The Running Thread - 2026

[Dopey 2020]

Not Ultra, series 8. Ultra seems a bit too bulky for me.

I’ve had a 10 since shortly after it came out because yeah my 7 died during a marathon. That is frustrating since you know apple has the same ability to make a good battery as Garmin or coros. I just can’t give up the integration with my phone/airpods/cell plan. Same as @marty3d I have cell plan and can opt to leave the phone at home. My 10 can do a full no problem for now and will go two days if I’m doing short runs or strength workouts. I may look to the ultra next time. If it ever becomes a problem again I’d probably go with the cheapest coros I could find just for races and keep apple as my everything else watch.

 

[Erika10021]

I’ve had a 10 since shortly after it came out because yeah my 7 died during a marathon. That is frustrating since you know apple has the same ability to make a good battery as Garmin or coros. I just can’t give up the integration with my phone/airpods/cell plan. Same as @marty3d I have cell plan and can opt to leave the phone at home. My 10 can do a full no problem for now and will go two days if I’m doing short runs or strength workouts. I may look to the ultra next time. If it ever becomes a problem again I’d probably go with the cheapest coros I could find just for races and keep apple as my everything else watch.

The best part of Coros is the battery life. While it has a lot of functions, I really only pay attention to distance and pace and, if I am using it, intervals, which can be set indefinitely. During the marathon in January, I had 221 run intervals! I go roughly two weeks between charges so 50 ish miles of walks and runs between charges.

 

[The Expert]

I started running 10 years ago with a fitbit and quickly traded it for a very simple Garmin 55. I went all the way to a fenix5s, which was gorgeous but heavy. Swapped that for a 245s and beat the hell out of it but it did everything and the battery lasted for days. I just upgraded to a 570 for the touchscreen and better GPS functionality and I love it. I wear my Garmin 24/7 and it does everything I need. To me the Garmin/Coros vs Apple decision comes down to whether you want a smart watch that does some run tracking or if you want a running watch with daily lifestyle functionality.

 

[The Expert]

April Recap

Running: 40.35 miles
Dog walking: 25.2 miles
Pilates/strength: 3:45 hours

 

[Mr_Incr3dible]

I had a Garmin 945 for a couple of years until it had an unfortunate encounter with a tile floor that broke its environmental seal, which I later found out at the beach....
I replaced it with a Forerunner 255, which is a bit smaller and slimmer, but still has the music feature (which I almost never use due to having my phone with me). I recharge the battery maybe once per week, and it lasts that long because I have text message notifications turned off on my phone. I became tired of all the buzzing and vibrating from spam calls and spam texts.
I also leave the RWR feature turned off most of the time, which greatly increases battery life. On my weekday runs I know by now where the walk intervals are on the course, and on the greenway there are 1/10 mile markers, so it is easy to have a good idea of where to walk. When I have used the feature for rD races, battery life wasn't an issue.
The DW wears hers 24/7 and uses it to track sleep; I take mine off at night. I'm going to sleep poorly either way.
I gave my DS a Garmin for Christmas since he's back to running, and DD1 just bought herself a Garmin, so we are a mostly Garmin family.
I really want my next Garmin watch to be one of the aviation watches with built in altimeter, moving maps, etc., but those are a bit $pendy for now.
Bottom line: I really like my Garmin watches and the data available such as steps, heartrate, run pace, etc.
YMMV

 

[KCO5988]

I have a garmin forerunner 165 and love it. I can preprogram workouts into if I want. I like that I have the option of setting multiple activity screens with different parameters showing. My main screen that I use for most of my training runs shows total time, total distance, current pace and heart rate. My second screen that I toggle between during a race shows the total time, the lap distance, lap pace and heart rate because I like to double check my average lap pace sometimes since current pace can be off. I don't like to leave it on lap pace the whole race though because if pace starts to slip off target, I may over correct and speed up too much - so I like current pace for that. I have another screen that I pull up during interval workouts that just shows current lap distance, lap pace and lap time.

 

[PrincessV]

The best part of Coros is the battery life. While it has a lot of functions, I really only pay attention to distance and pace and, if I am using it, intervals, which can be set indefinitely. During the marathon in January, I had 221 run intervals! I go roughly two weeks between charges so 50 ish miles of walks and runs between charges.

Yep, I’ll second the Coros battery life. I only wear mine while running and charge it maybe 1.5 times a MONTH!