Sunday Runday
In this weekly column, Android Central Wearables Editor Michael Hicks talks in regards to the world of wearables, apps, and health tech associated to operating and well being, in his quest to get sooner and healthier.
The Garmin Forerunner 570 and 970 are dearer than their predecessors. Other 2025 Garmin watches skimped on new options to maintain costs low, so I’m blissful Garmin did not maintain again on its Forerunners. But it is also grow to be clearer that Garmin does not really feel a have to compete with different manufacturers’ options — solely in opposition to itself.
The bounce between the $599 Forerunner 965 and $749 Forerunner 970 is important. You get the most recent Elevate v5 era for higher HR accuracy, ECGs and pores and skin temperature readings, flashlight, mic & speaker for calling and instructions, sapphire crystal safety, and new metrics like operating tolerance.
Or should you’re weighing the $549 Forerunner 270 in opposition to the $449 Forerunner 265, you additionally get the gen5 HR accuracy enhance, doubled display brightness on a bigger show, the identical mic & speaker, and pores and skin temperature with warmth acclimation.
The Instinct 3 and Vivoactive 6 caught to last-gen HR sensors, treading water on {hardware} in order that Garmin might preserve them of their fastened value ranges. I feared Garmin would do the identical with its Forerunners, making us wait till 2027 for actual modifications.
That’s why I’m excited for the Forerunner 970, but additionally feeling pissed off at how Garmin holds again mid-tier watches just like the Forerunner 570.
As costs rise, held-back options are more durable to simply accept
The $499 Instinct 3 did not have offline maps regardless of being an “journey” watch, whereas cheaper rival watches just like the $349 COROS PACE Pro and Suunto Race S did. I complained on the time, however Garmin hadn’t given it space for storing for maps, prioritizing a light-weight CPU for battery life.
The $549 Forerunner 570 does have space for storing for maps, and no want to carry again the processor. There’s no logistical motive it should not assist maps; even when they don’t seem to be pre-downloaded like on the 970, Garmin might allow you to obtain a particular area’s topo knowledge, at the least.
The solely actual rationalization is that their absence makes folks extra prone to pay for the 970.
The identical applies to the 570 well being sensors. I clearly admire the improved HR accuracy and pores and skin temperature. But each different gen5 watch has ECGs, together with the $449 Venu 3. And exterior of Garmin, ECGs are the norm, from mainstream watches to health rivals just like the COROS APEX and Polar Vantage sequence.
But Garmin ignores the context of its rivals; the one competitor that issues is the Forerunner 970. That wants to face out, so the 570 misses out. Heart well being warnings grow to be a $750 bargaining chip.
It’s a common-enough strategy for Garmin. With the superb Forerunner 165, you possibly can’t see your coaching load although it clearly calculates load within the background to find out your VO2 Max, restoration time, and day by day steered exercises with anaerobic or low cardio focuses. Blocking that knowledge upsells you to the Forerunner 265.
I accepted that synthetic function block as a result of the 165 prices $249, and coaching load continues to be pretty area of interest. But Garmin watch costs preserve creeping up. It’s more durable to swallow blocked options when these mid-tier fashions price rather more than a Galaxy or Apple Watch.
With Garmin watches, each part has a price ticket
Smartwatch “tiers” are frequent sufficient nowadays, and each firm desires to upsell you. But they’re additionally selective about which options are price-locked as a result of they know it’s going to look dangerous if a competitor presents one thing for a lot much less.
You clearly pay extra for metal or titanium casing, or different {hardware} boosts like higher battery life. But in any other case, they squeeze most options into the mainline mannequin whereas sticking to the identical pricing yearly (except for the occasional inflationary enhance).
With Garmin, each new function to modernize its watches comes with a value bump. MIP-to-AMOLED show swaps for the Forerunner and Instinct lineups price tacked on one other $50–100 to the standard value. On the Fenix 8, collectively including AMOLED, higher sensors, and a mic & speaker added $200 to the worth.
You will not discover dual-band GPS on any watch $300 or much less, nor offline maps on any sub-$600 watch. And although Garmin’s Gen5 HR sensors got here out in 2023, it is going to preserve utilizing the Gen4 sensors on “cheaper” fashions just like the $500 Instinct 3 at present.
I do not understand how a lot the elements price Garmin, however it desires us to know that it will move that price onto us.
Other elements like tariff issues bump up pricing, too. But Garmin’s 2025 strategy establishes a transparent Garmin precedent: Once a watch prices a sure value, you should not count on new {hardware} at that value, nor options already established on the flagship tier.
The subsequent model will both price the identical however make minimal upgrades, or add new instruments and value rather more.
Garmin treats any new function as a possibility to ask athletes for extra money in trade for extra worth. And it might do that as a result of it does not really feel as a lot strain to cost its health watches competitively as different manufacturers.
Garmin customers like its ecosystem an excessive amount of — or are too invested in it — to go away. And so Garmin accepts the unfavorable press round Connect+ paywalled options and price-locks the good new options as a result of its loyal prospects can pay $750 or extra for them, even when they grumble about it.
If you suppose the Forerunner 970 and 570 are too costly, then at the least you already know the last-gen Garmin watches are nonetheless out there — and discounted for Memorial Day, so a Forerunner 965 prices $50 much less than the 570.
Otherwise, we have to simply accept this new regular with new Garmin watches.