Garmin Connect App changes

Is it just me, or have they completely **** it with this update?

I liked it better before

i didn’t like it at first, but tried to give it a fair crack of the whip and not just be reactionary.

anyway I realised today that I haven’t opened the app in over a week now, and previously I’d look at it most days.  So maybe it is just crap!  I

also it seems to sync a lot less often.  I just loaded it now, there was no data from today or yesterday, and I had to manually start a sync.

Thought my garmin was playing up last night up loading a ride . Not as good  !

Agree. I don’t like it.

I’ve been using it for a while – I was randomly offered to ‘upgrade’ when it was beta, and now I’ve got used to it. It’s just moves the same stuff around and lets you customise the UI. Everything is still there, and you can stick to the original layout if you want (or you used to able to, dunno if that still the case now)

I think Garmin were having upload issues yesterday.  Probably been hacked again. 🙄

I was in the Beta testers and gave them feedback about one small thing but otherwise I like it a lot. I guess, like many things, it just needs some familiarisation. You might need to customise it to your liking too, definitely deciding what data you want brought to the fore.

Hated it at first, but afer editing the page I find it ok although everything being in blocks that make you scroll up and down to see stuff makes it worse.

same with any ‘update’ really, the majority of the posters above were probably quite happy with the app… all the update has really done is to allow you to customise the UI….

but.

why not offer customisation, rather that “customise” it and let all the users try to guess what it looked like before (when they liked/got used to, it)

was the stress thing useful or not, maybe it was heart rate that i glanced at, or maybe steps, i dunno – it just worked.

Ive had no sync issues tho.

ok, thanks. i’m generally in favour of moving forward wrt software changes but i basically have a blank homepage now. i’ll spend some more time on it, which was inevitable really. guess i just needed to shout at clouds a bit!

I don’t think its an improvement but I’ll get used to it. It seems to have stopped counting stairs tho.

I broke my watch a couple of months ago, and haven’t replaced it yet, so I haven’t been on the app for a while.

Just had a look, and I think it’ll take some getting used to…

The customisation isn’t enough though!  I wear mine due to chronic health conditions, so I just use the general ‘lifestyle’ stuff.  So ‘running trends’ and ‘cycling trends’ are not useful to me.  Why not allow people to add stress, or HR to the In Focus page?  What’s the benefit in removing that as an option?

i’ve been able to make it kind of better, which didn’t really take long to figure out at all to be fair! does rather seem to be change for change’s sake with some odd limitations. mutter, grumble.

you can. when you edit the page you can long-hold on cards and move them so they appear all the time.

ah. maybe not in to the ‘in focus’ bit but you can arrange them at the top of the ‘at a glance’ bit.

The main screen basically breaks down into three sections; In Focus, At A Glance, and Challenges. For the first two you can customise what’s seen (so, Floors can be added to the At A Glance section if you want quick access to it).

I’d have preferred if the order of the three sections could have been changed so that At A Glance was at the top.

@doris5000 go into the Settings / Home Screen and disable the In Focus area. That’ll bring the next section to the top. Then just choose what data you want to see in it.

They seemed to have removed the last 7 day summary which is pretty annoying. Not a fan.

@imnotverygood you can re-enable it in the Home Screen settings

Much prefer it to the old layout…my mate was on the beta and I had a look over his screen and it just seemed to be far easier to find the info. I then got offered to join the beta and it just seems much quicker and easier to get the info I want (admittedly, the info I’m checking isn’t ground breaking!).

I definitely think this is a big improvement over what it was previously.

I’ve turned the in focus off and its much better, in fact I think I prefer it now because I don’t have to scroll down so much to see what’s going on. I can see that my HRV has tanked straight away now, and tallies with how crap I feel

the info I’m checking isn’t ground breaking!

Annoying. I wanted to record some trench digging once and there isn’t a Garmin option for that.

I also did the Beta testing and honestly can’t remember the difference now. And I check it every day.

I can see that my HRV has tanked straight away now, and tallies with how crap I feel

I’m never sure if HRV really adds much, but this is my HRV for the past 4 weeks.

A few days ago I started feeling shit, sore throat and I’m currently coughing up green gunge. It’s interesting that there was such a dip just before the symptoms hit me.

