Garmin Venu Sq review

Our Verdict

The Garmin Venu Sq is a groovy value for those who want an cheap fitness tracker, complete with GPS and long battery life.

For

Great selection of fettle and health features
Accurate, fast GPS
Cracking bombardment life
Good price

Against

Poor app option
Feels inexpensive

Tom'due south Guide Verdict

The Garmin Venu Sq is a great value for those who desire an inexpensive fettle tracker, consummate with GPS and long battery life.

Pros

+
Slap-up option of fitness and health features
+
Accurate, fast GPS
+
Great battery life
+
Proficient cost

Cons

-
Poor app pick
-
Feels cheap

Following the lead of Apple tree and Fitbit, Garmin is releasing its own square smartwatch, the Garmin Venu Sq. Focused on health and fitness, the Venu Sq has many of the features found in the $349 Venu—GPS, Pulse Ox, mobile payments and optional music storage—just at a much more attractive cost of $199.

In more means than just the design, the Garmin Venue Sq is a clear shot at devices such every bit the Apple Watch Series 3 and the Fitbit Versa iii. As you'll see in this Garmin Venu Sq review, the watch is strong on fitness, but falls short of the competition when it comes to smartwatch features. Just it's however one of the best fitness trackers and the all-time Garmin sentinel you lot'll find at this toll.

Garmin Venu Sq review: Price and release engagement

The Garmin Venu Sq costs $199; the Garmin Venu Sq Music, which lets you store tunes from Spotify, Deezer, and Amazon Music on the watch, costs $249. Both are available starting September 23.

The Venu Sq is available in orchid/metallic orchid, white/light gold, and shadow grayness/slate. The Venu Sq Music Edition is offered in calorie-free sand/rose gold, navy/lite gold, moss/slate and blackness/slate.

Garmin Venu Sq: Specs

Brandish: one.3 inches, 240 x 240 pixels
Water resistance: 5 ATM
Battery life: 6 hours (GPS+ music), 14 hours (GPS)
GPS: Yep
SpO2: Yeah
Mobile Payments: Yes
Size: 40 x 37 x eleven.5mm
Weight: 1.3 ounces

Garmin Venu Sq review: Pattern

The majority of Garmin'southward wearables have had a traditional circular face, but for the Venu Sq, Garmin is aping the squircle blueprint found on smartwatches such as the Apple Picket and Fitbit Versa 3. I personally prefer round watches, but if square is what the kids like these days, who am I to guess?

While it's a upkeep smartwatch, I wish Garmin had invested a piddling more in the Venu Sq's instance. Its light plastic case and shape immediately made me remember of an fifty-fifty cheaper smartwatch, the $fourscore Amazfit Bip. It has a somewhat mesomorphic bezel, which is larger at the lesser of the screen to accommodate Garmin'south logo. The Versa three and Apple Watch 3 have metal cases, which makes then feel like more than premium devices.

The Venu Sq is only offered in ane size (40mm), which is too pocket-sized for my tastes, only will make information technology appeal to a wider audience. Its 1.iii-inch LCD touchscreen is actually larger than the AMOLED screen on the circular Garmin Venu, simply it has a much lower resolution of 240 x 240 pixels. The Fitbit Versa 3, which also has a 40mm example, has a one.58-inch display with a 336 x 336-pixel resolution. The 42mm Apple Watch 3'due south display has a resolution of 312 x 390 pixels.

There's two buttons on the right side of the Venu Sq. The top push opens your fitness activities, while the lesser button serves every bit a Back push button and lets you lot access watch settings.

Garmin Venu Sq review: Health and fitness features

As its pedigree is in fitness-first devices, the Garmin Venu Sq is as robust as many of the visitor's other sports watches when it comes to workouts. It has GPS, GLONASS, and Galileo satellite-tracking capabilities, and this device tin can measure a variety of gym exercises. This includes running and biking (both indoors and outdoors), swim laps, skiing, rowing, and cycling.

In addition to Bluetooth and Wi-Fi, the Venu Sq has an ANT+ radio, which lets you connect information technology to other sensors, such as bike cadence and eye rate straps.

Apple made a big deal nearly the blood oxygen sensor in its new Apple Sentinel half dozen, but this feature has been available for quite some time on Garmin devices. Like the Apple Watch 6, the Venu Sq monitors your Pulse Ox levels all the fourth dimension in the background, but you tin can also perform a spot-check manually. A person's Pulse Ox levels should be betwixt 95 and 100 percentage; anything lower could be the sign of a respiratory affliction. Garmin, Fitbit, and Apple are careful to note that their sensors have not been FDA approved, and if you have any concerns most your levels, y'all should consult a md.

The Venu Sq's GPS acquired a point in less than a infinitesimal, and accurately tracked me through my runs. Although its screen is modest, y'all can customize the stats you desire to meet, such as eye rate and pace. The low-cal weight of the Venu Sq works to its reward here, as information technology virtually disappeared on my wrist.

