Perhaps the product user interface was poorly designed, or perhaps the experience was otherwise ripe for failure. That doesn’t mean the company (Garmin or otherwise) is not at fault. Whether or not people want to hear it, the vast majority of items do tend to fall into buckets A & B above. Said differently, when I evaluate the steady stream of issues that land at my virtual doorstep via comments, e-mails, tweets, and carrier pigeons, I try and question a few things (no matter the brand):ī) Was this already fixed in a firmware update?Ĭ) If this is a legit issue, then is it widespread, or a very limited edge case? Any conversation that skips this isn’t really truthful. Understanding the Scale:īefore we talk bugs though, we do need to talk scale to put things into perspective. It’s about the a cultural problem Garmin seems to have around software stability and bugs, that appears to be ‘features first, stability later’. It’s not about some random bug that Apple, Wahoo, or Polar hasn’t yet fixed. But this isn’t a post about whataboutism.
Which isn’t to say these other companies are perfect. Be it hardware or software related issues, the products are just more dependable. It’s because Suunto spends the time to ensure the vast majority of bugs are never seen by customers. The reason someone chooses a Suunto watch over a Garmin Fenix series watch isn’t because Suunto has more outdoors features or even better accuracy these days (they don’t). It’s because they have a product that seemingly has less bugs (and also as everyone points out, because you can configure your data pages via phone app). The sole reason Wahoo has slowly gained market share in cycling GPS computers isn’t because they have a technologically more feature laden or better priced product (they don’t). But the reality is that the ‘Garmin bugginess’ is also true, and everyone knows it. It’s because that person has been bit one too many times by buggy Garmin products.Īnd sure – that intro paragraph might seem unfair, after all I do record the vast majority of my own workouts on Garmin products without issue. In effect, my bet is the vast majority of time a person chooses a non-Garmin product over a Garmin one is not because Garmin lost the features or price battle. Or more specifically, their lack of focus on solving bugs that ultimately drive consumers to their competitors. Garmin’s biggest competitor is themselves. To the casual observer, one might assume Garmin’s biggest competitors are Apple, Fitbit, and in certain cycling circles – Wahoo.
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