Sanjay Mathew
Yes Sir ! This is THE watch to have. Prior to this I had the Garmin Swim watch just for lap swimming. I also have an Apple Watch 2, which is pretty but useless if you want to track activities with other users / web sites. Also thanks to this watch I have started doing OW swims :) Watch is very light weight and not very bulky. I have medium sized wrist. Battery like is exceptional - over 10 days for me and I leave it on 24 - 7. Other great feature is sleep tracking which it does automatically, not like my Apple Watch where I had to download a 3rd party app like Pillow and tell it to start and stop speech.For swims it hasnt yet missed a lap and I do about 14-q5 miles a week. Stroke count is accurate. It does sometime list my backstroke as breaststroke but that might the way I start off. Crawl and Butterfly is listed correctly. It has a drill mode so I can do kickboard or other drills where I am moving my hands and then I can manually enter lap count.For walks and run, GPS and HR is accurate.I like having the 24 -7 HR data alsoOnly complaint I have is that HR feature is disabled during swim and I know that once water gets between watch and skin then HR gets off , however with trial and error practice I have found that I can get a correct HR on my Apple Watch if I strap it down real tight.I know Garmin is making people by their chest strap, but I for one don't like it. I am disappointed Garmin doesn't give me the option to enable HR during swim if I want. If they fix it I can give this watch 5 stars.
Adrian L. MikeAdrian L. Mike
Phenomenal. This review is about a month after I had received the watch.I had waited and waited to buy a watch that would fulfill all the different activities I do and the Garmin 935 is the best fit for me.The manual that comes with the watch is basic as with most similar products but the Garmin online forum is great and just search for a particular topic and a set of easy to follow instructions should pop up. I have successfully found out how to do all the changes/customization's I want to do.PROS:- I have been able to customize the screens to what I want and add several activities to my favourites so I do not have to go "looking" for them and they pop up first.- I have cycled (outside and indoors), ran, pool swam and open water swim all with great recording results.- I have attached a couple of the faces of the different options and one which I customized when I swim.-The open water swimming has been pretty accurate and has shown a true swim path.- I have synced it with my Garmin 520 as a heart rate monitor with no issues, got picked up straight away.- Indoor rowing, great as I had no way to count my stroke rate, now I do.- The watch face customization's are really great and have downloaded several through the Connect IQ store.- The battery life is really good and I generally to charge it every couple of days and that is with exercising every day.CONS:- One minor complaint is that the pool swimming is not that accurate, I have tried it in a 25 m, 50 m and a 18 m pool and it will generally be within 100-150 m of my total workout.- No HR during swimming. I would have thought that for this watch, Garmin would have updated the algorithm to capture this as I do use my heart rate during the swim. The Samsung watch captures your HR during swimming which my buddy constantly points out. I will not plan to buy the chest strap to swim with as it is uncomfortable and I do not see the reason why I should spend that money after buying this watch.- The watch screen could have been a sapphire lens.All in all, if you want a very versatile Multi sport watch, The Garmin 935 is it.
Nick
Using it for 1 year now.PROS: Well, for running, quite perfect. The GPS and the app shows most of the information I need.For swimming, most of the uses in pool or open water it’s pretty good. The information in the app is also great.CONS: However the GPS gets lost sometimes in open water. The water temperature detection is not working anymore.And in the pool, it gets lost sometimes when you change strokes. The system also do not recognize drills with the mix of lap swimming + kicks so you have to change mode everytime and it’s cumbersome to insert distance manually, specially when you vary the distances.