Garmin Venu Sq review: Slumber and stress tracking

Apart from fitness, the Venu Sq has a number of wellness features, including resting middle rate, slumber and stress tracking. During one specially busy day last week, the sentry buzzed on my wrist, telling me my stress level was high. Information technology then offered to guide me through a relaxation exercise.

Another primal metric that'south specific to Garmin is 1 called Body Battery, which takes into business relationship your activity, slumber, center rate, and more to give you an overall score of your energy level. A score of 100 means you're fully charged and fix to get, while 40 and below ways it'southward time to go some residue.

The simply existent difference, fettle-wise, between the Venu and the Venu Sq is that the latter lacks a barometric altimeter, so it won't rail your step-climbing. That, and there's no on-screen animated workouts.

Garmin Sq review: Condom features

If y'all bring your phone along with you lot on workouts, you tin enable a few condom features: Livetrack volition send a link to selected contacts who can runway you on a map. Incident Detection and Assistance will send an email and a text if your sentry detects a high-G event — such equally if you get hit by a auto while running or biking — or if you press and hold the peak button on the Venu Sq for three seconds. The text and electronic mail will tell them your location, and will beginning a live track.

Garmin Sq review: Interface

Garmin smartwatches aren't ever easy to navigate; while logically laid out, there's oft a lot of push-pressing to get where you want. Partly because it has a touchscreen, and partly because it has fewer features every bit, say the Fenix vi, getting around the Venu Sq was a fairly simple process. The top button starts and stops exercises and the bottom push button serves as a Back function and accessing settings.

Swiping up or down from the home screen displays such things as weather, your daily stats, health stats, notifications, and whatsoever other widgets you may desire. If you tap on any of these screens, yous'll get a more than detailed expect at that function or characteristic.

Garmin Venu Sq review: Music

I tested the Garmin Venu Sq Music, which lets you shop tunes on the watch itself. Once relegated to higher-end devices, it'due south chop-chop condign a must-take feature for those who desire to mind to tunes but exit their phone behind.

You tin can add music from Deezer, Spotify, and Amazon Music provided y'all have a premium business relationship from those services, which allows you to store music locally.

As with adding apps, adding music from Spotify or other streaming sources is a multi-step procedure. You have to first use the ConnectIQ app to download the Spotify app to the Venu SQ. You lot then have to open the Garmin Connect app to enable the characteristic, and make sure that your watch is continued to Wi-Fi. From the watch, you tin then add playlists, individual tracks, and more.

You tin also sideload music onto the Venu Sq. Later on plugging the spotter into your calculator via USB, you can either just drag-and-drop files, or utilise the Garmin Express desktop app, which shows you how much storage you have remaining.

Garmin Venu Sq review: Smartwatch features

The biggest area where Garmin's smartwatches lose basis to competing devices is with its app store. Outside a few recognizable names, such as Spotify, Amazon Music, the Garmin Connect IQ store is but a paltry collection of watchfaces. As sparse equally information technology is, Fitbit's app store looks similar Apple's in comparison.

More annoyingly, installing any of these requires you lot download the Garmin ConnectIQ app to your smartphone. But, if you lot want to cheque on your health and fitness stats, you have to use the separate Garmin Connect app. It's been this way for a while now with Garmin's smartwatches, and nonetheless doesn't brand any sense.

Other smartwatch features include mobile payments, calendar, find my watch/phone, and weather. Yous tin can also receive notifications, and if the Venu Sq is continued to an Android device, you can answer to text messages.

Garmin Venu Sq review: Battery life

The Garmin Sq is rated to final upward to vi days in smartwatch manner, upward to 14 hours using GPS, and upwardly to half dozen hours when using both GPS and music. That'due south miles better than the Apple tree Watch 3, which gives you lot xviii hours in smartwatch mode, and a bit longer than the Versa three, which Fitbit says will terminal upwardly to 12 hours using GPS.

I wore the Venu Sq for four days, wearing it for two nights and taking it on two half-hr runs using GPS (merely without music playing). At that point, the battery was down to 27 percent.

I also like that Garmin has started to standardize its USB charging cables. The last few devices I've tested have all had the same small, but secure connector. It keeps things simpler when upgrading from an older device, or switching betwixt watches. More than companies should practice this.

Garmin Venu Sq review: Verdict

If you're looking for 1 of the best fettle trackers for less than $200, you lot tin't do better than the Garmin Venu Sq. For $199 (or $249 if you spring for the Venu Sq Music), you go almost all of the aforementioned health and fitness features as in the $349 Venu.

The Fitbit Versa 3 ($229), Samsung Galaxy Watch Active two ($229), and Apple tree Lookout man Series three ($199) all look nicer and take much ameliorate app stores, making them more suited for those who want something that's more than a smartwatch. Notwithstanding, none are as comprehensive as the Venu Sq when it comes to health and fitness.

Michael A. Prospero is the deputy editor at Tom's Guide overseeing the home, smart home, drones, and fettle/wearables categories, likewise every bit all buying guides and other evergreen content. When he'due south not testing out the latest running watch, skiing or training for a marathon, he'southward probably using the latest sous vide motorcar or some other cooking gadget.