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Garmin Fenix 7 Sapphire Solar 47 mm, Slate Grey/Black (010-02540-21)

£99.995£199.99Clearance
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We’ve worn the Fenix 7 consistently for just over a month now. It’s comfortable to wear all day, every day, but often we’ve found ourselves taking it off in bed in a half-conscious daze, probably because it’s a little clunky. It actually weighs 73g, which is a lot more than the 38g of the smallest Venu 2 or the 46g Fitbit Sense. I’ve long found that Garmin tends to overshoot here. Nonetheless, there’s also some misunderstanding on this from many users. This item isn’t actually saying not to train, it’s saying not to go out and do a hard workout. Thus, within the context it’s usually not too bad, though I think it still tends to err on the side of keeping you h So how close was that to reality? Well, reasonably close. In my case the ride finished on a 1.5KM 12% climb, which I dutifully hammered. So by the time I got to the finish point, I was baked. But was I absolutely 0%-1%? Probably not. As any endurance athlete will tell you, much of sport is mental as much as physical. In my case, I was shot, but I suspect if push came to shove I could have done another 5-10KM (after doing 118KM with 10,000ft of climbing). Probably not at any meaningful intensity though. Still, I was beyond-done mentally, and certainly in most other respects too. So to that end, it got things more than close enough. Garmin Epix and Fenix 7 watches both have impressive mapping and navigation tools (Image credit: Garmin) I’ve not yet completed the new dual-frequency tests but this post gives an interesting look at GPS vs All Constellation accuracy if you want to read more detail.

SpO2 is one of the more health-leaning stats that the Garmin Fenix 7 can record. This is your blood oxygenation. Garmin calls it Pulse Ox, a feature that has been part of the Garmin roster since before SpO2 readings became trendy. It’s a great, digestible way to show sleep data from a series not always known for its user-friendliness. The only issues are that the Fenix 7 sometimes takes a little while to finalize its sleep report: get up ultra-early and it may show the wrong figures until later in the morning. Not bothered by the price but don’t like the Fenix 7 design? The Suunto 9 Peak might suit. It is Suunto’s top-end watch and made, in part, for hikers. However, its mapping support is far more limited than Garmin’s. You create routes on your phone and a basic trace line is sent to the watch for reference. It’s quite a different proposition to the full map data available with a Fenix 7. Notably absent though is there’s no wrist-based running power like COROS and Polar have. If you want running power, you’ll need some sort of external sensor – either from a 3rd party (Stryd), or paired with Garmin’s HRM-RUN, HRM-TRI, HRM-PRO, or RD-Pod units – for Garmin’s own running power data field. Nothing has changed there.Within the Connect IQ app store app, in addition to the 3rd party free watch faces, you can also create your own watch face, such as with photos or the like:

And here’s the red light, which is obviously less bright than white, but also useful when you don’t want the full intensity of white. I’ve actually found the red light more useful at night around the house, than the white light. Merely because it’s much more subdued. Note that even on the lowest white-light settings, it’s still fairly bright, and uses both white LEDs.

Top Garmin Fenix 7 questions and answers

When comparing my experience of the watch’s other sensors, there doesn’t seem to have been any great improvement from Alex Evans’ experience of the Fenix 6. Only Sapphire models have the dual- frequency GNSS reception from the Airoha chip (MediaTek). All models have dual- constellation but that’s always been the case. Perhaps non-Sapphire models retain the Sony chip? (Edit: dc rainmaker sources confirm only Airoha, as expected)

But we’ll get into all those details and plenty more throughout this review. I’ve been testing the Fenix 7 for quite some time, and have put in countless hours to figure out what works well…and what still might need some love. This includes all three core models, as well as its Epix sibling. And this includes a wide variety of conditions from riding and running up volcanos, runs in freezing temps, openwater swims, cities to mountain passes, and everything in between. Oceans, forests, deserts, and more.

Fear not. More features will follow in 2022/23. Sure the Fenix 6 will also get most of them but the older your existing Fenix, the less likely it will be given the newer feature or, indeed, it may simply be unable to run them.

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