Transcription
I'm pretty sure it was John Muir writing to his sister in 1873 who said, "The mountains are calling and I must go." But first, let me check my training readiness score on my Garmin Phoenix 8.
Now, I've had the Garmin Phoenix 8 for about 100 days now, and I wanted to take a very close look with you guys, show you guys a few things, and discuss if you really need to spend $1,100 on Garmin's top-of-the-line, do-everything, rugged GPS sports watch.
Okay, so I originally reviewed the smaller edition of the Phoenix 8 when this watch first launched, and then I returned that watch to Garmin. And I spent my own money on this 47mm orange AMOLED Phoenix 8. Uh, I did get a discount code from the Dial Cycling Lab. I have a coupon code over there that saves about 7%. It's not an affiliate link or anything like that, uh, but that does include free shipping. So it does end up being a pretty decent deal. You're welcome to use that same discount code if you guys want to. Uh, but I do want to be respectful of your time. So if you don't want to watch my entire video, you should. It's going to be a fantastic video. Here are my quick thoughts on the Garmin Phoenix 8.
Number one, I do love this watch. I really, I haven't taken this watch off ever since I received it. Um, and I do from time to time need to review other watches, but I'll often wear this watch in addition to another watch, just so that I get to keep wearing this watch. But this is by far my favorite Garmin watch that I've ever tested, and it probably should be. It costs $1,100.
Number two, there are some really good alternatives at better price points here. Alternatives right from Garmin, and of course, I'll go over a couple of those in more detail towards the end of this video. But just between the two of us, I'll just say one of them rhymes with "Shuro Tree." If you're wondering, "Shuro Tree."
Okay, so if you're clicking on a video about a watch after 100 days, you're probably interested in how it's holding up as far as durability goes, if there are any scratches, and how that titanium bezel is holding up. Well, here are some super up-close and personal macro shots of this watch. Uh, I did try to wipe it down before I videoed this, but I'm sure there's all kinds of gunk and dust in here. Uh, but to my naked eye, not zoomed in quite so much, uh, I really don't see a ton of major issues or scratches with this watch.
This edition of the Phoenix has a titanium back plate, a titanium bezel, and a sapphire crystal front lens, so it should be made of fairly durable material. Here on the right side of this watch, there's this new anodized sensor cover. It's between the start button and the back button, and it protects the barometer and the newly added speaker and microphones with this watch. It's a little similar to what Garmin's Descent line of watches has done, if you're familiar with that line of watches. It's not something that can be removed or swapped out for a different color or anything like that. It kind of looks like you could, just because there are these two little screws in here, uh, but messing with it could affect the barometer, or it could affect things like air pressure readings or the dive depth gauge. So probably a bad idea.
And then these buttons are inductive buttons. They're different than physical switches that Garmin has used in previous models of their watches. It eliminates the need for Garmin to add seals to these buttons and it reduces the risks of any leaks with this watch. So instead of a physical click, these buttons actually give you this little haptic feedback. It's, it's really a negligible difference between this button and like the normal clicky buttons. It's not something that I really notice at all. Uh, I guess unless the watch is completely turned off, then you wouldn't get the haptic feedback, but then these buttons really wouldn't do all that much other than potentially like turn the watch back on. I don't know.
Now, the new Phoenix has a new user interface as well, and I get that it might be a bit friendlier to people who are new to Garmin, but after 100 days, I'm, I'm not loving it. Uh, check this out. Uh, I've been on the indoor bike trainer a lot lately. I always start out riding for a bit and then I forget and remember to use my Phoenix 8, at least use my Phoenix 8 as a backup to Zwift, which is recording my trainer output and my external heart rate sensor. Uh, but it's one click to pull up the first menu, a click to select an activity, scroll down to bike indoors, select it. It finds all of my trainer stuff, and then I select Free Ride, which still doesn't start my ride, and then one final click of the start button to actually start my activity. And I think it used to be one click to pull up an activity type, one click to select an activity, one click to start. Uh, maybe that's not a massive difference. I mean, I get it, you're probably like, "First world problems," right? But most of the UI changes are very minor here with the Phoenix 8. It's just little changes that I really don't feel are that helpful. Uh, but ultimately, it does look like this is the new UI for the Phoenix going forward, and this is the new UI on the Garmin Enduro 3. Sadly, uh, this new UI will not be retrofitted to any older models for those of you guys that are hoping to have this UI on your particular model. It's not going to end up coming to like the Phoenix 7 Pro, for example. Uh, and then with this new UI, the Connect IQ apps are now allowed to have up to four data fields. It was two, uh, but then each of these new data fields only get half of the memory per field. Now, I'm not a huge Connect IQ guy, uh, but let me know if this is something that you've noticed with your particular Connect IQ apps, or if you're a Connect IQ developer and some of these memory limitations are causing you issues.