I think the most annoying part for me is when viewing it on a computer, all the information is on a strip in the middle of the screen only using about 1/3-1/2 of the screen, widescreens have been standard for well lover a decade now, no excuse for not using the full screen.

I was in the beta programme as well. I quite like it after editing the settings/panels.

If you hate it, I take full responsibility 😆

Ive had no sync issues tho.

I have.  Went for a ride yesterday, hit stop+save on the eTrex. Login in to Garmin Connect, and see “you have no activities this week”.

Sync via the Windows app (Garmin Express?  Or Garmin something else – don’t recall – they have too many apps) by plugging the eTrex in. Claims Sync OK, only to see “you have no activities this week”.

Good job the main way I record activities is via Polar watch and Polar Flow, which then syncs to Strava (which it had done within seconds of me stopping activity).

No comment on the layout , until it CBA to actually get my stuff from eTrex to Android app and Web app for me to actually play around with.

Not a fan at first but have gotten used to it fairly quickly.

Pretty sure if they reverted it I’d probably not like it for the first few days.

Ah, I think I have found my missing activity. It looks like it appended it to a copy of the previous activity, but decided it is chronologically before the actual saved/synced previous activity.
Time for some manual TCX editing (not for the first time, although that was due to dumb default settings in the eTrex rather than Connect)

The default new home page is pointless. 80% blank screen and a waste of space, and the only tile with any information is the one with my hardcoded weight. Just make it got straight to either the calendar or the list of activities as the “home” page.

I can see that my HRV has tanked straight away now, and tallies with how crap I feel
I’m never sure if HRV really adds much, but this is my HRV for the past 4 weeks.

Is HRV only available on some devices? I can’t find it in the app, but maybe my watch and chest strap don’t support it. But I’d have thought you could work it out if you know heart rate and time.

Is HRV only available on some devices?

Yes. My Fenix 6 records/calculates it overnight.

While we’re on the subject of Garmin Connect, does anyone else bother with the Challenges and Badges? I started doing them during one of the 100 days of exercise until Xmas threads on here, as a way of trying to mix up my activities a bit and create a little more incentive. It has ended up with a little friendly rival between a few folks I know.

We have a family weekly leader board for steps. Usually won by Abigale due to her job roll. The rest of us try not to be last.

I’ve dropped down the table since we lost the dog

However we haven’t been able to access it since the last update

7 day summary

scotroutesFull Member

@imnotverygood you can re-enable it in the Home Screen settings

I’ve done that, but the only items on display are my activities & HR. All of the other stuff requires you to select the item from at a glance and tap again for the information.

@Tracey the secret to winning the Steps challenge appears to be to own a dog.

@scotroutes the secret to winning in our group is to be a Bike Patrol Officer at Skyline, Rotorua

A bike patrol officer winning the step challenge??? Something sounds off with that, surely? 🤣
I’ve gone down the badge rabbit hole…mainly to get myself up another level – I’m not competitive as such but I do like trying to get a bit better. Stupidly mentioned it to a mate and he has gone all in for badges and points.
I’m needing to up my game but it is encouraging me to keep doing some movement.
Don’t look at the badges or challenges as they draw you in and get you doing more…and more…😉

That was my thoughts but she says it’s down to trail maintenance 🤔

Agree it would be nice to re-order the sections. The way today’s activities are displayed are a bit too basic on the home screen, preferred the old display there. More customisation such as change tile size (ie options for 1, ½, or ⅓ width) with amount of detail changing with size.

It’s a very poor UI. You need to now swipe or scroll to view information titled “at a glance” when previously all the information was on a single screen. It’s the exact opposite of what it purports to be. Like websites, anything “below the fold” just doesn’t exist.

I’m guess it was designed by someone using either a tablet or a very large screen phone. There’s a lot of wasted white space.

Basically it’s making the user work more to access the same information as before. That’s bad design, no matter how shiny it looks.

Qualifications: expert in UI design and psychology of how people learn to use interfaces plus 25 years professional experience. I wouldn’t have let that out the door.

Are we all commenting on the app rather than website? I’m not seeing any wasted space on the Android app on my phone…

Nothing useful to say other than I absolutely hate this “upgrade”.  I don’t have time or inclination to poke about on any app trying to find info that just used to be there. It’s changed to green all the colours for various activities that I had set up and right now I can’t even see a use for my garmin watch anymore. Should be allowed the option to upgrade when it’s cosmetic not security.