A place for runners.
Many years ago i was thinking that garmin should use its vast trove of training data, hire some data scientists and use machine learning to improve the workout suggestions (they are complete trash). This was way before all the LLM nonsense.
In 2025, i'm much more wary of what "AI" features are going to look like. Been a garmin customer for 15 years (cycling and running gear)
Will be making plans to switch if this AI stuff turns out to be nonsense like the AI in strava
Personally I think it's likely that this is that pre-LLM sort of data analytics, and they're just capitalising on the AI hype that LLMs created for marketing purposes.
I'm far more enraged by Garmin's embracing of subscription pricing, when they have always, in the past, gone for the Apple model where you pay for premium hardware, and get great support for those products. I've criticised this at times because there's been a tendency to only provide about one year of feature updates, two if you're lucky. But at least it was one price and you're done.
I will wait untill my user experience is not degraded by not subscribing to this new features.
I was thinking about upgrading my old garmin 645 before I read this on DCRainmaker. Then I looked at Suunto Race S which ticks all the boxes but the change from one ecosystem to another is off putting. Probably I’ll do nothing now until the watch dies then decide. But for now Garmin just lost one sale. Not that that makes any difference.
It really sucks, I was thinking of going back to Garmin after having a coros for the last couple of years, because the features with workout suggestions based on your own performance and training history was enticing to me. I really miss that in my coros.
Are there any good sports watches that have similar features to Garmin in this aspect?
Edit: and gadget bridge is not a solution, it nerfs way too much of the sports-aspect which is what I want.
The only other brands really worth discussing are Wahoo and Polar. I've never really looked into them to know in great detail.
Tbh without having seen exactly what's going on at Garmin so far, I'd probably still be inclined to go with them, in spite of this. I'd be asking myself: if they didn't have this subscription offering, and the features behind the subscription price simply didn't exist, would I still stick with Garmin? The subscription itself is, for the moment, entirely a neutral factor for me.
The only risk is that in 5 years all the newer features are locked behind the subscription. But Garmin has always been stingy with software updates to give new features, so this doesn't really affect that.
🤢