If you’ve seen my other reviews for other Garmin smart watches, such as the Quatix 6 and Quatix 7, then it’ll come as no surprise to read that I love this watch in its latest incarnation.

First, I need to talk about the strap.

For every new waterproof smartwatch I try from Garmin, I have to  quickly remove the standard silicon strap and clip on a metal strap instead. I find the standard issue Silicon strap causes irritation as I wear the watch 24/7, at the gym, at the pool, out sailing, out rowing, cycling, sleeping and so on. It it a constant companion. So if this is how you roll , then I strongly suggest ordering a  metal band to go with it. The good thing about the  strap system is that they clip on and off in seconds. So it’s easy to switch between a sports strap and a daily strap.

I use my Garmin Quatix 7 pro Smartwatch for everything, from sleep monitoring, to streaming my heartrate on a rowing machine at the gym, to keeping tabs on the tides, barometer, sunrise times, and a host of other features to keep me informed of my health and wellness stats.
Most if my life I preferred a simple analogue watch, but as someone with poor executive function and time blindness, I have found the multiple alarms I can set throughout the day to be a huge help. The curated selection of diary alerts I set to buzz me via the watch ensure I’m never later for a video meeting. I have multiple alarms set for the mornings to wake me up and throughout the day to give me steady stream of time checks throughout the working day. Including one to remind me to feed the dog… more on this later.
At night my phone and watch automatically switch over to do not disturb and the Quatix 7 pro turns off the bright screen and there’s a much dimmer red option displaying the time on demand. This helps with the battery life as since they switched the screens over from the MIP, that loads of people whinged about being too dark to see, but used very little battery allowing for very long battery lives and solar charging, so we now have the bright and garish amoled sapphire displays. Yes, they’re bright. Nobody is complaining about them being dim anymore. I am complaining though that they don’t go dim enough for my eyes in the middle of the night on night watch.

There’s a load of functionality I don’t get to use right now because I don’t have a fully integrated Garmin set up on my boat, but I do like being able to control my music playback from my watch. This means if I have music playing through my stereo via my phone and it’s down below on charge and I want to skip a track, play one a again or change the volume I can that from my watch.

So, there’s the Garmin Quatix 7 smartwatch and the Quatix 7 Pro. What’s the difference?

From the outside, the display is a little bit sharper and more defined, with the sapphire glass it is a bit more robust too. And Garmin finally added a built in LED torch light. There’s a couple of new apps too related to fishing, but let me just go back to that flashlight.

I’ve tested the best head torches from so many top manufacturers. They sit around my desk and all over the place, but invariably, I take my dog out at night after teatime and forget to pick a head torch up. So I’d be standing around in the dark, plastic bag on hand, tapping the ground, trying to find the warm bit (if you know what I mean). Except, now I have what I can only describe as the James Bond gizmo of choice for poo picking. Why have a $30 head torch when you can have a $1000 wrist watch to find that chihuahua nugget in the dark? I can’t help but feel smug when I light the way for others in a similar predicament.

Just the other day,  I was in a dimly lit bar with friends trying to read the menu.

I just lifted up my sleeve, pressed the quick access button and handled that like a pro.

The menu was lit! We all had burgers.

Back to the serious business of actually sailing.  It’s also kinda handy for lighting up a kit bag at night while trying to find your hat/gloves/headtorch when heading out for night watch. (it has both white and red functions)
If you already have a Garmin Quatix 7, then I can’t really say it’s worth upgrading to the Quatix 7 pro, but if you’re still using a Quatix 5 or maybe a 6, then it’s worth a look. I absolutely love it. I live in mine.