JULY 2021 T3 73Tested
Garmin Venu 2armin finally made a fitness
smartwatch that’sactually usable
and doesn’tlook toobad either.
Better still, the batterylifeis pretty
impressive for anAMOLED watch. e Venu 2
has stayedtrue to its roots in terms of offering a
more fitness-yexperience; it just doesit way
better than previous iterations.
e 1.3-inch AMOLED touchscreendisplay
has a resolution of 416 x 416 pixels and iteven
has anoptional always-on mode. e AMOLED
screen reallybrings the widget view of the
Garmin OS to lifeand all the milestone
animations, like when you hityourstep goals,
look waybetter on the pretty screen.
Batterylifeis a categorythe watch really
excelsin. Officially, it offers ‘upto’ 11days in
smartwatch mode;with GPS on, battery lifeis
22 hours and8 hours ifyou listen to music as
well. Now, this mightnot sound amazing but
this is an AMOLED smartwatch, which tend to
havea battery lifeof a dayor two, max.
ere areplenty ofnew workout modesin the
Garmin Venu 2. First of all, the new Muscle Maps
are an illustration showing which muscles are
workedduring the strengthtraining session. But
they only tell you which muscles are activated by
certainworkouts rather than howmuch they
were actuallyworked, making them only helpful
if you don’t know push ups workthe pecs.
Other new features are slightly better.e
new HIIT workout mode has a‘free’mode
tracking heart rate and calories burned but you
GThis fantastic fitness watch
packs a punch, featuring a
new heart rate sensor and a
beautiful AMOLED screen
Garmin
Venu 2
SMASH HIITWE’RE IMPRESSED Great
battery life; large AMOLED
screen; new Elevate sensor works
well; seamless touch controls.
WE’D IMPROVE Health
Snapshot feels pointless; Muscle
Maps are gimmicky; algorithm
only accurate if worn 24 /7.
THE LAST WORD A handsome
smartwatch that can track daily
sport activities. The new Elevate
sensor and improved health
analysis are just icing on the cake.VERDICTFind the best deals for the
Venu 2 at: bit.ly/t3venu2can also download HIIT workouts from the
Garmin Connect app or use the Venu 2 as a HIIT
timer. As forthe new bouldering mode, you can
set a grading system so the watchknows how
difficult the wall is you’reabout to ascend.
As well as thenew sportmodes, the Venu 2
has the new Health Snapshot feature, which
provides you with a snapshot of yourheart rate,
SpO2, respiration and stresslevels, as well as
heart rate variabilityestimations. We’re not
sure we see the point of this because you can
check all this anyway at any point onthe watch
or inthe app,but anyway,it’s available.
Body Batteryis back too and it’s pretty
precise, thanks to the Firstbeat Analytics
algorithm. Granted, it’s still not a medical
measurement of energylevels, but at least now
poor sleep doesn’t always replenish the Body
Batteryas it used to. e smartwatch also
measures stress, respiration, blood oxygen and
sleep too,allwith seemingly good accuracy.
Sensor-wise, this is the first watch to feature
the new Elevate v4heart rate sensor, which now
has a few extra LEDs. ankfully, it works
pretty welland when you take the watchoff it’ll
stop displaying heart rate levels, unlike
previous gen Garmin watches.
If youaren’t keen on having a dedicated
sportswearable wrapped aroundyourwrist and
appreciate a goodlooking smartwatch that has
actually usefulhealth and fitness features, you’d
be silly not to givethe Garmin Venu 2 a go. It’ll
be ourpreferred fitness smartwatch for sure.From £ 349 .99
garmin.com