Garmin Venu 3 & 3S: Specs
Worth: $449
Dimension: 45mm, 41mm
Show: Touchscreen AMOLED
Battery life: 15 days (26 hours GPS)
Sturdiness: 5 ATM
GPS: Sure
NFC: Sure
Compatibility: iOS, Android
There are wonderful smartwatches and wonderful health trackershowever there are only a few units which can be equally wonderful as each. When it comes to fitness-tracking smartwatches, the $449 Garmin Venu 3 strikes a stable steadiness of comfort, instinct and accuracy.
Constructing on the Garmin Venu 2 Plus, Garmin’s newest life-style flagship introduces fairly a variety of upgrades throughout all areas of wellness. Nap-tracking and a brand new sleep coach work on monitoring your relaxation whereas each day summaries supply behavioral insights. An abundance of sport profiles, added Restoration Time strategies, and on-watch interval creation maintain you tuned into your exercise, whereas a Guided Meditation function leverages the Venu 3’s built-in mic for doses of mindfulness.
Whereas it’s providing you with real-time steering on how you can most effectively sleep and train, the Garmin Venu 3 stays powered for as much as two weeks. That’s a troublesome estimate for even the greatest smartwatches from the massive names to match, however in fact, there’s extra to gauging the wearable expertise. This Garmin Venu 3 assessment has all the things it’s worthwhile to learn about whether or not it’s the fitting smartwatch for you.
Garmin Venu 3 assessment: Worth and availability
The Garmin Venu 3 is obtainable now for $449. That’s the identical worth because the Garmin Venu 2 Plus, however up $50 from the usual Venu 2 that launched in April 2021. It seems you possibly can nonetheless buy each the Garmin Venu 2 and Venu 2 Plus, although I’d solely suggest doing so if you’ll find them at steep reductions.
I examined the Garmin Venu 3, which measures 45mm. Garmin additionally affords a Venu 3S mannequin, with the ‘S’ indicating a smaller 41mm watch face. Each fashions price the identical and supply virtually equivalent specs (minus battery life, particulars beneath) so it merely depends upon your sizing desire.
Garmin Venu 3 assessment: Design
The Garmin Venu 3 is fairly indistinguishable from the Garmin Venu 2, in addition to the unique Garmin Venu earlier than that. The Venu household is Garmin’s flagship for the approach to life class of units — a.ok.a. not niche-specific units just like the Forerunner, Strategy, Intuition watches. With its spherical face, trio of aspect buttons and glossy {hardware} particulars, it seems most similar to the Samsung Galaxy Watch 6.
All three buttons set off completely different controls, with the highest opening a fast menu of exercise selections and apps, the center displaying just lately used apps, and the underside performing as a again button. An extended press of every button launches extra options, such because the voice assistant and setting menus. This smartwatch additionally operates by way of touchscreen, however the buttons are nonetheless crucial for navigation.
As for the show, the Garmin Venu 3’s shade AMOLED display has a number of brightness ranges and an ambient mild sensor that may regulate the brightness primarily based in your atmosphere. It additionally has an always-on show possibility, although it’ll minimize into battery life. And even then, the show isn’t as vivid because the MIP show on the Garmin Fenix 7 Professional. However having examined the watch in quite a lot of “regular” lighting circumstances, the Venu 3 fared simply advantageous.
Garmin Venu 3 assessment: Health and well being monitoring options
The Garmin Venu 3 has all of the fitness-tracking fundamentals. Step counts, transfer objectives and stairs climbed tracked my regular exercise, whereas extra superior exercise options promoted efficient train. With dozens of built-in exercise varieties (together with some that present type animations), I had no battle discovering the presets I wanted for quite a lot of actions together with strolling, swimming, biking, energy, and tennis. There’s even a pickleball possibility, for many who have taken up the stylish sport.
After all, you can even run with the Garmin Venu 3 and discover ways to run a 5K or how you can prepare for a marathon utilizing the Garmin Coach’s free adaptive coaching plans. That stated, the Garmin Forerunner 265 is the perfect working watch for a similar worth, with added management buttons and the fan-favorite Coaching Readiness function. If working is just a slice of your exercise conduct, although, the Venu 3 may need extra of the flexibility you’re on the lookout for whereas nonetheless supporting VO2 and on-watch interval exercise creation. In my expertise, the GPS loaded up in seconds and precisely tracked all my outside train, in order that’s not a priority in the event you’re deciding between the 2 watches.
