Garmin could soon supercharge your sleep tracking with rumored coach feature

A Garmin watch and an iPhone on a blue background showing sleep tracking
Garmin watches like the Fenix 5 (above) already support sleep tracking features, but rumors suggest Garmin could be prepping a more powerful Sleep Coach feature (Image credit: Future)

Garmin’s sleep tracking powers are about to be considerably bolstered with a new software tool, according to the latest rumors – and this is something the purportedly imminent Garmin Venu 3 watch may also benefit from.

As spotted by Android Central, this speculation comes from The5KRunner (who credits leaker @JohnW for the revelations), and the contention is that Garmin has a new ‘Sleep Coaching’ system in the pipeline.

The idea is to offer tailored feedback on your sleep quality, working off a personal baseline (based on past sleep data). We’re told there will be an emphasis on HRV insights (heart rate variability, used to detect stress levels) to provide recommendations to improve your overall health and wellness.

For active types, workout and exercise data will apparently be incorporated into this overall picture, and will factor into sleep recommendations going forward. Broadly, as the name suggests, the feature will be about coaching you into better sleep habits, and will also apparently appear in the very handy Morning Report.

The new system will also facilitate nap tracking, and be able to cope with tracking your sleep in the day, if you have an irregular sleep schedule for whatever reason – allowing body battery data to be updated based on those daytime rest periods, too. That's a feature that many Garmin fans have been crying out for.

Speaking of irregular sleep, the leaker also suggests that Garmin’s coach will be underlining the importance of keeping a consistent sleep pattern wherever possible, as this is “scientifically shown” to lead to a better quality of sleep. We certainly wouldn’t argue with that.


Analysis: A promising feature – if it comes to older watches

A Garmin Venu 2S watch showing a muscle mass diagram on a blue background

(Image credit: Garmin)

Building out sleep functionality seems like a great move to us. I have a Garmin Venu 2S and find the sleep ratings pretty handy, though I take them with a serious pinch of seasoning, being aware that it’s not always that accurate (in my experience). Just looking at sleep evaluations relative to my past records, though, is a useful practice.

And, of course, this is pretty much what Garmin is doing here – getting a virtual sleep coach to do that for you, and perform a much more in-depth job, integrating fully with your workout and daily activity details.

Will this sleep coach be AI powered? It's possible, but we don’t know and AI isn’t actually mentioned anywhere in the leak. Still, you can’t have anything new these days without putting AI into it, right?

With this feature seemingly imminent, and the Garmin Venu 3 theoretically turning up next month, it makes sense to put two and two together and conclude that the Venu 3 will likely have this functionality. There’s no guarantee of that, of course, and given the reliance on heart-rate variance insights, it may be limited to relatively recent Garmin watches.

Still, whenever it arrives, the hope is that this Sleep Coach will be retroactively applied to Garmin watches that can theoretically support it, like the Garmin Venu 2 (which tops the list of the best Garmin watches) and my Venu 2S, of course. Time will tell...

You might also like

TOPICS

Darren is a freelancer writing news and features for TechRadar (and occasionally T3) across a broad range of computing topics including CPUs, GPUs, various other hardware, VPNs, antivirus and more. He has written about tech for the best part of three decades, and writes books in his spare time (his debut novel - 'I Know What You Did Last Supper' - was published by Hachette UK in 2013).

Read more
The Fitbit Charge 4 and the Fitbit app
Fitbit Sleep Lab leaked – new feature could give you personalized bedtime recommendations
Rock climber using a theragun and wearing a Garmin watch
Theraguns can now sync with your Garmin and Strava accounts to offer personalized recovery plans based on your workouts
Garmin Fenix 8 AMOLED watch on wrist
Garmin's Fenix 8 just got a ton of free upgrades, here's what you need to know
Garmin Forerunner 965 on wrist in the dark
Garmin is about to give users a major Body Battery and Strength workout upgrade for free
Garmin Fenix 8 vs Enduro 3 comparison
Garmin's latest beta brings 40 fixes and features to the Fenix 8, Enduro 3
Samsung Galaxy S25, OnepLus watch 3
I tested the OnePlus Watch 3's sleep tracking powers against our top smart ring – and it didn't measure up
Latest in Health & Fitness
NordicTrack Ultra 1
The new NordicTrack Ultra 1 treadmill looks like it was designed by an architect and costs $15,000
Half-Life running on a smartwatch
This Redditor installed a game engine on their smartwatch, and now it runs Doom, Quake, and Half-Life
Man adjusting settings on Garmin Fenix 6 watch
5 hidden features on your Garmin watch you're probably not using, but should be
Apple watch pair with iphone
I've been wearing an Apple Watch for 10 years – these are the 5 settings I change right out of the box
Garmin Instinct 3 next to the Apple Watch Ultra 2
New figures claim the smartwatch market just shrunk for the first time ever, and the Apple Watch Ultra 3 is to blame
Garmin Forerunner 265S
One of the best Garmin running watches just dropped to a great low price at Amazon
Latest in News
Google Gemini Flash 2.0 Images
I tried Gemini's new AI image generation tool - here are 5 ways to get the best art from Google's Flash 2.0
An image of the Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra from a hands-on event
Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra could resurrect an intriguing camera feature
Eurocom Raptor X18
At $15,000, this massive 256GB RAM laptop makes Apple's MacBook Pro look affordable, tiny and very, very slow
Cristin Milioti in Black Mirror season 7
Netflix launches trailer for Black Mirror season 7, giving us a look at its first-ever sequel episode and an unexpected returning character
A graphic of the PC Gaming Show
Get ready for a bounty of PC games on June 8, as the PC Gaming show is back
A close up of The Daily podcast from Pocket Casts' web page
‘Podcasting shouldn’t be locked behind walled gardens’: Pocket Casts slams Spotify and makes its web player free to all