Garmin epix Pro (Gen 2), 51 mm, Glass, Slate Grey, Black

Product Information

When it comes to sensors, the new units keep the same set of ANT+ & Bluetooth sensors as the existing Fenix 7/Epix units: Chronic Training Load & Load Ratio: Chronic training load is simply the average of your 7-day training load chunks, but over the last 28 days. And Training Load Ratio is a comparison of this week’s Training Load versus that 28-day average. In other words: How does this week’s load compare to the last 28 days load? Once a course is loaded you’ll get prompts for turns as you approach them. For hiking/running/etc it’ll be about 50 meters out, and for cycling it’s about 150 meters out. You can see this here as I hike up an 8,000ft mountain on a 35km or so route:

Pro Series + Epix Pro (Gen2 Exclusive: Garmin Fēnix 7 Pro Series + Epix Pro (Gen2

The current Garmin Epix 2 range (above) are already capable smartwatches, but there's still room for improvement. (Image credit: Garmin) To begin, the Epix follows the standard Garmin 5-button design, but with a full touchscreen display as well. Garmin’s approach for this layout is that you can do any function you want via either touch or buttons. If you hate touch, you never have to use touch. If you hate buttons, the only time you need buttons is to start/stop/lap an activity. Equally, if you love touch for daily use but hate it for sport, you can even disable it during sports. Or disable it for running but keep it for hiking. The world is your oyster here. Overall, we'd say that's the pattern with this latest sensor. It's by no means a huge leap forward - which is likely why this isn't being branded openly as Elevate V5 (yet) - but it is, at least some of the time, just that bit more accurate. The Epix Pro & Fenix 7 Pro units in particular now feature shaded relief maps (though existing Fenix 7/Epix units get that via firmware update). Interestingly, this doesn’t actually increase the map size. Rather, this is done using existing data in the maps data sets. Your Endurance Score looks at your overall activity duration in conjunction with the intensity level. The longer the better, but at the same time, intensity plays a part, and in particular, intensity relative to your VO2max. However, the idea is that your Endurance Score is comparable with other people. Here’s mine below:This means the series is now aligned with the Fenix 7 and Fenix 7 Pro watches, with a much broader array of users able to find the right fit for their wrist.

Garmin Epix Pro (Gen 2) review - Wareable

You can see your historical Endurance Score, though how much you see is super variable on a painful amount of Garmin platform wonk. Basically, the first time you use the watch, it’ll pull your previous 30 days of historical data (maybe, that too depends on which watch you had). And then populate the graph.Hill Endurance: This first component is focused on going long, or rather, going high. Distance over speed – the longer and higher you go, the better. So a very long mountain day would spike this more than your weeknight hill repeats would. You can then play an animation that looks ahead at the next several hours. Further, you can zoom in/out and pan around. Here’s the wind variant:

Pro and Epix 2 Pro - Wareable First look at Garmin Fenix 7 Pro and Epix 2 Pro - Wareable

That’s especially true of new features like the flashlight and discovering its multiple modes, or enabling the red shift mode that turns the screen and interface red. It’s a similar story for the busy Garmin Connect app and the separate Connect IQ Store app that you need on your phone to add more watch faces, data fields, widgets and a small collection of apps. The idea with Training Readiness is to take a bunch of components under one umbrella, and figure out how ‘ready’ you are to ‘train’ at that very second in the day. The value will shift throughout the day (higher if you do nothing, lower if you do a workout). The score is comprised of all the fellows you’ve seen before: Sleep, Recovery Time, HRV Status, Acute Load, Sleep History, and Stress History: Again, our issue isn't as much with the score's accuracy as it is with how useful it can be when you don't clearly know how to improve it. Our score hasn't moved even with a lot more hills and mileage increases over the past six weeks, for example.

Garmin Fenix 7 Pro

HRV Status: This is measuring your HRV values constantly while you sleep, and then comparing it against your 3-week baseline, up to a 90-day rolling window baseline. A single night of drinking doesn’t tank this score, but three nights of partying won’t keep you in the green. This will obviously be of huge interest to trail runners out there, and, considering we tend to avoid big inclines/declines during our runs, we feel like our mediocre Hill Score is about right. I’ve been wearing the Sapphire Edition of the Epix Pro (Gen 2), which has a titanium bezel and a tough silicone strap in the Whitestone color. It’s the 47mm model, but you can also choose it in a smaller 42mm case size or an even larger 51mm size. There are different finishes and straps available for each case size, giving you plenty of choices. Alternatively, you can select it with a stainless steel bezel and Gorilla Glass over the screen, which works out a little cheaper. The touchscreen is only one part of the way you interact with the Epix Pro (Gen 2), as it also has five buttons on the side of the case. The layout and basic functionality are clear, but it does get confusing as you dig into menus, and when you press a button in an activity expecting it to do one thing, it does another. The on-screen details are often confusing, too, with acronyms used or numbers presented without much explanation. Andy Boxall/Digital Trends

Epix 2 **PRO** models - inbound - the5krunner three new Garmin Epix 2 **PRO** models - inbound - the5krunner

Once you press down from the watch face, you’ve got your widget glances. These are little snippets of information that can be opened for more detailed views of that topic. You can re-arrange these, put them in folders, add/remove them, add 3rd party ones, and so on.The built-in LED flashlight that first debuted on the Fenix 7X is now available on all size variations of the Epix Pro 2, with it built directly into the top of the case. Hill Strength: This second component is aimed at how fast you can go up a given pitch. So something like hill repeats would help here, assuming you were pushing a bit. But it's also being squeezed into an ever-growing Garmin lineup that still includes the very capable Epix (Gen 2) and Garmin Forerunner 965 as cheaper options. That latter detail is crucial, in our view, because it means you can still get a Fenix-level battery if you're willing to make a compromise on the display (which, technically, you'll already have to if you choose a Fenix instead of an Epix).