We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites, this is at NO extra cost to you. These small fees allow us to create great content and keep striving to create better content.
Garmin Enduro Review
If you’re someone who participates in ultramarathons or long course triathlons, this smartwatch will definitely pique your interest. In this review, you will find an overall description of the watch, as well as its features, so you can decide if it meets your needs as an endurance athlete.
Before we jump into the Garmin Enduro review, we wanted to share the process we went through to make it happen. This isn’t a sponsored post; we bought the watch to check out its features and take our own pictures. The purpose of this review is to help you decide whether this is the best watch for you.
- Long battery charge
- Lightweight
- Superior product for marathon runners
- Extensive activity tracking
The Garmin Enduro
The Garmin Enduro is Garmin’s latest smartwatch and promises that “you’ll wear out before your watch does” with a solar-charging battery that can deliver up to 65 days of run time. This battery life has never been offered by a smartwatch before!
This smartwatch supports Garmin’s mission to be a company that lasts by creating superior products in the categories they serve, including outdoor and sports. With the power glass solar charging lens on the Garmin Enduro, the company supports its vision to be a global leader in every market they serve. The solar lens provides up to 300 hours of GPS battery life in particular conditions.
Pros
- Long battery charge
- Lightweight
- Superior product for marathon runners
- Extensive activity tracking
Cons
- No Topo maps or Onboard music
- No wifi sync
- No Climbpro on the fly (can use it based on a course)
Things to Consider Before Buying a Garmin Enduro
If you’ve struggled with battery life with other smartwatches, this will be the least of your concerns when you have a Garmin Enduro. You can manage the watch’s power usage while you’re working out or while you’re racing so that you can extend the battery life.
This is for the endurance athlete who trains in various sports, including biking, golfing, hiking, rowing, skiing, swimming, and trail running. This watch’s features support your training and provide performance metrics and recommendations on when you should rest and workout programs. It also helps with your overall health, measuring oxygen intake and how much solid sleep you’re getting.
For athletes who want their watches to provide music while they train, the Garmin Enduro falls short. You’re paying for the extraordinarily powerful battery life. If you want music and maps on the go, you’ll want to look at the more cost-effective Garmin Fenix 6 series of watches, where you can find some of the features the Garmin Enduro lacks without sacrificing too much when it comes to the life of the battery.
Features & Benefits
Below you’ll find some of the features and benefits of the Garmin Enduro. You’ll see some tools you can find in other Garmin smartwatches and others making their debut with this watch. Read on to see if this is the smartwatch for you!
Bezel Choice
You have your choice of a bezel when you’re considering the Garmin Enduro. You can choose the stainless steel bezel with the grey Ultrafit nylon strap or the DLC (diamond-like carbon) coated titanium with a black Ultrafit nylon strap. The choice of bezel affects not only the watch’s price but its weight, with the stainless steel model weighing 71 grams and the titanium model weighing 61 grams.
Regardless of the color of the bezel you choose, you’ll be able to enjoy a 280 x 280-pixel display and 64 MB of memory. It’s okay if you don’t like the color of the strap that comes with the bezel you choose since these watches are Quickfit watch band compatible.
Solar Charged Battery
The Garmin Enduro’s crown jewel is its solar-powered battery. It can run for 2 weeks in maximum battery mode and can last for 65 days when the watch is in smartwatch mode using solar power. This surpasses previous smartwatches that boasted 30 days at best, and this watch more than doubles that battery power. You’ll never have to worry about running out of power when you’re on the trail with this watch!
Power Manager
This is an excellent feature for the athlete who wants to make changes while moving. If you’re on the trail and feel like you’re losing battery power too quickly, you can make changes that will extend the battery life right on your watch without cutting into your race or training time!
Trail Run V02 Max
Trail Run V02 Max is a new addition to Garmin’s smartwatch lineup. This is a useful feature for those who want to track how your workouts affect your cardiovascular fitness. You get to see how different workout conditions affect your performance so you can adjust the routine as needed. If you have cardiovascular health goals, this feature might be the one you’ve been looking for!
Ultrarun
Ultrarun is another new addition to the Garmin smartwatch features. Endurance athletes, including triathletes, will appreciate this benefit since it allows you to track the time spent at rest stations. After your race, you can review the time spent at the rest stations, get a better idea of your actual race time and see where you can improve your race time for future events.
MTB Dynamics
This feature is for the athletes who participate in mountain bike training and racing. Keep track of every trek on your bike with mountain bike benchmarks provided by this watch. This highlight offers specialized grit (the difficulty of the ride) and flow (how well you maintain speed in varying conditions) measurements that rank trail difficulty and how easy the descent is, giving you a score to beat the next time you get on your bike.