Sasa
Smartwatch full of surprises despite the outdated model, functional and light, after understanding how it works it was really easy to use, very long lasting battery
Donna Bumgardner
What can I say I do like my Garmin. This is my 3rd. I’m still learning how to use all of its features but it seems like a solid watch
KB
I recently bought the Forerunner 235 and sent it back for several reasons. One of those reasons was the shockingly dim display (and the awful heart rate accuracy). After reading reviews, and after a brief fling with an Apple Watch, I ordered the Forerunner 935, especially after reading that the display is brighter than the 235 and 735, and the brightness level could be adjusted. Well, no. But, yes. Depending on what your definition of display brightness is. More on that later.Pros:1. Incredibly accurate heart rate monitor, even when working out. Same as my Garmin chest strap.2. Sleep tracking, as far as I can tell, is accurate. More importantly, very comfortable to sleep in.3. Lots of cool stats and analytics for the geek (me).4. Lots of watch faces to choose from. A ridiculous amount.5. Notifications are great when they work (see below)6. Display is bright in direct light.7. Garmin Connect app is very good.8. Quick to pick up (and stay with) external senors (Bluetooth and ANT).Cons:1. Yeah, so, don't confuse normal display brightness (cannot be adjusted) to backlight brightness (which can be adjusted). Backlight happens when you press the appropriate button on the watch or when the watch is gestured towards your body (at least it is most times, although I haven't quite figured out the exact hand-body motion algorithm for the gesturing activation yet). Otherwise, in a dark room, if you look at your 935, it is dim dim dim. So, if you want a watch face with thirty metrics, you better have superhero vision, even when you're looking at it in direct sunlight, because most of the additional stats (other than time) are itty bitty.2. Notifications are finicky. I have an iPhone and there is a little song and dance you have to do when notifications stop working. Just be prepared. It's not a tragedy, but can be slightly annoying when it happens. Also, even when notifications work, some notifications get skipped. Example, for 1 text I get a notification, and then 2 minutes later another text arrives but I get no notification. Then, 5 minutes later I get a text notification for the next text. Weird. It's like the iPhone and 935 never really get along, but have come to some sort of passive-aggressive agreement to coexist. I would definitely not describe the relationship as seamless or consistent.3. If you're going to constantly monitor your heart rate just be prepared that battery life is not going to be super-fantastic. I charge it at night when I'm showering. Charges fairly quickly. Example, last night I started at 99% before I went to bed. Tracked sleep. Heart rate has been constantly tracking. It is now 5:00 PM and the 935 is at 87%. So not too shabby. But, after I work out tonight I'm guessing it will be in the low 70%.4. Pricey. Not sure this a $400 watch, and for about that much you can get a lot more in the way of apps and connectability with an Apple Watch, if that's your thing. I wanted this for activities, not to have another iPhone on my wrist, so I like it better than the Apple Watch 4 (which I did also order and send back).5. While there are many, many, many watch faces available, there are surprisingly few apps like weather and other non-activity-tracking apps available. Looks like even on the Garmin Connect Store there are apps that are in weird stages of development (require API codes and other developer-type workarounds). The interface is pretty one-dimensional, which accounts for the lack of "fun" apps. Good thing statistics and metrics don't need to be fun.Summary, if you want a smartphone on your wrist, with access to hundreds of cool apps and the ability to be able to answer texts and calls from your watch, don't buy the 935. If you are a serious athlete and an accurate wrist-based heart rate monitor is your thing, and you want to be able to ONLY see calls and other notifications, I would suggest the 935.One final note: if you have an iPhone, before you buy this, I would suggest getting on the Garmin forums and checking out the issues that have been going on for some time with no real solutions.Pro tip: if you opt for the 935 and you have an iPhone, be prepared to have the Garmin Connect app running at all times to increase the likelihood that you will receive notifications. That will tax the battery on both ends, but it seems to help.UPDATE1. Every morning I have to reset notifications to start working again. It's easy but has to be done every morning. Check out Garmin forums. Turn off Garmin Connect notifications, then turn off Bluetooth, then do all that in reverse. Works every time.2. Do not have the Garmin Connect app open when you're working out or the 935 will reboot itself several times during the workout.3. Email notifications from the iPhone email app are annoying. Several times during the day the 935 will suddenly give me individual notifications for all the unread emails in my inbox even if it already has notified me prior of those same emails.Would I buy this watch again? Maybe. Personally I probably should have waited 2 weeks for the 945 and shelled out the extra $ for that. But this is an above average smartwatch for athletes.