I have a Garmin Instinct 2X  Solar watch (software version 16.11).

I have had it for about 15 months, and I had the previous Garmin Instinct for over three years before that. Both watches have the same basic problems that I find annoying.

I use the watch only for exercise. I don’t wear it all the time, partly because it’s bulky and the rubber armband is itchy and does not fit well, no matter how I adjust it. I put the watch on before I walk, hike or bike and then track my activity. It syncs with the Garmin Connect app which gives me a full log of all activities, maps and statistics. When walking or biking, I don’t really need the GPS capabilities, but when hiking they are critical in the event I get lost. Besides being a tracker, it’s also a normal watch and shows the time of day as a default.

I have three main gripes with it.

Time Zone Adjustment is Painful.

Within the last 12 months I have hiked in Europe, Iceland, Hawaii and Vietnam and three different time zones in the US. When I travel between time zones, the watch never seems to follow automatically, even though my setting says it should. I have to go outside, choose an activity, let it try to get satellites, and after minutes of walking around, holding up my arm, trying to avoid trees and buildings, I can get it to set. Without making this effort, the watch will stay in the previous time zone.

My iPhone seems to have no problem finding its time zone instantly within the airplane before I even get off. How can a $500 plus device specialized for GPS not find its time zone?

The Heart Rate Monitor is Flakey.

In all my activities I show my heart rate in the upper right circle. At my age that is critical for measuring my performance and making sure that I stay within the range I need to be safe. For instance, when I hike uphill in the mountains, if I am not careful, my heart rate will go over 150 which is not sustainable for me. Same with mountain biking during climbs. I glance at my watch and pace my activity.

For some reason, from time to time, the heart rate shows way off, like 40 points lower than it should be. I know immediately that it’s wrong, of course. So I stop and fiddle with it, adjusting the arm band, wiping the back where it touches my skin, moving it around. Nothing seems to work. Then it eventually jumps back to where it should be, but sometimes it doesn’t. My old watch did that, and I thought I had a dud, so I bought the Instinct 2 just to correct that. But unfortunately, both watches exhibit the same identical behavior. It’s obviously a design problem.

The Elevation Sensor is Weak

Another big reason why I have the Instinct is that I want to know my elevation, particularly when hiking or mountain biking. I often go pretty high, and knowing where I am is important to me. So elevation is always displayed in my activities.

Over the years, I have learned that it varies widely, by a swing of maybe 500 feet. I have tried to turn it on and off, to no avail. It says it needs to be out in the open when I do it. I don’t usually turn it on in the house or car, but when I am ready to move. The default elevation is often ludicrously off. For instance, I will be at sea level, walking by the ocean, and it indicates 250 feet elevation. It will off both high or low. There is a way to manually calibrate the elevation. That makes sense when I am at my house (where I know how high I am) or at the ocean, but otherwise I have to know it, before I can set it. It kind of beats the purpose. Once it is set, it stays set and remains fairly reliable, but as soon as I turn it off, all bets are off again.

My iPhone has an Altimeter app which reliably determines my elevation to within +/- 10 feet. It even works inside buildings. I have even tested that in high rise hotels. I have started using my iPhone to determine the elevation and then manually calibrating my Instinct watch. How can a $500 plus device specialized for GPS not find the correct elevation on its own if a general purpose smartphone can do it?

Summary

I like Garmin products, they are designed for the outdoorsman like me. But I marvel how Garmin get away with such inadequacies, particularly when a smartphone app performs much better with these tasks.

One positive for the Instinct 2X – the battery life is phenomenal. It lasts a whole month or more the way I use it. That’s where it beats the smartphone. I can rely on there being power for days out in the wilderness, when my iPhone will long have died.