivoactive HR to replace my forerunner 225 and I love this watch. Extremely easy to scroll between screens during the run, and for an added bonus it is a great smart watch that allows you to have access to email, text, and social media. If you are looking for a running watch that can double as a smart watch then this is the watch for you.

I have had my fair share of smart watches for running from Nike Tom Tom, to the regular TomTom watch. Both of those watches took minutes to connect to the GPS and if it was cloudy or raining good luck. The Garmin takes seconds, even in the rain, and snow! It is extremely accurate on the distance, heart rate and steps. The battery does in fact last about 7 days. There are so many apps you can download for it too. Since I work in corrections I am not allowed to have it synced to my phone so I haven't used the mobile app, but I do connect it to my PC and it works just the same. When the watch is dead it takes only 10 or so minutes to reach a complete charge. I cannot say enough good things about this watch.

This watch is everything I wanted in an activity tracker and it does a great job without getting in the way. The battery life on it is amazing I get up to 6.5 days on one charge. I only wish there was more support for this watch through Garmin and better app and sync support, wish it was more comparable to Fitbit and their ecosystem. If your looking for a basic activity tracker then look elsewhere. This is for the fitness enthusiast. Personally I love it! Some people complain about the screen being too dim, this is true but its a good trade off considering the screen is always on. Has built in GLONAS and GPS and always on HR monitor. I am very please with this purchase. I hope Garmin adds more support in the near future. Top it all off its water proof up to I think 30 meters for 30 min.

This watch is more durable than thought it would be. It takes a lot of abuse from working on a construction site and still looks brand new and holds a charge surprisingly well. The notifications is a really nice feature as well.

This is a solid product where function meets style. Have had it for a few months so I feel qualified to evaluate it. The good: Features (water resistant, GPS, good developer support for apps, and good app for monitoring activities). The bad: Dim watch face (as compared to Apple Watch, which I own), large for small wrists, and unmet potential based on computing power. A good all-around advanced activity tracker for the intermediate athletic person. The upside is its continually having software upgrades to deal with previous deficiencies and reach potential. A worthwhile purchase.

I preordered this for both my husband and I. I am a small woman and I don't have any problems with the size. It fits comfortably on my arm. Setting it up is easy, syncing with Garmin connect is easy. I don't have any issues with the brightness of the screen. I find it interesting to track my walking, sleeping, syncing with MyFitnessPal, and all the other things that others have mentioned. I have worn it 24/7 since I got it except to charge and it charges really fast. I usually charge it when I know I am going to be still reading or on my computer for a few minutes. The only problem I have with it is the golf. The GPS works great for measuring the distance to the hole or measuring a shot. IT DOES NOT KEEP STROKE SCORE AS IT ADVERTISES. It only does Stableford and NOT stroke play - and does not do any statistics such as putts. I emailed and called them, but unless there are a lot of customers who complain, they will not make any changes. This is a real bummer for my husband and me because we can't use it to keep score like we were excited about. I was using the S4 and the Vivofit and hoping to only have one device. Now I wear this and the S4 on my other arm.

I waited 2.5 months for this new product to be released. It was worth every moment. Garmin had me at waterproof! Perfect for tracking every activity imaginable.

I have this fitness for five days now and I love it as it tracks all my steps and it is easy to use which is touchscreen which is awesome. I would recommend this tracker to anyone who wants to stay on track with being active especially if you want to lose weight and go for the goal of 10,000 steps which I usually do a 5K walk 3 to 4 times a week with the GPS tracking where you are walking and when it is paired with smartphone you can see it which is awesome!!!!

This has everything I need: HR monitor, waterproof, auto-sleep tracking, tracks every activity imaginable including swimming, works with iPhone, simple user interface. Screen is great in sunlight (though a little dark in a poorly lit room). Just bought it, and so far it has worked perfectly. My only complaint is that the plastic exterior scratches very easily (got a scratch on day one) - would receive a 5 if not for that.

Heart monitor is good, battery life is good, water resistant for swimming as well. My issue is the brightness. As I sit in my living room during the day, I cannot see the watch reading without hitting the backlight. I have my product brightness turned up to 9 as well. I am still considering taking this back. I own several other garmin products and this is the 1st negative experience I have ever had with one.

I feel like the garmin vivoactive hr is probably best in its class for wrist based heart rate monitors. I've found it to be on par with the treadmills/stair masters/elipticals. The gps tracking was very quick and took about 5 seconds to lock on. It's not the best looking watch but it's not built for that. It was built for the individual that is looking to track their workouts/runs and not have to worry about its ability to hold up. The backlighting of the watch could be improved for night runs, but outdoors during the day there are no complaints. The only complaint I have for wrist based heart rate monitors and possibly the garmin Vivoactive hr was that they're not ready for prime time just yet. There is a 15-30 second delay for real time heart rate during a workout, especially during anything like crossfit, lifting weights, functional training etc. This issue has to do with the wrist as the primary reading for the heart rate. It is mostly bone and doesn't provide as accurate of a reading like the forearm, chest, or forehead.

I was a big fan of the fitbit surge prior to this product, until the wristband began to tear. Unfortunately it is not replaceable and working with fitbits customer service was not the greatest. Now onto the Garmin. So far a week into ownership, I LOVE IT. It's a fitbit surge on steroids! Same type of low power display, I charged it 6 days ago and I'm at 52% battery. Customizable watch faces, custom stride length, replaceable wrist bands, the list goes on. The HR monitor is accurate, but you will have to play with its placement at first. Very happy with it, and would recommend to anyone.

