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Apple Watch 5 - accuracy tips?
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I bought an Apple Watch 5 last week (my wife wants constant trackability [i.e., she's crazy and has anxiety issues, but I digress]), and I hate carrying a phone. The cellular function of the watch seemed to make sense as a compromise.

This watch seems horribly inaccurate, and the GPS smoothing function Apple uses seems to tell you what speed you were running 60 seconds ago, not what you're running right now. That'd be fine for long, steady runs....terrible for intervals, etc.

I wore the Apple Watch and my ten year old Garmin Forerunner 10 at the same time for the past two days, and verified that this isn't just confirmation bias. I ran ten or so identical loops last night, and the Garmin had them all within 0.01 mi of each other, and the Apple didn't.

The Apple Watch seems to work better when you don't carry a phone (apparently it defaults to the phone's GPS when they're paired, which is less accurate?).

Is there anything else I can do to make this thing work? I have about four or five days left on the return policy if I can't make this thing useful.
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Re: Apple Watch 5 - accuracy tips? [gatorFL] [ In reply to ]
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Not really. The AW is a terrible fitness tracking device on many levels. Distance and pace accuracy is just one of many limitations.

The AWS5 is a great general purpose smart watch. I have one and I love it. It is my daily watch, but I would never use it for fitness nor activity tracking. (It sucks at activity tracking too.)

Honestly, I would double-wrist... use the AW for constant trackability, but wear your Garmin for fitness activities.

Or, the flip is upgrade to a higher-end Garmin that can do the tracking stuff, and carry your phone with you for the broadcast features. I almost always carry my phone with me anyway, so I have that for trackability if needed.
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Re: Apple Watch 5 - accuracy tips? [gatorFL] [ In reply to ]
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I got an AW5 back in December. For about 2 weeks I double waisted with my Garmin 645. Initially the AW5 was horribly inconsistent, especially when compared to the Garmin, over a known 3 mile loop. However, I noticed that after about a week or so the AW5 started to get much more consistent readings and ultimately I ditched the Garmin around 2 weeks in and haven't looked back.

Having said that the Garmin always draws a prettier GPS track when looked at on Strava. The AW5 is always very "jumpy" but overall the distance is good.
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Re: Apple Watch 5 - accuracy tips? [gatorFL] [ In reply to ]
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I use AW4 pretty regularly for runs. I use the strava app to record rather than the native apple run app. Consistently about 10 sec/mi faster pace than my garmin. However, the wrist based heart rate is extremely accurate for me on AW4. I did hear that the optical heart rate sensor on AW5 is not quite as accurate.
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Re: Apple Watch 5 - accuracy tips? [gatorFL] [ In reply to ]
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I use Map My Walk to chart out my run so I know the exact distance.

Then I use the stopwatch on my Timex watch.
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Re: Apple Watch 5 - accuracy tips? [logella] [ In reply to ]
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Any idea what causes the accuracy to change?

Also, did you notice any difference in pace responsiveness over time, too? I'm seeing that it takes the AW a good 30 - 60 seconds to display a pace change (part of the GPS smoothing, I'm sure). After a run is uploaded, it seems that it read the paces okay, but the real time display during the run lags really bad (at least for me after using it about a week).
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Re: Apple Watch 5 - accuracy tips? [gatorFL] [ In reply to ]
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gatorFL wrote:
Any idea what causes the accuracy to change?

I heard somewhere that there's a bit of a break-in or settling in period. I'm not sure if it was from DCR or somewhere else but seems consistent with my experience.

gatorFL wrote:
Also, did you notice any difference in pace responsiveness over time, too?

I can't help too much here as I generally don't pay attention to pace very close (or at all) during a run and rather go by feel. Sorry.
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Re: Apple Watch 5 - accuracy tips? [gatorFL] [ In reply to ]
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gatorFL wrote:
I'm seeing that it takes the AW a good 30 - 60 seconds to display a pace change (part of the GPS smoothing, I'm sure).
My personal theory is that the AW takes far less frequent GPS readings to stretch its battery. Like, if I were going to guess, it is on the order of every 10 seconds or longer. It is then using its accelerometers to guess what was happening between readings. Maybe it calibrates to better understand your pace & cadence relationships to improve its guesswork. Regardless, all that course smoothing is probably the direct result of occasional GPS readings versus steady 1-second readings like every other fitness device on the planet.
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Re: Apple Watch 5 - accuracy tips? [exxxviii] [ In reply to ]
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exxxviii wrote:
gatorFL wrote:
I'm seeing that it takes the AW a good 30 - 60 seconds to display a pace change (part of the GPS smoothing, I'm sure).
My personal theory is that the AW takes far less frequent GPS readings to stretch its battery. Like, if I were going to guess, it is on the order of every 10 seconds or longer. It is then using its accelerometers to guess what was happening between readings. Maybe it calibrates to better understand your pace & cadence relationships to improve its guesswork. Regardless, all that course smoothing is probably the direct result of occasional GPS readings versus steady 1-second readings like every other fitness device on the planet.

This makes perfect sense. On logella's recommendation, I just read DCR's long review on the AW as well as few other blogs from runners (i.e., reviewing the running watch capability instead of the smartwatch capability). This seems to be general consensus. I guess this thing is going back.

