I purchased this watch on 26 Jan at Rebel in Sydney. On 28 Jan, the watch face cracked vertically for no apparent reason. Rebel immediately replaced the unit, without argument, under warranty. My web investigation suggested this crack had happened to a tiny minority of users over the last 9 months since release. Probably due to "flex" pressures on the plastic watch frame and thus gorilla glass.

Product is interesting from an analytics point of view. I own in addition to a Garmin Forerunner 965 (all purchased in last year):

1. Fitbit Charge 6 - to try out their google analytics
2. Amazfit GTR4 - to test all around value
3. Huawei GT4 & GT Runner - to replicate their reputed accuracy and use the latter elegance
4. TicWatch Pro5 - to understand whether google wear ecosystem will survive; and
5. Polar H10 chest strap - to get an accurate HR reading to feed into most watches or watch apps

I have also tested a latest release Apple watch, but do not own one.

Each of these products does something that I value, that the others do not. Hence my excessive expenditure on this hobby.

In the end the Garmin Forerunner 965 looks less elegant and is slightly less accurate in gathering data compared with a Huawei GT4 (or an Apple or Google watch), BUT feeds data into the most vibrant analytics ecosystem at both the mobile and web-based levels. In the latter it also currently does better than Google Wear/FIT or Apple Health.

For instance, when one investigates the estimated Vo2 max of these devices, in my case, the Garmin device is nearer external test reality. In my case, FitBit (Google) and Polar over estimate and Amazfit and Huawei underestimate. The difference appears to lie in how each of their algorithms use actual resting and maximum heart rates, and age of respondent, as opposed to assumed values for a particular age and sex. GPS and thus distance data variances/accuracy are less of an issue.

The Garmin Forerunner 965 looks cheap, but delivers good analytics. I will keep it, along with my Huawei GT4 (to check accuracy and look better) and Polar H10 chest strap, but have abandoned my FitBit Charge 6, Amazfit GTR4 and Huawei GT Runner.

Beautiful screen. Navigation is passable, but routing is slow. Integration with phone is not as bad as I'd thought, but still marginal.

Before this I had an Epix Pro 2. On that watch, the buttons were all reliable. On this watch, they're not--sometimes I think I've pressed them but the watch ignores the presses. Just a cheap mechanical system, I think. Pity Garmin couldn't put reliable buttons in its "cheap" watch...

This is more comfortable to wear at night than the Epix, especially if you have company. That would be important if it were good at sleep tracking, but:

I'm sending it back because of "sleep tracking". You can put the watch into sleep mode and take it out again (and even set up instant buttons to make this convenient), but the watch overrides you. You tell it you're going to sleep, and it takes itself out of sleep mode half an hour later. You tell it to get out of sleep mode when you wake up, and it continues to claim you're sleeping for another hour. Garmin's brilliant idea: you can give yourself a strict schedule for every day of the week, and if you go to sleep and wake up when you've promised, sleep tracking works ok (but see The Quantified Scientist's youtube reviews for gory details). But if you deviate from that schedule, the watch overrules the information you give it, and demands that you obey your schedule. If I wake up earlier than promised and take the watch out of sleep mode, it keeps putting itself back into sleep mode until the scheduled wake-up time. If I want to sleep in, it leaves sleep mode on the predetermined schedule. There is no way to work around this or disable it, and Garmin's "tech support" has assured me that there never will be, because it's Correct to obey a fixed schedule or something.

Oh also, there's an option to display "speed" rather than "pace" for some sports. NOT for rowing, which is just moronic, but for walking, running, cycling, kayaking, etc. However, the setting has no effect that I can see: everything is still displayed as pace if the watch decides it should be, with no regard for your choice.

Basically: Garmin developers think that your user input should be overridden and ignored. OBEY THE WATCH, STUPID HUMAN!

Time to try Coros.

If you are switching to Garmin from Apple you are likely doing so for the health and metric benefits. From that aspect, this watch will not disappoint. I love that my exercise minutes are now based on a week vs day, as well as more points for higher intensity vs less intense. This watch seems to assume you want to be healthy and gives you metrics to gradually improve your fitness. There’s so many helpful functions: upcoming race, digital coach as well as sleep, VO2, body battery and so many more. I have no complaints on the athletic functions and need to continue to explore more. I know this watch is more marketed to runners but as an avid mountain biker, I find it just as useful. The display is great, maps are nice, and it is a lot lighter than the Epix.

Now the down sides. Coming from an Apple watch my main complaints are, I can’t send a quick “yes, no, maybe,” canned reply for text messages from my watch. I get that there is no speaker to dictate messages but a dozen canned replies would help a ton. I also do not like that all of my notifications are lumped into the “text” icon on the watch, i.e. if i have two unread text messages and two other apps also sent miscellaneous push notifications, the text icon shows 4 unread messages. I hope Garmin will change, in a future update, the ability to only show actual unread text messages in the text number icon vs every possible notification your phone generates.

All in all, this watch is excellent. It will likely improve your health but it does come with one or two drawbacks from the Apple integration side.

The watch face is large, ie fitting a dress shirt or jacket cuff is sometimes a pain. But the large size enhances the beautiful OLED display. The 965 is fabulous for all its features. Bottom line is it enhancing my training motivation, my health consciousness in now monitoring my sleep quality, my recovery status, my VO2 max progress, my HRV, and more. I literally want to get a good night’s sleep just so my morning report upon waking gives me a good sleep score! I love the GPS accuracy in monitoring speed, distance, mile time. I even just programmed a 5k’s route using Garmin Connect online which will track via Garmin mapping when I run the actual race in April. As for activities, I’ve only so far used run, treadmill run, and strength train. I don’t know how it knows what kind of strength rep I just did, but it does, and I can’t figure out how it knows my sleep stages too. I thought I would prefer the simulated analog EpixPro watch face imported through Connect, but the widgets don’t work, and I prefer most the circular colorful digital face as advertised. There are so many more features, and I know I am just getting started. The watch also connects quickly to my Polar H10 chest strap as soon as the activity is activated. Battery life is quite good and I can get a full recharge in the time I’m done with my shower! For highly informed fitness training and health monitoring, this is an impressive watch! When will I put my Rolex Submariner back on? I just don’t know!