When comparing Garmin Vivoactive HR vs Garmin Forerunner 235, the Slant community recommends Garmin Forerunner 235 for most people. In the question“What are the best fitness trackers?” Garmin Forerunner 235 is ranked 7th while Garmin Vivoactive HR is ranked 19th. The most important reason people chose Garmin Forerunner 235 is:
It's quite lightweight at 1.6oz and has a large bright display for easy reading while on the move in all types of lighting conditions. It's water resistant up to 50 meters so you're safe to wear it running in all types of weather.
Specs
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Pros
Pro Good display
The fitness tracker has a large backlit full-color touch-display that's sunlight-readable and responsive.
Pro Easy to use
The fitness tracker has two buttons, a back button that also locks the device and a start button that also enters settings, and an intuitive touch interface that is controlled with swipes and taps. The learning curve is close to nonexistant.
Pro Step, stairs, heart monitoring
Pro Ideal tracker for runners
It's quite lightweight at 1.6oz and has a large bright display for easy reading while on the move in all types of lighting conditions. It's water resistant up to 50 meters so you're safe to wear it running in all types of weather.
Pro Quickly picks up a GPS signal
It picks up the GPS signal much faster than most other GPS fitness trackers available, so there is little waiting around for it to connect before you start your run.
Pro Customize the display screen to display the data most important to you
The display screens are fully customizable so you can control which stats you want to see.
Pro Extremely lightweight and comfortable
Despite the amount of hardware this tracker contains and it's large size, it's very lightweight and comfortable to wear.
Cons
Con HR monitoring does not work during swimming
The fitness tracker's heart rate monitoring gets turned off during swimming.
Con No sleep monitor
Con Has trouble tracking heart rate during intervals
During interval training when there is a frequent change of exertion, the Forerunner 235 has trouble continuously providing accurate readings. It's better suited for running with a sustained pace.
Con Needs to be recharged often
Garmin states the watch has a battery life of 11 hours training and 9 days of use as a watch, which is a fairly short charge compared to other fitness trackers.
However many people have found the actual charge to be much less, often needing to be recharged every couple of days.