Now, with the Phoenix 8, Garmin has added both a new microphone and a speaker to this watch. Uh, if you are someone who works in a secure environment and you aren't allowed to have a microphone on your wrist, I get that. Uh, anything that this microphone picks up is either processed on the watch itself or sent over to your phone, uh, via Bluetooth. So nothing is recorded from your Phoenix and automatically, you know, uploaded to some sort of cloud server in Beijing or something weird like that. Uh, for me personally, I haven't used the microphone super frequently. Um, really only to demonstrate features for you guys. Uh, I like the idea of having a microphone that can access my smartphone's assistant. Um, I, I think, I think if we're honest with ourselves, Siri is not the smartest smartphone assistant by any means. Uh, I do expect stuff like that to change. I expect smartphone assistants to get infused with AI and become much more helpful over the next two or three years or so. For now, not so much. Uh, but I also don't tend to use the built-in microphone on my wrist for phone calls. I could definitely see some value to having it if I were to leave my phone at home when I go out for a run, uh, but still want to be able to answer phone calls. Uh, but the Phoenix 8 doesn't have any sort of LTE capabilities. All of that connectivity is phone dependent. And it's odd because Garmin actually did explore having an LTE option with its watch. It was the 940 LTE watch, if you guys remember that one. I, I have no idea why Garmin never went forward with more LTE options, and maybe they still will in the future. Uh, but speakers on this watch seem perfectly fine to me. You can use it to play music, and I would say play music in quiet environments. Maybe here's a voice note on the Garmin Phoenix 8. Um, it's, it's definitely not something that would be my first choice. I would prefer my phone to the tiny speaker on this watch. Uh, but you can listen to voice notes as well. Again, uh, definitely not something that I'd really use, maybe just as a demonstration. But I have noticed that after swimming, this watch will actually use the speaker to vibrate and eject water, which is cool. It's something that I've only seen on Apple Watches prior to this, and I think it's a smart use of the speaker.
Now, I don't want to dive too deeply into the new dive capabilities of the Phoenix 8. Uh, if you're a diver, that's fantastic. I'm just not, and it's not a feature that I've personally experienced using the Phoenix 8. But the Phoenix 8 does support scuba diving, apnea or free diving, and snorkeling. Uh, the watch is dive-rated to 40 meters, and it will show you data like the depth gauge, your dive time, a compass, water temperature, uh, your maximum depth that you've gone, uh, and other critical alerts like a safety stop notification. Now, what's nice here is that these features are similar to what's on the Apple Watch Ultra with the Oceanic app, but unlike the Oceanic app, Garmin doesn't charge us $10 a month on some sort of subscription for these features.
Now, if we flip this Phoenix 8 over, we'll see Garmin's latest, or their fifth-generation Elevate optical heart rate sensor, which is one of the most accurate optical heart rate sensors that I've tested here on this channel. Here, take a look at this. This is a 7-mile run where I wore about five watches, but I want to focus on the Apple Watch Ultra 2 in purple, the Phoenix 8 in green, and the Garmin Forerunner 165 that's connected to an ECG-style chest strap, which we can basically think of as our golden standard here. And you can actually tell that the Phoenix 8 actually does pretty well. It reads a little bit high for that first mile or so, but it's not far off, and then it tracks pretty well throughout the rest of the run. It's definitely not perfect, but it's pretty good. I would say it's pretty close to the Apple Watch Ultra 2, although I'd probably give the nod to the Apple Watch Ultra 2, we being super critical.
Here, now, two quick tips for any of you guys that are using optical heart rate sensors. Uh, make sure that you're wearing them pushed back just a little bit away from your wrist joint, and then I would suggest snugging them down just a little bit just before each run. I basically toggle between two notches tighter for an activity than my like normal day-to-day wear, and I'm using the 22mm silicone watch band that came with the watch. Uh, it does have like a little bit of stretch to it, and I like it quite a bit. And just as a heads up, the 51mm Phoenix 8 comes with a 26mm watchband instead of 22, in case you're thinking of like switching these watch bands out.
