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Garmin has just announced their Venu 4 & Venu 4S watches, which are their mainstream but sportier competitors to the Apple Watch, Google Pixel, and Samsung Galaxy Watch. And at first glance, based on the relatively thin marketing materials, these would seem to be a letdown.<\/p>\n
However, in reality, this watch is actually just a Forerunner 570 with a different case, a flashlight, and ECG. That means it\u2019s a massive upgrade over the existing Venu 3, whether you wanted it or not. This means a ton of new sport features, especially around running and triathlon, training load\/status, as well as expanded sensor support, and a full metal case. Albeit, we lost a button. RIP button.<\/p>\n
But it also has new-to-Garmin features too, primarily around sleep and health tracking, like Sleep Alignment and Lifestyle Logging. But it also adds a number of new accessibility features including spoken watch faces, spoken health data, color filter options for color blindness, and more.<\/p>\n
So, let\u2019s dig into all the newness and how it compares.<\/p>\n
What\u2019s New:<\/strong><\/p>\n The Venu 4 is a substantial upgrade over the Venu 3. Perhaps the most notable thing out of this entire list is the least flash: It\u2019s now on the same shared \u2018Garmin OS\u2019 platform that most other 2025 watches are using, including the Fenix 8\/8 Pro, Forerunner 570\/970, and Venu X1. But that doesn\u2019t mean it has every feature, rather, it just means that it\u2019s finally sharing a common underlying OS. So new features can be more quickly added across all units, which should improve quality (rather than each team doing their own dance).<\/p>\n In any case, here are all the new features compared to the Venu 3, though I\u2019m frankly probably missing a bunch of tiny new settings and such, given the platform shift.<\/p>\n \u2013 Added LED flashlight (white & red) Now, on that pricing piece, I pushed back a bit on a discussion with Garmin about it, asking why there was a $100 price increase. Ultimately, they said that the Venu 4 unit is essentially a choice of whether a user wants a touch-first watch (the Venu 4), or a button-first watch (Forerunner 570). Both are priced the same, except the Venu 4 has ECG whereas the Forerunner 570 doesn\u2019t.<\/p>\n They noted that while sportier people want that button-first approach and sporty look of the Forerunner series, many more mainstream folks want a sleeker metal-encased look of the Venu 4.<\/p>\n The bigger question though, gets into leaving a substantial pricing\/market gap at the previous $400-$450 price range that Apple\/Google\/Samsung occupy with their very capable fitness watches. More on that later on.<\/p>\n Some Early Thoughts:<\/strong><\/p>\n Even if Garmin itself doesn\u2019t make it clear in their own marketing materials and site, there\u2019s no question this is a massive upgrade over the Venu 3 (with a huge increase in features, especially for sportier folks). It\u2019s literally a Forerunner 570 with ECG, a Flashlight, and a few lost buttons. All for the same price. With the big codebase merge behind the scenes, the users are the biggest benefactors in terms of not just tons of new features they might not have otherwise gotten, but hopefully also software stability. While this past summer was rough (at best) for most of these new devices as that merger happened, at this point, things seem much better.<\/p>\n The challenge though, isn\u2019t that Garmin has delivered a ton of value in this product (at least, ignoring the lack of maps). Instead, it leaves a really odd and big-sized gap for all their competitors to play in. Garmin has effectively abandoned the $400-$499 price range that is the most popular realm for mainstream watches. Sure, they have Instinct and a few others floating in there, but those aren\u2019t the same customers (else, Garmin wouldn\u2019t have 2,318 models).<\/p>\n And while they have the Vivoactive 6 with many core Venu features<\/a>, that sits at $299, so effectively undercutting not just their competitors, but also honestly undercutting Garmin\u2019s own Venu 4 products as well. Previously, you could make the case to pay an extra $100-$150 for certain Venu 3 features. Now, making the jump nearly twice the price seems tough.<\/p>\n Garmin will probably grumble that I always complain about price. And sometimes, that\u2019s true. But inversely, the also-announced Garmin Bounce 2 today saw a price increase, but that one is frankly very justifiable. The original Bounce 1 LTE was always priced bizarrely low (in a good way, obviously), floating around $125-$149. Now, at $299, that\u2019s the same price Apple is charging for their Apple Watch SE cellular which has the kid software\/experience wrapper for. And while these two watches are different, I think Garmin competes very strongly for the younger child demographic, especially.<\/p>\n Anyways, we\u2019ll have to see how the market reacts here (in terms of sales). As I noted in the video, the product execution itself is quite good \u2013 I just remain convinced on the reasoning to have a massive price-gap in their lineup.<\/p>\n Nonetheless, more to come. With that \u2013 thanks for reading!<\/p>\n FOUND THIS POST USEFUL? SUPPORT THE SITE!<\/p>\n Hopefully, you found this post useful. The website is really a labor of love, so please consider becoming a DC RAINMAKER Supporter<\/a>. 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It could simply be buying toilet paper<\/a>, or this pizza oven<\/a> we use and love.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Garmin has just announced their Venu 4 & Venu 4S watches, which are their mainstream but sportier competitors…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":431969,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[3314,146907,53,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-431968","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-technology","8":"tag-garmin","9":"tag-garmin-venu-4","10":"tag-technology","11":"tag-uk","12":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115221481919574340","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/431968","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=431968"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/431968\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/431969"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=431968"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=431968"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=431968"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/IMG_1945.jpeg\" "\\"IMG_1945.jpeg\\"")
<\/p>\n
\u2013 Increase display brightness\/nits (matches Forerunner 570\/970 displays)
\u2013 Added multiband\/dual-frequency GPS\/GNSS
\u2013 Added spoken watch face (for accessibility)
\u2013 Added spoken health data (for accessibility)
\u2013 Added color filter option (for color blindness accessibility)
\u2013 Added new Sleep Alignment feature (circadian rhythm tracking)
\u2013 Added new Sleep Consistency feature
\u2013 Added Lifestyle Logging on-device (plus all users get on Garmin Connect)
\u2013 Added Health Status on-device (plus all all users get on Garmin Connect)
\u2013 Added full Training Load suite (Acute Load, Recovery, etc\u2026everything!)
\u2013 Added new sports\/workout profiles (listed below)
\u2013 Added Auto Track Detection
\u2013 Added new Mixed Session (sport profile)
\u2013 Added AutoLap by timing gates
\u2013 Added Suggested Finish Line estimates
\u2013 Added Load Ratio
\u2013 Added Projected Race Time predictor
\u2013 Added Heat & Altitude Acclimation
\u2013 Added Evening Report
\u2013 Added Garmin Triathlon Coach training plans
\u2013 Added structured multisport\/triathlon custom workouts
\u2013 Added Focus Modes
\u2013 Added Large Font UI Option
\u2013 Added new sensor types: Added Extended Display, Club Sensors, inReach, Shifting, Shimano Di2 (previously had: HR, Headphones, Speed\/Cadence, eBike, Lights, Power, Radar, Smart Trainer, Footpad, Tempe)
\u2013 Added support for up to 4 CIQ data fields concurrently (versus 2 previously)
\u2013 Consolidates to Garmin\u2019s standard underlying firmware platform for Venu\/Fenix\/Forerunner 2025 watches (Garmin OS)
\u2013 Added metal case (previously just metal bezel)
\u2013 Removed third button for funsies
\u2013 Decreased battery life slightly on larger unit (smaller is same)
\u2013 Still offered in two sizes \u2013 41mm and 45mm
\u2013 Increased price by $150 to $549 (was previously $449)<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/DSC04869.jpg\" "\\"DSC04869.jpg\\"")
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