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Notifications
- All notifications delivered to the screen
- iPhone users can't reply to messages
- Notifications are all or nothing
Any kind of notification can be set to come through from your phone to your Vivoactive 3, we got everything from text messages to fertility tracker updates that you can then read in full on the screen and clear once you've read them.
If you have an Android device you're able to send canned responses, like "OK", but iPhone users aren't as lucky.
Unlike the Apple Watch 3, you can't speak to your watch or receive calls, but you can accept and decline them if you're not able to pick up your phone.
Annoyingly, right now you can only select whether you want every notification and call to come through to the Vivoactive 3, just calls or nothing at all. There's no way to say yes to potentially important WhatsApp messages and no thanks to fertility alerts on your wrist.
Interface
- Easy-to-read interface
- Customizable face and widgets
The Vivoactive 3's interface can at times feel ever-so-slightly laggy. But otherwise the experience is mostly seamless.
As well as the button on the side and the option to use the touchscreen, the Vivoactive 3 also has what the brand refers to as a 'Side Swipe' interface. What this means is you can run your fingertip down the side of the button and you'll be able to swipe through the device's menu without interacting with the screen itself.
At first we found this strange - and a bit pointless - but after a while it became more natural, especially because there are small grooves at the side and the watch vibrates as you move through each menu item, so it felt like getting subtle touch feedback as you use the interface.
You can customize how the interface looks through a store called Connect IQ. You can visit the store from within the Garmin app and choose from apps, including those about fitness or weather, as well as a range of different watch faces and widgets.
The way you browse the store feels a little clumsy, it's not as intuitive as the Garmin app itself, which we'll get to below, but it’s easy enough to pick something to download.
Once you've downloaded a new app or watch face, you'll need to go back into the Garmin app and add it into Activities & Apps, where it'll pop up alongside your favorite workout activities. It's a bit annoying that there's not another favorites menu somewhere else for new apps.
After a long wait in the UK, you can now use the contactless payment system Garmin Pay in the US, Australia and UK. We've yet to test the feature out on the Vivoactive 3, but it should allow you to make contactless payments without taking your phone or wallet out on your run.
App
- Newly designed app
- Lots of data but it's easy to digest
Garmin has recently launched a newer, beta version of its app, which improves the design and functionality.
When you first open the app you're greeted with 'My Day', which is a breakdown of everything that you’ve done today on a series of cards.
At the top are your workout cards, which contain details of any exercise you did today. Below that are cards which contain information about your steps, stress levels, sleep, calories burned, heart rate, floors climbed and intensity minutes.
Below that there's a summary card to show what you achieved yesterday, and under that a summary of the past 7 days.
Although they display a fair amount of data, the way these cards look and behave feels really natural and informative, without being overwhelming. It's likely because on different days you care about different stats, so your eyes can just glance over the ones you're not as interested in and find what you're after quicker than other, more involved dashboards.
If you want to find out more about any of these stats, you just tap on the card and you're presented with more data in the form of graphs and a detailed breakdown of how your day (or activity or stress) looked.
Some of these pages look similar to how the older version of the app looked, with dials at the top that serve up information about whichever section you’re in.
The app also has a section called 'Challenges', which is where you can challenge your friends or join a weekly steps challenge. Then there's 'Calendar', which is a nice, visual summary of how you've been doing over the past month, with color-coded sections to denote certain achievements. For example, a little green bar for indoor cycling.
There's also a 'More' page, which is where everything else is stored and can seem a little overwhelming at first. This is where you'll find everything from defining your favorite activities, through to accessing your personal settings and defining notifications and email preferences.
This becomes like second nature after a few days and we believe it's great for those who work out a lot and like delving into data and customizing their wearable experience, but may not be so ideal for anyone who hasn't used an app or device for fitness before.
