Subscription Model Weakness – No strong recurring revenue like Apple or Fitbit. Relies solely on hardware sales from new customers and 3-5 yearly consumer upgrade cycles.
Yikes. Obviously, this author can’t be blamed for Garmin’s recent announcement. But holy shit is it some awkward timing.
For me, like one commenter under that article, the lack of subscription is precisely why I liked Garmin. I want to buy a product and be able to use it for as long as it lasts, without needing to have an ongoing cost. This is especially true when the product I bought is hundreds of dollars.
A new fenix 8 is more then 1100 USD here in Norway. For that price you should have access to the software unbarred to the lifetime of the watch. Considering anything else is a sign a brain decay.
Not a fan of subscription models either but I would also love to be get useful software updates somehow.
So many fetures are not released for older models because they need to sell the newer ones.
As you said in you other comment OP this list of “what is wrong with Garmin” is basically a list of things that appeal to me and why I choose garmin over the other wank.
I don’t want 5g LTE bollocks, I don’t want all these “smartwatch” features or deeper integration with a phone. I’m super disappointed about their move towards subscription models.
I want a reliable watch that is good for tracking the sports I do, which it does. I like having buttons and not touchscreen wankery (I know some have touchscreens and I purposefully avoid those models).
Honestly this article is a load of shit, why are people so insistent on everything being identical, more diverse options in every space not just watches is a good thing in my opinion. Not everything has to conform and be a cookie cutter of each other.
I’m more or less with you. I don’t have a huge problem with the subscription stuff right now. But let’s see if they start hiding basic things behind it. I would guess that they will, but I can hope that they won’t.
I don’t want a smart watch. I want a fitness watch and that’s what I have. I love the touch screen on mine, but it also has all the same physical buttons that other Garmins do. AND it disables the touchscreen when I go for my workouts which is perfect.
Agreed, I don’t have a problem with it as it has been announced in that I have no desire for AI stuff and as long as it doesn’t affect my current experience people can knock themselves out with paying for that stuff. Sadly however I don’t believe for a minute it won’t creep into the basic experience like it did for strava for instance and slowly start eroding my experience unless I start paying a subscription. That I think is unacceptable but also seems par for the course these days and it is disgusting.
What you’ve described doesn’t sound too bad as long as you have buttons too. My hatred came from having one of their watches in the past where everything was controlled with the touchscreen and it was an absolute nightmare, particularly trying to end an activity after a long run when it is cold or raining or whatever and it just not responding was the most frustrating bullshit. I am a fan of buttons in general though and miss my physical keyboard on my phone etc.
I can just cross my fingers and hope Garmin doesn’t do what Strava did.
As for the touchscreen… What watch was that?? That sounds like a terrible fitness watch.
It was the Garmin Vivoactive I think it was called. I hated it.
I just checked the updated app. You also get customizable charts. This is a feature that is silly to hide behind a paywall.
I bought mine for tracking GPS routes and pretty much no other feature.
This 👆👍