I started running again and wanted a good fitness tracker. Husband had a FitBit I wore for a while, it was ok but not for me long-term. Husband wears a Polar, likes it but it's too big for my wrist. Found the Vivoactive HR before it's release and was interested. Read comparisons and pre/post release reviews and it was the golf app that won me over. I'm no super athlete but... Pros - Fits me (Female with smaller wrist). Good for what I want it for = running, walking, golf, HR, reminding me to get off my butt, biking (when I decide to do that) and other apps that can be added. Battery time is reasonable, wore for 4 days on wilderness hike and tracked hikes. Battery ran out as I reach the truck to drive out. Back lighting improved with update (but still not as clear as husband's Polar). Seems to be accurate with mileage tracking and HR (as long as correctly positioned on wrist, but still better than having to wear strap) Cons - Wasn't the most intuitive to set up, didn't want to link between phone & watch and took several tries. Took me a little time to understand how all apps work (like golf courses only show within certain distance of course, so you may think they didn't all download). Screen freezes occasionally and doesn't always want to power-off to reset. Screen can get scratched (should be more durable if worn on wrist) so I have concerns of chipping. Doesn't track HR while sleeping, (which ok because I prefer to wear bulk when sleeping) Overall, I'd recommend if fits what you want to use for

I think that every time Garmin adds something to its line-up it is bound to be better or more in tune with the purpose they built it for. I was looking for an alternative to using my VivoActive without the HR monitor built within. Not the chest strap. It was a fantastic watch that took a beating and was water resistant enough to swim regularly. I am more satisfied now with the same watch multi sport functionality, but with a built in HR on the back. WTG Garmin. They also added more multi sport features for SUP and more.

I have a Garmin 620 sports watch and a wrist worn HR monitor because chest straps are so annoying. I also have a Garmin Edge 520 for my road race bike which has integrated sensors. This technology worked fine except I was looking to have one wearable device to collect the biometrics needed to support my training and competing goals (I am not a professional, just a weekend warrior) and the Vivoactive HR seemed to be the answer. I waited for a long time for the Vivoactive HR to be released and despite what Garmin's website indicates the Vivoactive HR is now available for purchase. My hope was that for $250 Garmin had created the perfect sports watch since I just can't justify paying $600 for the other models Garmin offers. I have had the watch for several days now and have used it for marathon and cycling training. My assessment is that it is a relatively comfortable watch, highly configurable, it does record HR, and battery life is good, however the screen is so dim (even when fully cranked up) that it is worthless unless in bright sunlight. It works ok for running though I question some of its accuracy. Some data fields are so far off accurate that I wont use them. For example temperature is off by 10 degree or more. It also does not directly connect to WIFI as the Garmin 620 does meaning you are teathered to your phone so it can blue tooth to it. Here is the biggest deficiency...it is not of much value for cycling. For those of us that use Zwift and Trainer Road you know streaming HR to those services is critical. The Vivoactive HR forces the users to go deep into the setting to set the "broadcast HR" function but in doing so it cuts you off from any other functions on the device. Who wants to mess with settings menus every time you train or race. This is really very poor software design. You have to do this to make the Garmin 520 Cycling Computer pick up HR and there are some metrics cyclist would want on the 520 and others on your wearable device to get a complete metrics picture. You would think the integration between these devices were well designed and seamless since they come from the same company but this is not the case. This renders the Vivoactive as a very expensive HR monitor when it comes to Cycling. Though it held so much promise...this is not the watch for multisport athletes. I am glad I kept the boxes as I plan to return it this week. I love my Garmin 520 Cycling Computer and my Garmin 620 is a nice sport watch only lacking the HR monitor. Too bad the Vivoactive HR was such a disappointment for me.

This is my first time to wear a fitness watch. It does a good job of tracking my steps and monitoring my heart rate. The back-light is dim; I think Garmin needs to improve the lighting. I downloaded a non-Garmin app (Sky Watch). It did mess up my watch. Tech Garmin Support fixed it; they said to be careful about downloading anything not from Garmin.

I really wanted to like the watch. I just started running again and wanted to keep up with my stats including heart rates. The watch is very light and feels really good. Could easily wear it all the time with no discomfort. My big issue was the screen is just to dim. Nothing like the pictures you see in the advertisements. I did read other reviews complaining about this issue. I know that a brighter screen draws more battery power but I would much rather give up a few days running time in order to brighten it up some. Also my eyes aren't what they used to be and the fonts on the screen are too small for me to accurately see. Garmin could have made this watch just a little larger and brighter and I think I would have kept it.

I am happy with this Garmin product...quirks and all. It's a great running watch and accurately tracks distance thanks to built in GPS (which is a BIG deal to a runner). PROS: light weight, inactivity reminder, pop up alerts / messages from paired smartphone, accurately tracks distance, you can control your music on sync'd phone, activity auto start (just break out into a sprint and the garmin will immediately identify you are exercising and begin to track your stats), built in heart rate monitor and has its own Garmin app store to help personalize the watch. CONS: the display is made to be able to see outdoors in bright light but then renders the display difficult to read sometimes when indoors (especially with a screen protector over the watch face), does not accurately track stairs / number of flights climbed (this is a common complaint seen in other reviews), frequently have to manually sync to my iPhone 6. Overall, it's a great watch for the price and the pros far outweigh the cons.