I wonder how long until Garmin adds a cellular chip capability so I can stop lugging around the damn phone.
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Re: Apple Watch 5 - accuracy tips? [gatorFL] [ In reply to ]
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When I run outdoors, I run with both a Garmin 935 (to track my run) and an AW for communication and music. It feels a bit nerdy to be wearing two watches, but this way each device does what ti's good at.
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Re: Apple Watch 5 - accuracy tips? [gatorFL] [ In reply to ]
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gatorFL wrote:
Any idea what causes the accuracy to change?

The watch tweaks its calibration with every run. Obviously I'm only a single data point, but my AW4 is more accurate at pace and distance than any watch I've has save my old V800; better than a Fenix, Suunto, and Coros. It also has the only wrist-based optical heart rate monitor that's even close to accurate. It tracks spot on with a Polar H10, while other watches tend to cadence lock for me.

I don't find the AW to be practical for intervals.
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Re: Apple Watch 5 - accuracy tips? [sathomasga] [ In reply to ]
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I just got an AW5 with GPS and cell. I had a friend using the HRM and saw that it seemed good. My TomTom multisport reads my stride rate vs HR most of the time.

Had it on the track this morning. It was bang on for distance. The HR was dead on. I peaked out at 159 in 400M intervals. My resting HR is mid 40's. It's automatically tracking all movements and time standing.

I did the EKG a few times and it looked good. I could send a PDF to my doc buddy,

But the battery died at noon today, recharges in about an hour. I guess that's not bad but I got weeks with my TomTom if I did not use GPS etc. I like to sleep with a watch so I know how far off the inevitable is...

Training Tweets: https://twitter.com/Jagersport_com
FM Sports: http://fluidmotionsports.com
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Re: Apple Watch 5 - accuracy tips? [gatorFL] [ In reply to ]
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My wife has an Apple Watch Series 4 with cellular and GPS; she also has a Garmin Forerunner 735XT for training and racing. She discovered early on that the AW was not accurate when compared side-by-side to the 735. She still wears the AW so she's connected when training (on-call for a major hospital IT system), but also wears the Garmin and tracks with that. YMMV, but I wouldn't rely on a AW for training data.

- John
"Have courage, and be kind."
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Re: Apple Watch 5 - accuracy tips? [ In reply to ]
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I had do run with my AWS5 today because I forgot to charge my Garmin. I did my routine route that has hundreds of runs logged with multiple GPS watches. They all average 5.07 miles, and rarely vary from the average by more than 0.02 miles. Today, my AW measured 5.17 miles. A GPS watch reads above 5.1 miles fewer 1 out of 100 runs.

But, the AW is handy as a backup device.
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Re: Apple Watch 5 - accuracy tips? [exxxviii] [ In reply to ]
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Was on a noon hour run yesterday with the AW5. Had a co-worker pushing me, she was on my e-scooter* :). Anyway I took my first phone call. It was great, glad they got a hold of me! I was surprised too because other than a quick link to my iPhone on setup, that is all i did. I had left my iPhone back in the car. So that's awesome.

I gotta get used to this thing, but there is a lot there and quite useful. I've turned the always-on display = OFF. But if you bring the watch up to read, it turns itself on. Brilliant!

*I bought a pair of E-scooters and found they are ....... might do a post.

Training Tweets: https://twitter.com/Jagersport_com
FM Sports: http://fluidmotionsports.com
Last edited by: SharkFM: Apr 10, 20 11:33
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Re: Apple Watch 5 - accuracy tips? [SharkFM] [ In reply to ]
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SharkFM wrote:
I've turned the always-on display = OFF.
I had an ASW4, and THE REASON I got the AWS5 was the always-on display. I often glance at my wrist but do not move it enough to activate the screen. The always on was a game changer for me. But, it is a massive battery sucker. The AWS4 would easily go 2 days without a charge. The S5 could make it 2 days, but it is on the edge. And, it definitely wouldn't make it if I did a workout.
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Re: Apple Watch 5 - accuracy tips? [gatorFL] [ In reply to ]
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Did this get any better for you?
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Re: Apple Watch 5 - accuracy tips? [gatorFL] [ In reply to ]
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I double wrist with a Garmin 920 and pick the best one after my workout. I also use a Stryd though, which makes distance accuracy 100% for the Apple Watch. I already double watch on important runs anyway, so it's a no-brainer for me.

To get a better track (like already mentioned) you can leave your phone off, or turn off the phone's GPS or bluetooth, but battery life really suffers. It's already bad enough. You can get a 3h run out of a fully-charged watch, but if you're using GPS, with bluetooth and LTE for music, it's kinda sketchy. And I've noticed a bit more stuttering with tracks/music.

Either way, it's a great watch as a watch, but an okay one for training.

But if your main concern is having location tracking, I assume you don't want to run with your phone, right?

_____________________________________________________
George Dedopoulos | @geodee | geodee.com | Team Atomica | Toronto Triathlon Club
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Re: Apple Watch 5 - accuracy tips? [gatorFL] [ In reply to ]
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Weird, I've had great results with my AW5. Mind you, it's not the version with its own cell service... I always have my phone with me, which might have an effect on accuracy. The only thing I've experienced - if I don't double check it when I get going - is on rare occasion it's taken a bit for the HR to kick in and register. Super annoying, but again if I just check it and snug it up or give it a wiggle, it's typically fine.
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