Garmin

My vivoactive 4 has been resetting after owning it only 4 months. Garmin support has had me do soft resets, hard resets, and factory resets. Nothing works. Garmin has offered to replace my watch with a refurbished watch and not a new one. They don't seem to understand or care that I do not want to risk inheriting a watch that has already failed and likely has other bugs lurking. Bottom line, the watch is great (if it worked), but Garmin's replacement policies are terrible.

Garmin resolved this issue. It was the service provider that garmin used that caused the issue. Garmin no longer uses that provider.

Garmin fenix 3 HR. Paid over $500. In little over a year started having software issues. It's out of warranty. To replace for refurbished is $130.00 plus tax. Meaning I will have refurbished watch and it would cost me more than $600. It's ridiculous. Costumer service not willing to work something out and help. So in plain words. In approximately year and half I supposed to spend $650.00 dollars to have refurbished Garmin fenix 3 watch. For this price they should give better warranties of have some better replacements options. Now you can find this watch online for $320 brand new So decision to make is To have Refurbished for $650 Or new for $850 Since I already spent $500 year and a half ago.
Garmin costumer service doesn't care.

If you are looking for an attractive, stylish watch the Garmin Lily fulfills that requirement, but there are numerous issues that make me recommend not to purchase it. I purchased mine in March, 2023

1. It is not user friendly when trying to adapt it for your personal use.
2. Inconsistent performance.
3. It spontaneously begins an activity when I don't request it. If I go out for a short walk without needing to track, later in the walk it launches into a walking activity and begins to track the time.
4. Sometimes after a power walk, and I'm home having breakfast afterwards, it tells me to Move.
5. The face setup even changed spontaneously.
6. I set it to track miles, but it will only track laps, which one lap clearly doesn't coincide with a mile. I know the mileage of my walk. Tech support couldn't fix it and in fact blamed my new Galaxy S23 phone's GPS as being inaccurate since the watch relies on the phone GPS. A GPS isn't built into the Lily. The tech representative probably gave me that reason just get me off the phone.
7. The menstrual cycle is useless to those of us who are past that time of our life. It took me a while, but I finally figured out how to delete it and stop reminding me.

I absolutely do not recommend purchasing the Garmin Lily unless you want to wear it just for looks. I give it one star.

Had an issue with a GPS Unit losing all 250,000 preloaded geocaches. Customer Service spent over an hour with me trying to get them back but couldn't. They apologized and sent a replacement. Can't ask for anything any better.

I purchased an InReach Mini to help me be safer on solo backpacking trips. There is a HUGE learning curve to learn how to use the unit, the online accounts to get everything set up, and learn how to use MapShare program which is supposed to allow friends and family to follow me on my trip. Instructions are very user unfriendly and I still don't know how to do all of these things. Maybe it would allow me to be rescued if I am injured (I have not had to test this capability) but other aspects of use are difficult to learn.

Bought an updated model GPS for wife's car a couple of years ago. After some routes on roads that weren't on the database recently, we decided it might be time for some database updates. Unfortunately the limited memory of the unit wouldn't handle the entire update. Initially downloaded loaded only the Eastern U.S. (our normal touring region), This update went a lot faster than the update earlier on an older unit. Bought some additional storage, reran the update which included the entire U.S.and was done in minutes. Garmin continues to be top notch in my book.

The nautical unit that I used on our boat was equally was satisfying, with lots of nice features. Go Garmin!

Garmin sells GPS stand alone devices, etc. So far, so good. The problem starts when the devices start demanding "map updates." This becomes so annoying that you figure: ok, i'll do the upgrade since the device has been very very good to me. Here's what happens: The happy customer goes to the Garmin website, you plug in your device, pay for the new maps, and then (get ready for the ride)... NIGHTMARE! First, various HTTP 500 errors occur (i. E. unidentified server errors). Then, try calling customer service--THEY'RE NEVER OPEN DURING HOURS YOU NEED THEM. You finally get ahold of someone and you are told (in so many words) that you're a moron and that you didn't do some software upgrade. Ok, you do the upgrade... more HTTP 500 errors. Again, customer support isn't available. Repeat cycle. Here's the moral of the story: Download a directions app to your smartphone and forget Garmin.

