Chest heart rate monitor - recommendation?

I reckon they're all much of a muchness. I have a Garmin Dual and a Magene. They function identically. The only one I've heard bad things about is the Wahoo.

My Coospo has been boringly reliable for 2-3 years now. Even the bit you wet to pick up heart rate has not come away from the stretch elastic yet. Yet 🙈

I've always used Garmin ones, and aside from one that died almost immediately (and was replaced very efficiently) they've each lasted many years.

+1 to CooSpo. Been the most reliable by far for me. Outlived Wahoo and Polar ones costing 5x as much.

Probably jinxed that now.

Oh good. The CooSpo seems to be available on the non Bezos Ali express.

Have been using polar for years. Current H10 is great, has double Bluetooth connections. Always gets good reviews for accuracy. Allows analysis of various HR related metrics if you have the correct watch.

Garmin has proved to be very reliable for me (6+ years), but the wee screws are a pain to undo/redo when replacing the battery. I think the more recent models have better fasteners.

Can't compare it to much, a couple of £15 Halfords items (which did work but would randomly drop connection mid-ride every now and again), so my experience may not be accurate.

Went budget with Magene for a while and it was poor. Less reliable than Garmin, which I’m using again. 

Posted by: a11y

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+1 to CooSpo. Been the most reliable by far for me. Outlived Wahoo and Polar ones costing 5x as much.

Probably jinxed that now.

Yes, agreed. The best one I've had by far, never any problem and still going strong after a few years.

Cardiosport TP3 here. Cardiosport make a lot of the parts and sensors for other brands.

I wrap some electrical tape around the battery cover area of the chest unit as that may help longevity, plus keep it somewhere warm and dry. It's been better than the others I've had, 4 yrs old now. I use a HRM for all my road and gravel miles and have done for about 14 years, on my 5th HRM strap/transmitter. 

Would buy the TP5D next time for the LED indicators, useful to check if it's the battery in the transmitter or watch fading when signal starts to act up. 

Another vote for Coospo (H6). Bluetooth and Ant+. I use it with Rouvy and Concept2 rower.

Coospo for me too. Much more comfortable than the Garmin one I had previously. The coospo strap is available separately if you need one, which is helpful

I’ve got the standard wahoo and wouldn’t buy again. Seems to eat batteries and the hrm output is wildly inconsistent - often seems to vastly under estimate heart rate. 

Coospo for me too. From AliExpress. 

Works better and more reliable than either Garmin strap I've had before

FWIW my Garmin Dual is currently fitted to a Polar strap as I found that more comfortable than the Garmin original - which also managed to undo itself while running. 

I used a Coospro for a while but mine started eating batteries, I'm guessing sweat got inside the battery compartment.

I now use an Xoss X2 pro which I got from AliExpress for £13 and it's been faultless. It's rechargeable and comes with a little dock which you connect it to, can't fault it for the price!

If anyone is buying direct from Coospo website I can give you 10% off code. I have 2 Coospo ones, after about 8 years one of them has died which has been better than the Garmin ones which lasted about 2 years if I was lucky.

the wee screws are a pain to undo/redo when replacing the battery. I think the more recent models have better fasteners.

the tiny screws were indeed a pain: my most recent garmin one is tool free, just press and turn the battery cover. A great improvement. 

Bought another Coospo after the old one started eating through batteries. It does seem to need a bit more spit to make a quick/accurate connection, but that's not something I'm in short supply of.

I gave up on chest strap HR monitors about 18 months ago because I was only getting about 2 years life out of the straps even though I was washing them religiously as per their guidelines ( Garmin and Polar ). Moved to the coros arm hr monitor and I find it much more comfortable and, so far, very reliable. It might be a tad slower to react than a chest strap but there's not much it when I compare the two traces