GarminSwim 2, GPS Swimming Smartwatch for Pool and Open Water, Underwater Heart Rate, Records Distance, Pace, Stroke Count and Type, Slate Gray

This watch replaced a Garmin Venu Square that stopped charging. Since this watch is more expensive I picked up the 3-year warranty on this one.Pros: Simple to use. Outside rim of the watch protects the bezel nicely. Looks good. Accurate GPS built in. HR monitor matches well with built-in HR in exercise equipment. Looks pretty good for a fitness tracker.Cons: Only one Cardio option. Pricier than the more flexible Venu Square. Can't customize display for fitness use. No Walk event tracking.I have been sticking with Garmin because I need accurate HR monitoring in the water, and most trackers disable their HR on swim functions. These seem to do a good job with that, and if you are an avid swimmer this would be a great watch for you. It has swim tracking and logging functions that I don't use, so I can't speak to those.With this watch being so much more expensive, you don't need your smartphone for the GPS to function, but I'm a little disappointed that there's only one, generic Cardio event for tracking. Otherwise there's Pool Swim, Open Water Swim, Cycling, and Running. I suppose you could use the Running Event to track a walk or hike.Wish List: Break Cardio event into a variety of events only distinguished by there name, for more easy history analysis in the Garmin Connect app. I would like to customize what's shown on the display screens during a recording event. For instance, when swimming I want to see distance, elapsed time and HR on the main screen. Instead, all you can see is the interval distance and time, with unused space at the bottom.So, all that being said, I like this watch. While there are some things I wish it would do, generally speaking it just works. I like not having to mess with a screen protector like I've had to with my earlier, raised bezel models. If you don't mind that, always have your smart phone on you, and need more flexibility, check out the Venu Square, but get the protection plan!

Update 16June2022: I just want to give a shout out for Garmin phone support. I was having trouble getting GPS to find satellites this summer, and it was losing track mid swim. Mary Beth at Gamin support walked me through several paths to finally get the find time down to under a minute. She was patient and seemed genuinely interested in solving my problem -- a rare event from support lines these days. I'm still loving my Swim 2 after nearly a year.------- original review --------------My earlier Garmin Forerunner 310XT wrist GPS takes forever to achieve satellite lock, and it showed me zipping back and forth while I was open-water swimming, so I needed something new. It's all in the software, because a watch on your wrist will lose a satellite or two while it's under water, and the software needs to adjust for this and not think you have zoomed at high speed to the point where it regains satellite lock. Garmin has been working on this issue for some years, (as have others) and I'm very pleased with the results.I also borrowed an Apple watch for a few open-water swims. Tracking was excellent, but it has a feature that locks out any screen actions while swimming, making it somewhat difficult to control. Also, the Garmin is really built for swimming, so it has many more swimming metrics besides speed that make tracking your progress easier. The other advantage is that the Swim 2 software interface is very smooth on a PC, whereas you have to interact with an Apple watch with an iPad, Mac, etc. (There may be options for the interface that I'm not aware of.)The real killer for my use of the Apple watch was that it was less reliable reading my pulse while swimming. Both Apple and Garmin use optical pulse measurement, which is a bit dicey in the water (both say to adjust the band tight but comfortable), but often I would finish a swim to find that the Apple watch had not recorded my pulse at all. The Garmin may make some mistakes occasionally, but it keeps doing the best it can.Controlling the Garmin is not as intuitive as the Apple watch, but once I got used to it I didn't start activities unintentionally or make similar mistakes too often.On balance, the Garmin Swim 2 is a keeper and has replaced my Timex Triathlon as my main watch. The alarm, timer, and stopwatch features are more flexible than the old Timex and get a lot of use.

The GPS tracking, and heart rate monitoring functions work well in all conditions. This watch is optimized for pool and open water swimmers. Triathletes may do better with other options. This is my second Swim 2, the first lasted four years until battery life became a problem for marathon swims.Great watch, no complaints.