Restoration is a a lot larger precedence on the Garmin Venu 3 than it was on the Garmin Venu 2 Plus. Now, my Physique Battery studying affords deeper perception into the elements that impression my rating. The ELEVATE V5 optical coronary heart price sensor screens your coronary heart price and HRV across the clock to offer steering on conduct. For instance, on a busy work day that I didn’t rise up from my desk a lot, the watch alerted me that I ought to attempt to transfer a bit earlier than going to sleep. In any other case, the helpful Well being Snapshot function may give you a full overview of what’s occurring together with your physique in simply two minutes. (Aspect notice: it baffles me that the Apple Watch hasn’t copied this function but.)
As a part of restoration, the brand new sleep coach on the Garmin Venu 3 gives a Day by day Abstract with suggestions primarily based in your sleep traits and up to date exercise. On my regular routine, my sleep coach advised me my “wants” align with my regular baseline of eight hours per night time. However the concept is that if I exercised or strained myself excessively on a given day, the coach may counsel extra relaxation. Alternatively, if the brand new nap-tracking function detects I obtained significant zzz’s in the course of the afternoon, the coach might say I’ll get by with much less shuteye in a single day.
In comparison with sleep monitoring from different smartwatches I’ve examined, the Garmin Venu 3 is among the solely ones that detects when hours of sleep doesn’t essentially imply I had restorative sleep. In actual fact, after a very anxious day, my Venu 3 stated in my Morning Report that my eight hours of sleep was non-restorative, incomes a dismal 50 sleep rating and 30 Physique Battery studying. In my expertise, solely the Oura Ring Gen 3 equally knew once I had an off day and wanted to prioritize restoration.
Another health-tracking instruments accessible with the Garmin Venu 3 are menstrual monitoring, being pregnant monitoring, hydration monitoring and even a jet lag administration function. I didn’t essentially want these to be a part of my each day routines, however they’re there in the event that they matter to you.
Garmin Venu 3 assessment: Smartwatch and connectivity options
The Garmin Venu 3 seems to maintain you extra linked than a number of the model’s sportier watches due to a built-in microphone and speaker. With Android and iOS cellphone name help, making and answering calls from my wrist was a breeze. The voice assistant, which I arrange with Siri by way of my iPhone, let me perform some easy instructions, too. New for the Venu 3 is the audible Meditation Exercise, which guides you with cues to observe, as an alternative of needing to control your wrist whilst you’re attempting to calm your thoughts.
I like how the speaker can play music out loud, too. The watch can retailer playlists from Spotify, Amazon Music and extra. Garmin Pay, mirrored notifications, calendar alerts and instruments like timers are additionally built-in into the person expertise. Extra applications might be put in with the Garmin Join IQ retailer, although the third-party app choice is extraordinarily restricted in comparison with the watchOS and Put on OS wearable app shops. I discover Garmin Join IQ is primarily helpful for exploring 100s of watch faces, if the dozen or so built-in choices aren’t to your liking.
One other manner the Garmin Venu 3 may lack attraction in comparison with the Galaxy Watch and Google Pixel Watch, and Apple Watch is the continued lack of LTE help. Garmin doesn’t make linked smartphones like many different prime smartwatch producers, but it surely nonetheless appears like one thing Garmin ought to work in direction of introducing if it needs the Venu 3 to steal some Apple, Samsung and Google prospects.
Garmin Venu 3 assessment: Battery life
Battery life is a giant cause I loved my Garmin Venu 3 testing expertise. The Venu 3 has as much as 14 days of battery life, whereas the smaller Venu 3S will get as much as 12 days. All through testing, I haven’t wanted to recharge it as soon as. That stated, I opted out of utilizing the at all times on show mode, which cuts the battery life again to five days. Both manner, I appreciated not needing to deliver the charger with me once I went out of city for a weekend.
In comparison with my different favourite long-lasting smartwatches, the Venu 2 Plus falls between the Fitbit Sense 2 (6 days) and the Garmin Forerunner 265 (15 days). Steady GPS use will minimize down in your battery life estimate, with the Venu 3 lasting as much as 26 hours with GPS-Solely GNSS or 20 hours with All-Techniques GNSS.
Garmin Venu 3 assessment: Verdict
The Garmin Venu 3 is the Garmin watch that greatest rivals the likes of the “sensible” smartwatches corresponding to Apple Watch, Galaxy Watch and Pixel Watch. Although it lacks sufficient third-party apps and LTE, the built-in mic/speaker makes the watch as handy as any. Pair that with thorough health monitoring and restoration options, and the Venu 3 is a straightforward smartwatch to suggest.
I’ll say the value similarity between the Garmin Venu 3 and Garmin Forerunner 265 might complicate the selection for these runners available in the market for a smartwatch. I’d say that for coaching or goal-oriented wants, the Forerunner is the most suitable choice. However for a extra versatile expertise, the Venu 3 is difficult to beat.