Heat & Altitude Acclimation
If you’re running at different elevations and in varying temperatures, this feature will allow you to see how your body deals with those different environments. This is a great tool for athletes who travel to compete in races or even to train since you can prepare yourself for the race depending on the race’s environment.
Performance Metrics
This feature is a great tool for training since it allows you to view advanced metrics, including providing you with a recovery advisor. You get to see how heat and altitude acclimation affects your cardiovascular health with adjusted V02 max. This will help you maximize your training, as you can train in different conditions and see how it affects your heart health.
Recovery Advisor
Consider this feature like your digital trainer! It recommends how long you should rest before pushing your body to the limits again based on data collected from previous workouts and races. It’s great to have training programs that push you to test your limits, but it’s also nice to have a reminder to rest, so you don’t push your body to the point of injury.
Daily Suggested Workouts
If you’re getting bored of the workouts that you’re used to, you’ll appreciate the daily suggested workouts offered with this watch. Whether you’re looking for a new ride or a new run, these workouts are personalized for you. The programs take into account your fitness level and training load before recommending a workout. The convenient thing about this is that the workouts are being delivered straight to your watch!
Multi-GNSS Support
Avoid getting lost with the Garmin Enduro. This watch has access to numerous global navigation satellite systems so you can track where you are in locations where GPS on its own makes getting a signal more difficult. With this watch, you can venture on your training with the confidence that you won’t lose your signal regardless of how far off the beaten path you choose to go.
Navigation Sensors
If you thought the GNSS support was enough to support you in your training, you’ll be pleased to learn about the ABC sensors, which provide an altimeter to provide you with elevation data, a barometer to check the weather conditions, and a 3-axis electronic compass to pinpoint your location. You’ll appreciate the barometer when it warns you about a storm during your workout so you can find shelter and not have to worry about getting caught in the downpour!
Mapping
This is one of the areas where the Garmin Enduro falls short when compared to other smartwatches. The Enduro uses breadcrumbs routes, which is a feature found in the Garmin Forerunner 745 as well. The downside to this is that the routes provided don’t compare to an actual map.
The map workaround for the Garmin Enduro is dwMap, a navigation app that was designed for more basic models of Garmin watches that didn’t have any navigation, using a breadcrumb route function, with a premium option that provides turn by turn directions. This feature is better suited to trail running rather than riding bike trails.
PacePro Technology
This is another great feature of the Garmin Enduro, and it helps you stay on pace with guidance that is adjusted for the changes to the grade as you run the course. Set up your goal for a particular distance, and this feature will let you know if you’re on pace to meet that goal. If you missed the goal for one leg of the race, your watch will automatically adjust the pace for the remainder of the run or ride.
Surf-ready features
This is a feature any surfer will appreciate. The Garmin Enduro can be paired to a compatible smartphone running the Surfline Sessions app. Once synced, you can capture videos of waves while surfing in the sight of your Surfline camera. You’ll be able to watch those videos later and make a plan of action for the next time you plan to catch those waves.
Wrist-based heart rate
Check your heart rate intensity during your workouts, including variability to calculate your stress level with an optical sensor. This feature works underwater without needing a heart rate strap, so you can track your heart rate regardless of whether you’re working out on dry land or in a pool.
Pulse OX Sensor
Find out your oxygen absorption rate, whether that’s while you’re working out or while you’re asleep. Oxygen intake is important, and this feature gives you an idea of how healthy your oxygen intake is at different points during the day.
Advanced Sleep Monitoring
This feature provides a breakdown of how many hours of sleep you’re getting on a nightly basis. It tracks your deep sleep and REM. It also provides information based on the data gathered by respiration data and the Pulse OX Sensor so you can see how your breathing and oxygen intake are affecting your sleep.
Body battery energy monitoring
This is another great feature for the endurance athlete that takes their training seriously. This tool is designed to help you improve your body’s energy bank using information like your sleep, stress levels, heart rate variability, and other data. The data is used to indicate when you’re ready to be active and when you need to rest, ensuring that you’re always operating at your best.
Hydration Tracking
Water intake is important for everyone, but it’s essential when you’re doing rigorous training and competing in endurance events. This feature offers the ability to log your daily water intake to remind you to stay hydrated. When you enable auto-goal, you’ll be able to see sweat loss after a workout or race, and the goal will be adjusted as needed.
Respiration Tracking
Monitor your breathing throughout your day and see what changes are happening depending on the activity you’re doing. If you ever have trouble sleeping, this feature may be of significant interest to you since it’s been said that a high respiratory rate can indicate that something isn’t right and can affect your sleep.
