Garmin reveals Vivomove Sport hybrid watch and the long-awaited Venu 2 Plus
Garmin has unveiled two new sports watches at CES 2022: the Vivomove Sport and the Garmin Venu 2 Plus.
The Vivomove Sport is a new addition to Garmin’s range of hybrid watches, which have an analog dial with a hidden digital display to show your daily fitness stats like step count, stairs climbed, calories burned, and Intensity Minutes. The watch hands move out of the way when you want to see your activity metrics, then glide back into place when you’ve finished.
In terms of features, the Vivomove Sport is almost identical to the Vivomove 3, but is slightly cheaper. It’s available now direct from Garmin for $179.99 / £159 / $279, whereas the Vivomove 3 is $199 / £199 / $299.
The Garmin Vivomove Sport is a hybrid watch with both digital and analog faces (Image credit: Garmin)
Like the Vivomove 3, the new Vivomove Sport has Garmin’s Body Battery monitoring, which uses your sleep score and activity levels to determine how much energy you have for the day ahead. There’s also all-day stress tracking based on heart rate variability, sleep tracking, and a range of dedicated sports tracking modes.
Like previous watches in the range, the Vivomove Sport has connected rather than on-board GPS, meaning it uses your phone’s GPS chip to determine your location and pace during outdoor workouts like runs, walks and bike rides.
It does, however, have its own SpO2 sensor for measuring blood oxygen levels, plus all-day heart rate monitoring with customizable low and high heart rate alerts.
The Garmin Vivomove Sport comes in (Image credit: Garmin)
The Vivomove Sport also has the women’s health tracking features that have become a key part of all Garmin’s new watches over the last two years. The Vivomove Sport offers menstrual cycle tracking, plus pregnancy tracking, with the ability to log symptoms in the Garmin Connect smartphone app. Guided breathing sessions round out the new watch’s features.
A voice-enabled Venu
We got our first glimpse of the Garmin Venu 2 Plus back in November 2021, when a leaked image appeared prematurely on the company’s own support pages. It was quickly taken down, but not before being grabbed by tech writer David Zatz, who noted a new microphone logo on the device’s screen.
Now we know the reason why: the Garmin Venu 2 Plus will allow you to take calls from your wrist, and use your phone’s voice assistant (whether that’s Siri, Google Assistant or Bixby) without having to dig your handset out of your pocket.
The Garmin Venu 2 Plus allows you to answer calls from your wrist rather than reaching for your phone (Image credit: Garmin)
The new watch’s other specs match those of the original Venu 2, which received our Editor’s Choice award in 2021 for its balance of everyday smartwatch features and dedicated sports tracking tools.
These include 24/7 heart rate tracking, on-board GPS, SpO2, Body Battery energy monitoring, all-day stress tracking, sleep tracking, and women’s health tools. You can also take a Health Snapshot, which captures key fitness stats in a two-minute window and creates a report that you can share with a doctor or keep for your own reference.
The Garmin Venu 2 Plus is available in black and slate, cream-gold and ivory, and powder gray and silver (Image credit: Garmin)
The Venu 2 Plus is available now direct from Garmin for $449.99 / £399 (the Australian price has yet to be confirmed). For comparison, the Venu 2 has a recommended sale price of $349.99 / £349.99 / AU$629.
Check out our complete guide to the best running watches
