vívoactive: a GPS smartwatch for an active lifestyle
Garmin’s 2015 vívoactive combined GPS sports apps, everyday activity tracking and smartphone notifications in a slim smartwatch.
Garmin introduced vívoactive as a thin, lightweight GPS smartwatch with apps for sports and other activities. Designed to help users develop and maintain a healthy lifestyle, it recorded activities including running, cycling, golf and swimming.
Comfortable enough to wear all day, vívoactive used smart notifications to keep wearers connected with friends and family. Connect IQ offered additional watch faces, apps and widgets. The watch had a high-resolution color touchscreen and interchangeable bands to suit different clothes and occasions.
“vívoactive brings many of Garmin’s popular features, including built-in GPS, long battery life and a clear display, to an exceptionally slim smartwatch that keeps you connected,” said Dan Bartel, vice president of worldwide sales at Garmin International.
“Designed for everyday wear, vívoactive can be personalized in many ways, from interchangeable bands to different watch faces, apps and widgets, making it versatile, functional and stylish.”
Play harder
The built-in running app recorded workouts outdoors or indoors, even beyond smartphone range. GPS supplied pace, time and distance, while the accelerometer measured speed and distance indoors when GPS reception was unavailable. The watch could also connect to a heart-rate strap and speed/cadence sensors, or act as a remote for a Garmin VIRB® action camera.
A cycling app measured time, distance, speed and calories for training rides or the commute. Golfers could download data for more than 38,000 courses worldwide through the golf app, including hole number, par, distances to the green, layups and doglegs. The watch also kept a scorecard.
With a water-resistance rating of 50 meters, vívoactive offered swimming functions for counting lengths, total distance, pace and strokes. It also calculated a SWOLF score, a measure of swimming efficiency.
Between workouts, it tracked steps, calories and distance, set personalized daily goals and displayed a red inactivity bar after prolonged inactivity. Garmin’s announcement cited research suggesting that long periods of sitting, such as spending much of the day at a desk, reduce production of fat-burning enzymes, and recommended regular short walks to counter this effect.
Work smarter
The thin, lightweight watch offered up to three weeks of battery life in watch/activity mode or up to 10 hours in GPS mode. Gentle vibrations alerted the wearer to incoming calls, calendar events, emails and text messages from a compatible smartphone over Bluetooth®. Tapping and swiping revealed more information, while a button cleared the screen.
The high-resolution display remained readable in sunlight. Alongside notifications, users could start and stop their music playlist or send a signal to locate a misplaced smartphone.
Live better
vívoactive automatically synchronized with a compatible smartphone through the Garmin Connect™ Mobile app, providing an overview of daily activity. Garmin Connect, a free fitness community, displayed sleep statistics and trends and offered online challenges and virtual awards for motivation. Linking a Garmin Connect account with MyFitnessPal® provided a more detailed calorie overview, comparing calories burned with personal goals.
Connect IQ was introduced as Garmin’s first open platform for third-party applications. Its store, accessed through Garmin Connect Mobile, offered custom apps, widgets, data fields and watch faces. Changing the wristband provided another way to personalize the watch.
At launch, vívoactive was expected to become available in March 2015 in black or white, with a recommended retail price of SEK 2,399 without a heart-rate strap or SEK 2,899 with one.
More information: www.garmin.se