Now, the Phoenix 8 can also track your blood oxygen saturation levels, and this new sensor can perform an ECG reading. And just recently, I think as of last week or maybe the week before, uh, Garmin enabled ECG functionality on this watch for those of you guys in the EU and in Australia.
Now, moving over to GPS accuracy, the Phoenix 8 has the latest and greatest multiband GPS chipset, but all kinds of brands have the exact same chipset. What makes Garmin's watches so much more accurate is the way that they set up these GPS antennas on these watches, and I think the custom firmware that they're allowed to run on these GPS chipsets. And I think one of the best ways to see some of these differences is to wear more than one watch while out there on a run. And of course, I spread these GPS watches out a little bit just so they don't have any sort of interference with each other. So in this case, I have five watches: the Phoenix 8 on my left wrist (shown here in red), the Apple Watch Ultra 2 on my right wrist (shown in blue), the Apple Watch Series 10 on my right hand (shown in purple), the Polar Vantage M3 (shown in yellow) – all of which have multiband GPS chips, all of which were turned on. And then lastly, the Garmin Forerunner 165 (shown in green), which does not have multiband GPS as an option.
And on this run, I'm actually trying my best to run around downtown Portland and find the biggest and tallest skyscrapers that Portland has to offer, and then run right up underneath them and around them, just because tall buildings like this are typically the hardest on GPS watches, just because signals can often get bounced around by these tall buildings, and your tracks are going to end up getting distorted by these buildings. But to me, it's pretty obvious that the Polar Vantage M3 is the one that's struggling the most here, which kind of brings me to this question that I have for you guys, and it doesn't really have anything to do with the Phoenix 8, but do you guys think that the multiband GPS is just a little bit overrated?
Okay, so what's not overrated is Garmin's SatIQ mode. It's basically intelligently switching between single and dual-mode GPS based on the strength of the GPS signal while you're out swimming, biking, or running. So you'll get better battery life until your watch thinks it needs the extra accuracy, and then it'll switch into that dual-frequency mode. Now, I haven't done any open water swimming synchronized water to film them, I think, but my experience with the Phoenix 8 has been really good. Uh, I'm almost always going to recommend that SatIQ mode, unless you think that you're going to be doing some sort of activity that's really going to push the limits of the watch's battery life.
For GPS activities, you can expect somewhere between 28 and 30 hours of battery life. So for a lot of us, that should cover someone doing like a full Iron Man event for sure, or even potentially for some of you guys that want to do a 100-mile ultra run. Uh, there is a built-in music option with this device, which I don't personally use, but if you want to listen to your Spotify playlist from this watch, it will take a toll on the battery life. You can expect somewhere around 10 hours of battery life if you're using music. So again, still probably perfectly fine for those of you guys that are doing a marathon or something in that distance, something in that 10-hour range.
Now, if you've listened to all of these new features on the Phoenix 8 and you're still not 100% sold on this device, I think it would be very, very smart to look at some alternative options. Garmin is actually selling the Phoenix 8 in a solar option with a memory-in-pixel display for those of you guys that want to extend the battery life of the Phoenix. And Garmin also sells a version of the Phoenix called the Phoenix E. E, I think, stands for Essentials. Uh, the problem is, Garmin already sells a watch with a ridiculously good battery life. It's called the Garmin Enduro 3, and instead of $1,100, it costs $900, or I'm actually seeing it on sale for $837. And of course, I'll leave links below to everything I find. Or instead of the Phoenix E, there's Garmin's Epix Gen 2 that's been heavily discounted for months now. I'm currently seeing it for around $500. But when considering any of these Phoenix options, we should really all consider something like the Garmin Epix Pro, which came out about a year ago and has that built-in flashlight that I love. I think is fantastic, but it's missing a microphone, speaker, and dive capabilities. So if that's not a big deal for you, that watch is about $700 online right now.
Now, lastly, I want to remind you guys that yes, I do love this Phoenix 8. It's a watch that I really have been enjoying over the past few months. Uh, but I also don't want you guys to spend money on features that you don't really need. And Garmin has actually made this really hard because there are other really good options out there, smarter choices for the price. But what do you guys think? Do any of you guys have this watch? How are you guys enjoying it so far? Let me know in the comment section, and we can continue the discussion down there. The comment section is right below this video, and it's right below the like button and the subscribe button. But either way, fancy new Garmin watch or no watch at all, I really do hope that you guys are getting out there swimming, biking, running, repeating, and repeating it all over again. And we will see you guys on the next one.