Garmin Watches as key

[SwampNut]

Congrats on being the 1% of people who are actually serious athletes. I'm not, so I choose the more useful consumer grade devices.

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[johnj2803]

Completely disagree. All of the serious athletes I know have Garmin or COROS. No one uses Apple watches. My wife and I are both big cyclists and tried the Apple watch for a couple of years but are back to Garmin. Garmin has superior metrics, ANT+ compatibility, and as others mentioned, the battery life. Sure the screen isn't as fancy, but I didn't buy Garmin watch for stripped down apps that could be accessed on my phone, I use the Garmin watch 99% for health and fitness tracking / metrics. My phone does everything else.

Completely agree here. Non serious athletes could benefit from Metrics provided by Garmin watches.

 

[ElGuano]

Garmin user here. It's a great sports/adventuring watch, probably sets the high bar in the category. I'd love to have it be a key as well, but I also wonder whether it has whatever built-in security is needed nowadays for PaaK. Considering many Garmins have NFC payment capability, presumably it's technically possible to make it function like a keycard (hold it up to the door handle or charger)?

 

[Noplacelikeloam]

Completely disagree. All of the serious athletes I know have Garmin or COROS. No one uses Apple watches. My wife and I are both big cyclists and tried the Apple watch for a couple of years but are back to Garmin. Garmin has superior metrics, ANT+ compatibility, and as others mentioned, the battery life. Sure the screen isn't as fancy, but I didn't buy Garmin watch for stripped down apps that could be accessed on my phone, I use the Garmin watch 99% for health and fitness tracking / metrics. My phone does everything else.

This 100%. Im an Apple fanboy but at the end of the day Garmin is miles ahead of Apple in the outdoor and athletics space. I wear a Fenix 8 and cannot imagine going back to an Apple watch at this point. Ultra looks fancy but its a toy compared to Garmin.

Its not about the 1% either. Apple talks a big game around its fitness capabilities, but its very rudimentary in its scope of data, analysis, and insights. Then there is the battery life . . . no more needs to be said about that one.

 

[ElGuano]

Then there is the battery life . . . no more needs to be said about that one.

Fenix/Epix user here as well. Running ~25-30mpw I get 8-9 days straight with sunlight-readable 24/7 always-on OLED before needing to charge. On MIPS screen, it's 22 days between charges. Garmin is way, way ahead of the game in serious fitness tracking.

 

[Donald Stanfield]

Fenix 7x user here, echoing what everyone else is saying. For athletics, Garmin is the main game in town. It tracks my rowing, hiking, rock climbing, running, and anything else I find myself doing. It has a built-in strobe for running at night as well. Plus the battery lasts 30 days with the solar.

I'm not nearly as active now as I was in marathon training, but I like that it tracks rock climbing. Plus, connecting to HR straps and tracking pace, footfall, and ground contact time helps when you are concerned with running efficiently and using the correct technique. Those metrics were the difference between me having to walk a good part of a half marathon and being able to complete one in sub-2 hours with gas in the tank.

Garmin is hands down more focused on "real" adventurers than Apple is. Most of the people I know who wear a Fenix are people I would consider athletes, even though we are all weekend warriors and not pros. The reason for that is simple: the only things Garmin does exceptionally well are athletic-focused. Other smart watches have better displays and apps and look more fashionable.

 

[SwampNut]

And yet it still can't unlock your adventure truck after the adventure? Shame.

 

[Closedquestion]

Noob here. Has it been implemented on Apple and Samsung watches? If yes, then it seems like a no brainer. If no, it seems like those two would be higher priority (though I get your point re: adventure).

a developer has developed an app for Apple Watch. I was an early tester and it works great. I don’t know how apps are developed for Garmin, if they use outside developers, it’s probably up to one to get an app going. Here is a link to the WAAK app in apples app store
https://apps.apple.com/us/app/waakey/id6504162270

 

[TTedP]

Garmin has superior metrics,

I'm a 6yr user of many Garmin devices. They have a lot of great traits - but I've come to find "superior metrics" isn't one of them (looking at you Training Status). Still, love my Garmin and I wouldn't pick an AW Ultra over it.

Back on topic, I think if someone were to do an app, it would have to be 3rd party. Garmin isn't supporting that and the Connect marketplace isn't in the same league as Apple or Android. Nice to wish though!

 

[Greenwater]

I think the apple watch as a key works on Tesla's using ultra wide band/uwb, is that correct? (partly explaining why it won't work with older ones). I think rivian gen 1 doesn't have a uwb chip. My garmin doesn't have uwb as far as I can tell. Gen 2 does have uwb.

So for rivian, we'd need nfc or bluetooth unlocking from the watch. I believe NFC is what the lamented wrist band used (mine stopped working and rivian didn't fix it yet).

So my vaguely sourced information leads me to: garmin has to act as a key through nfc or bluetooth and that could work on all rivians at least in theory.

Edit - looked at the apple watch key for rivian, it says it's using bluetooth on both gen 1 and gen 2, but there are complaints about it being buggy.

 

[SwampNut]

but I've come to find "superior metrics" isn't one of them (looking at you Training Status).

Yeah, their stuff is amazingly bad. I tried the wife's high end Garmin mountain bike thingy because it can also integrate with my e-mountain bike controller, and I couldn't believe how junky it is. Trash buttons, metrics that are mismatched from the other TWO sources of similar data, and a ride where I didn 1400 MPH and instead of logging 32 miles it logged 7. Junk.

I think the apple watch as a key works on Tesla's using ultra wide band/uwb, is that correct?

On gen 1, the third party WaaK app works via Bluetooth. For Gen2, it's UWB, which is why the Garmin won't work that way.

 

[Greenwater]

On gen 1, the third party WaaK app works via Bluetooth. For Gen2, it's UWB, which is why the Garmin won't work that way.

Which (garmin?) watch worked on gen 1 with bluetooth? Was there a garmin watch app that worked with bluetooth? I am a dev, I could hack someone else's app probably if it was on github (I found some things yesterday but they seemed focused on teslas). I'd need instructions like how to get my 'key' and put it in the watch.

It looks like the two most common watches used by owners are apple watch and garmin. And then we have gen1 vs gen2. I happen to have both an apple watch and a garmin but I never use my old apple (battery life is too awful). So we have a user base than needs all 4 spaces with a solution (gen1 or gen2 rivian, and apple or garmin).

 

[SwampNut]

Which (garmin?) watch worked on gen 1 with bluetooth?

The question I quoted was about the Apple Watch, whic is the only watch that works. What I said applies to that, not Garmin.

 

[cwardak]

The Garmin lacks the modern chipsets and tech to do this the right way. It could be cobbled in using the old tech, but Rivian isn't going to do that. A third party theoretically could.

And the Ultra version of the Apple Watch is far more adventurous than the Garmin, which is pretty cute if you think "adventure" includes a Starbucks at the end of the half mile trail.

How is this possible. My Garmin Epic Gen 2 has both NFC and bluetooth which is what Apple Wallet Key uses and the Apple Watch. And the Garmin watch connects to my iPhone so all the needed tech appears to be there.

 

[tbinmd]

How is this possible. My Garmin Epic Gen 2 has both NFC and bluetooth which is what Apple Wallet Key uses and the Apple Watch. And the Garmin watch connects to my iPhone so all the needed tech appears to be there.

But does Garmin have an API that can used for a key function?

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