DO NOT order anything from Garmin, go with Wahoo. Garmin has an awful customer support team that is just money hungry. Rather than fixing a defective device that's all over the internet saying it's an issue, KURT from Garmin got very snotty and said, well that's from 5 years ago so it's not at all credible. Then I showed him others and he kept making excuses that it's not a "known" issue with Garmin and I would have to PAY FOR A NEW device.

I live in New Zealand and Over two years I planned a hike to the Canadian Rockies. I wanted a robust reliable GPS for the hikes I planned to do. So a month before I left NZ I went and bought a Rino 750. After arriving in the Rockies I hiked about 45km in roughly 3 days, added a number of waypoints for key places I visited and saved them each day, some of the waypoints were needed to back track to get out of the areas I hiked into. Well on day 4 I turned on my Rino 750 only to final it has reset itself all my data is wiped, when I touch "Add Waypoint" I get a "database error" message, and the device will not turn off. It will also not load any of the maps I had been using on my hikes and spent $400 purchasing for the trip. I've removed the data card with maps and tried to restart the device with out any success. To say I'm disappointed is an understatement. I'm now stuck in Canada with a useless device with 4 days before a leave to start a 3 week Alaska trip that I was depending on the Rino for. As far as I'm concerned the product is so incredibly unreliable and my advice to anyone considering purchasing one is don't, they are garbage.

I have owned x 2 Garmin watches over the course of 8 years.

The first was a Fenix 2 which I lost as a result of the rubber strap becoming worn and it falling off during a hike. I contacted Garmin at the time and requested that I be provided with the most recent location of the devise so that I could search for it. Garmin informed me that they could not provide me with the location of the devise as their watches only receive GPS data and do not transmit their location to Garmin. I found this incredibly disappointing and difficult to understand given that Garmin is considered one of the best GPS (Global positioning System) companies in the world- but cannot locate the devices they provide. Garmin left me with no solution therefore I accepted that this watch was lost.

I was gifted a new Fenix 3 which worked well for 4-5 years without any issues.
The start/Stop button on my device then became faulty and I reached out to Garmin to request that I be directed to where I could get my watch repaired.
Garmin replied and stated that they no longer repair these watches and all they could offer me was 30% off a new 600+£ watch. I made it apparent that this was not good customer service and was clearly a means of getting more money rather than helping to maintain their products- to no avail. As I was not willing to pay more for another watch, Garmin did not offer any other options.

Overall my experience is that the products they provide are of good quality the aftercare/ interest in maintaining their supplied devices is not present. Despite being a GPS company they cannot provide device locations in the event that a customer's device is lost.
Garmin appears to have forgotten that the customer's experience is important in maintaining future business and would rather customers spend more money on a new device rather than maintain their devices.

1500+£ later and Garmin would rather I spend more on a new watch rather than offer good customer service. I won't be purchasing another Garmin device as I know the customer service is lacking.

The worse online service ever! I definitely won't recommend to buy a Garmin online! I wouldn't buy a Garmin online so, they don't have online service.

Very disappointing

I bought a vivoactive3 smartwatch, very frustrated that I cannot get my notifications, I really wanted this as have a terminally ill brother & as I'm unable to use my phone at work didn't want to miss any msges, the tracking of activity is good as I've lost over 5st it keeps me on track with my exercise, there is no technical support via phone, other companies seem to manage their customer service by phone, I have emailed but have had no reply, spent a fair bit of money on this watch & am pretty disappointed with it, thinking of sending it back & getting something that will do the job
L Morgan (Swindon)

TRUST THAT GARMIN COULD NOT FIX PAIRING ISSUES. I've been communicating with Garmin for more than a month. They did literally a lot to pair my Forerunner 945 to Iphone 12. Until now, they could not solve the basic pairing issue. What is so disappointing is that I first tried a 20USD sports watch to get to feel if I really need a 700USD sports watch. The 20USD watch worked well with pairing and some of the basic features that is helpful; thus, I felt the need to upgrade to FR945. I'm close to begging for Garmin to finally fix pairing issues. If only I could refund, with all the tedious communication difficulties and an unsolved basic issue, I'll never look back at Garmin again!

Always put on hold. Can never get hold of a rep. Terrible service. Stay away... You won't ever receive product support.