Smart Notifications
Stay in the loop while you’re on the trail! Feel comfortable leaving your phone at home when you’re off on a run or a bike ride, knowing that you’re still connected! Once you pair your watch with a compatible device, you’ll be able to receive alerts, texts, and emails while you’re training.
Garmin Pay
Leave your cash, bank, and credit cards at home and pay with this app instead! This convenient feature allows you to travel light and safe since you can leave your cash and cards at home. All you need is a participating store, and you’re good to go!
Safety & Tracking
This is a great feature, particularly for those who love going off the beaten path and have loved ones concerned about their safety. You can share your location and the path you are taking with an emergency contact. You also have an assistance and incident detection feature with this watch that allows emergency responders to track you when you activate the SOS notification.
Alternatives
If you’re thinking about getting a smartwatch, but you aren’t convinced that the Garmin Enduro is the right one for you, one of the alternatives below may suit you better. Click on the smartwatch name to go to read my review of each watch.
Garmin Fenix 6 Pro
This is a great alternative to the Garmin Enduro if music and maps are important to your workout or while you’re competing in a race. The Garmin Fenix 6 Pro has a good battery, though it doesn’t compare to the Garmin Enduro. This watch promises 14 days in smartwatch mode and 48 days in battery saver mode, compared to the Enduro’s 65 days with solar charging. There is the option to get the solar-powered Fenix Pro to help get longer battery life.
Endurance athletes may consider this watch’s weight to be a drawback since it weighs 83 g with the steel bezel and 62 g with the titanium one. It is the smaller of the two watches measuring 47 x 47 x 14.7 mm, so you’ll have to decide whether the smartphone’s size or weight matters to you. Another thing to consider when comparing the two smartwatches is that the Enduro has double the internal memory of the Fenix 6 Pro.
- Accurate and high-tech GPS
- Ultra-lightweight with a durable and waterproof design
- Music syncing
- Contactless payment
- Safety tracking features
Garmin Forerunner 945
The Garmin Forerunner 945 is considered the smartwatch for elite runners. This is another great option if maps and music are a must-have for you. This smartwatch has full-color maps and music storage, and wifi features that the Enduro is lacking. This watch’s battery isn’t the same as the Garmin Fenix 6 Pro, offering 14 days when in smartwatch mode. This watch, unfortunately, does not have a battery-saving mode.
The Garmin Forerunner 945 is the same size as the Garmin Fenix 6 Pro; however, it does weigh quite a bit less than both the Fenix 6 Pro and the Enduro, weighing only 50 g.
- Lightweight GPS watch
- Long battery life
- Thin watch
- Lower price
Coros Apex Pro
The Coros Apex Pro watch is one to consider if battery power is important to you. This smartwatch promises 30 days of power when in battery saver mode. If you’re not happy about the Garmin Enduro’s lack of maps, then you’ll be happy to hear that the Coros Apex Pro does have a maps feature. The news about the music option is bittersweet; you can’t stream music from this watch, but you can control music on a paired device.
This watch is one of the lighter ones on this list, weighing in at 59 g. It’s the same size as the Garmin Forerunner 945 and the Garmin Fenix 6 Pro, making it smaller than the Garmin Enduro.
Conclusion
The Garmin Enduro is the perfect smartwatch for the serious endurance athlete who doesn’t want their battery to fail them, whether they’re training or competing in a race. If having access to music from your watch isn’t a big deal for you and you can do without live maps or wifi, you won’t feel like you’re missing out on anything with this watch. The Garmin Enduro offers great metrics to let you know how your workouts are affecting your overall health, in addition to feedback on your workouts.
The Garmin Enduro appears to be targeted towards high-endurance athletes who enjoy going off the beaten path and would like the security of navigating where they are at any moment, should they need to. Like many smartwatches out there, the Garmin Enduro offers you a digital trainer, offering you recommended workouts as well as notifications for when to rest and when to push yourself a little further.
When you check out the reviews on this smartwatch, you quickly notice that those who have purchased it were willing to sacrifice the maps, wifi, and music, for the outstanding battery performance. After looking at the alternatives to the Garmin Enduro, I don’t doubt their slogan for this smartwatch: “You’ll wear out before the watch does.” If the battery in other smartwatches has let you down, the Garmin Enduro is worth checking out. I don’t think you’ll be disappointed!
- Long battery charge
- Lightweight
- Superior product for marathon runners
- Extensive activity tracking
Robby McClung
This article was written by the editorial staff of the Canaan Valley Running Company and Robby McClung. Robby is the founder of the Canaan Valley Running Company. You can read more in the about section of the website on Robby and the Canaan Valley Running Company.
