Garmin Fenix 8 review

This is the big one. Fenix is not Garmin’s most expensive watch series, but for many people it is the most important. The Garmin Fenix 8 sees AMOLED screen tech come to the series for the first time — something that’s been on the cards since 2019, when the original Garmin Venu proved smartwatch displays and a high-end fitness watch experience need not be strangers.

Don’t want OLED? A classic transflective model is also available. But if you want that, then you should also seriously consider the Garmin Enduro 3, which has incredible battery life and does most of the same stuff.

Other key Garmin Fenix 8 changes include multi-faceted digital assistant support and dive-ready water resistance. That may risk nibbling away at the Garmin Descent range’s appeal, but Garmin has been forced into action by the super-resilient Apple Watch Ultra.

Is the Garmin Fenix 8 one of the best fitness trackers on the market? Absolutely. Is it overkill for most people? Absolutely. If OLED is the key draw, also consider the Forerunner 265, 465 and 965. All are excellent, and cost significantly less. This one is for the most demanding and well-heeled only. But what a watch it is…

Garmin Fenix 8 review

Garmin Fenix 8: Price and availability

The Garmin Fenix 8 launched at the end of August 2024, two and a half years after the Fenix 7 and roughly 16 months after the Fenix 7 Pro. As ever with a popular Garmin series, there are a whole bunch of options to consider.

The OLED version reviewed here is available in 1.69 in, 1.85 in and 2.00 in (43 mm, 47 mm and 51 mm) models, priced at $999, $1,099 and $1,199 (£949, £949 and $1,119) respectively. Models with transflective screens and solar charging come in 1.85 in/47 mm ($1,099/£949) and 2.0 in/51 mm ($1,199/£1,039) variants.

Sound like too much to spend? There’s also the 47mm-only Fenix E at $799/£689. And heavier stainless steel versions of the OLED Fenix 8 at £869 (not listed in the US at present).

Confused? No wonder, when there are up to 18 members of the Fenix 8 family (in the UK). Today, though, we’ll give you the lowdown on what’s the best all-rounder for many: the AMOLED 47m Fenix 8.

Garmin Fenix 8: Design and display

• Ready for scuba diving
• Titanium helps lower weight
• OLED brings smartwatch gloss

Take a brief glance at the Garmin Fenix 8 and you could easily think it is super-similar to the watches that came before it, with its round face and tough, industrial-looking bezel. There are a few key changes here, though.

First of all, the Fenix 8 is the first watch to provide dive-ready water resistance. It’s primed for dives up to 40m depth – though this has a knock-on effect in the buttons department.

“Our unique button design uses inductive technology to remove the need for a hole in the case — thus making leak points impossible,” says Garmin. In practice, this means that the Fenix 8’s side buttons don’t use a mechanical click, instead relying on haptic feedback, as used widely in the Apple Watch series.

I expected to hate this, and for the first couple of days the buttons did feel oddly squishy. But the haptics are a surprisingly good replacement for a classic button click, and technically very impressive. After switching to the mechanical Enduro 3, I even kinda missed them.

Wearing the Fenix 8 while sleeping was also a pleasant surprise. The use of titanium keeps weight down to a very reasonable 2.58 oz (73 g) with the standard silicon strap, or 1.87 oz (53g) without it. We’d suggest checking out of the smaller, lighter plastic Forerunners for true 24/7 wear, though.

Part of what you pay for here are the lightness and toughness of the titanium, and the scratch resistance of the Sapphire crystal — which I still somehow managed to put a small nick in.

Blending the old school, button-driven approach with a dash of smartphone style, my review Garmin Fenix 8 had an OLED touchscreen. You can use either control method, but scrolling through your daily stats with a finger again makes great use of the Fenix 8’s unusually refined (for Garmin) haptics, with a little click as you pass by each category of stats.

This screen is sharp and bright, and makes the transflective standard of older Garmin ranges look dull. It sees high-end Garmin watches move beyond being fitness tools, into something you’ll also just enjoy wearing.

However, to get the most out of the Fenix 8’s OLED screen you need to turn on the “always on” mode. This makes it display a simplified, dimmed version of your watch face all day, so you can treat it more like a watch. But then you can wave goodbye to the claimed 16-day battery life. More on that later.

Garmin Fenix 8: Features

• New assistant features are nice, but not essential
• Improved notification support
• Solid bedrock of features

The Garmin Fenix 8 is a better underwater watch than its predecessor. But in other areas? Garmin watches have had an overabundance of features for years. In this generation, Garmin has focused on developing areas that are only a tangential interest for the wider family: the smart stuff.

The Garmin Fenix 8 has a speaker and a microphone, just like a dedicated smartwatch. You can use it to take calls, and it offers two types of digital assistant support. You can hook it up to your phone to relay its assistant’s voice responses, or there’s an onboard Garmin asssistant that can perform a small handful of requests on-watch.

This onboard assistant can start activities, set alarms and timers and, well, not much more. Kitchen timers are clearly the number one use for the Fenix 8’s digital assistant anyway. Top-end fitness watches do not cry out for this stuff, but it’s another skill for the series to claim.

This smartwatch-like stuff is combined with much-improved notifications handling. Notifications are nested into types, and you can reply to messages with canned responses. It’s a lot more smartwatch-like than you might expect from a Garmin watch.

As ever, you get access to the Connect IQ app store, too, and it’s all wrapped up in a significantly redesigned interface that’s just familiar enough not to freak out Garmin veterans. It separates out mini apps and activities better, and has perhaps a little more gloss.

All the other classic extras of a higher-end Garmin watch are here as usual, too. You get 32GB storage, which can be used to download map data or store songs from the supported music services. These are Spotify, Deezer and Amazon Music, while there are also some podcast managers available from the Connect IQ app store.

One of my favourite abilities of these high-end Garmin watches is creating routes for runs, hikes and bike rides, and following them on your watch with no need for your phone. You can even devise these routes on the watch itself, but it’s more comfortable to do so on your phone.

The maps, across the world, are free to download. But there is a paid Outdoor Maps+ plan, which includes even more detail, relief shading, building footprints, full satellite imaging and light pollution info. It’s not a must-have upgrade for most, but shows how deep the Garmin rabbit hole goes.

And if you get lost while you’re down there, the Fenix 8 has a bright LED flashlight to help!

Garmin Fenix 8: Performance

• Very good tracking accuracy
• GPS slower to lock on than some previous models
• Great week-long stamina, even with heavy use
• Garmin’s 16-day claim can be met
• Uses Garmin’s classic charge cable

While the Garmin Fenix 8 is quite a departure from the Fenix 7 Pro in terms of its screen and water resistance, the fitness tracking basics remain familiar.

They share Garmin’s latest six LED, quad-sensor optical heart rate sensor, which uses four extra green LEDs to help stabilize readings when actually tracking exercise. It’s a very good sensor that I’ve found perfect for running and cycling. In the gym, its readings can seem a touch slow on the uptake at times, but endless minor 45-second exertions are a tough ask.

It’s also good for resting heart rate detection, and noticed when I picked up some sort of virus that resulted in my resting heart rate dropping lower than usual.

The Garmin Fenix 8 also has dual-band GPS, for boosted signal in tough areas like hugely built-up cities. And as usual, there’s an Auto mode to switch up to that top mode when necessary. You don’t want to use dual-band all the time, as it is an additional battery sap.

I did notice the Fenix 8 seems to take a few seconds longer to lock onto a signal than the last Garmins I used, which is the only major complaint to level at the watch. We’ve reached out to Garmin to see if there’s a reason for this — but it may well change in a software update anyway.

The watch also supports Garmin’s ECG app. We weren’t able to test this in the UK, but it is available to US users.

The battery life you get from a Fenix 8 will vary by watch size, and even more greatly by the screen tech you pick. This review considers only the 47mm OLED version, but should be indicative of the wider OLED family.

Garmin says you can expect up to 16 days of use, but we would recommend using the always-on screen mode, which displays the time all day. Seven days is quoted for this mode but, for the first time in years of reviewing these watches, the Fenix 8 actually outperformed Garmin’s estimations!

It started at 100% charge at 6:30 am on day one, and ended with 7% charge at 6:30 am on day 8. And that battery test period included 4.5 hours of tracked running, a 3.5-hour hike, a 50-minute cycle and two 40-minute gym sessions.

I used the watch for notifications too. More than eight days’ use in these conditions? That is great!

I also used the Fenix 8 for a good while with the always-on mode switched off, before this battery-watching test period. It lost 6% to 10% of battery life a day, suggesting Garmin’s 16-day claim is achievable with moderate use.

On the charging front, there’s nothing new here: the Fenix 8 still uses Garmin’s classic four-prong cable.

The Garmin Fenix 8 is yet more proof most users no longer need to fear a flashy OLED screen’s effect on battery life.

Garmin Fenix 8: Verdict

The Garmin Fenix 8 is big news, in that it brings OLED screens to the most desirable Garmin watch line. And, for good measure, the watch gets water resistance to a degree not usually seen outside of the diving-specific Descent range.

Is this mostly an Epix watch subsumed into the better-known Fenix family? It sure is, but it also marks the point where more watch fans should be considering an OLED fitness watch rather than a transflective one, given that we got well over a week’s use out of the Fenix 8 while hammering it pretty hard.

The price increase may be too much to stomach if you have no intention of using the diving skills, though. A focus on smart skills also suggests Garmin has prospective Apple Watch Ultra owners in its sights as much as long-standing Garmin fans.

If Garmin Fenix 8 is not for you

Fenix 8 too rich? Don’t forget the Fenix E exists. It loses the flashlight, has a slightly smaller screen, and misses out on the speaker, microphone and — perhaps most crucially — the latest-generation HR and GPS tech. It’s kind of a last-gen device, but with new software.

You should also keep an eye out for the Epix 2 and Epix 2 Pro. The experience of using one is very close to that of a Fenix 8, and both are available for a bunch less than the Fenix E.

Don’t rule out Garmin’s other series, either. The crucial one for prospective Fenix 8 owners is Forerunner. You lose some of the flashier build elements, but the Forerunner 965 provides similar core features for less money.

Garmin Fenix 8: How we tested

We spent six weeks testing the Garmin Fenix 8, which was enough time to run down the battery multiple times, to get a feel for its real-world stamina. It was used to track hundreds of kilometres of running, including multiple half-marathons to test the heart rate accuracy over longer sessions.

The Fenix 8 was used during gym sessions and bike workouts, including the use of heart rate broadcasting. We were not able to test its scuba diving features, though, so do a little more research on that area before buying if it’s a key draw.