Garmin - Venu 3S
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Reddit Reviews:
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Based on 1 year's data from Mar 17, 2026 How it works
Liked most:
19
1
"with continuous heart rate monitoring ... I need to keep a close eye on my heart rate."
"it tracks my sleep well. ... It's very comfortable to sleep with at night, and though the watch face is bigger than my Fitbit HR, it's never left marks on my face or scratched my mole like the Fitbit ... The Fitbit is not flat like the Venu3 S."
"mainly use it for sleep tracking"
32
4
"I have the venu 3s with small wrists and it’s perfect!"
"The venu is more comfortable ... I picked the venu 3s because it was smaller and had a better HR sensor than the vivoactive 5. My fenix was just so heavy and bulky, I really wanted something lighter and more comfortable"
"The face sizes are comparable, and so is the thickness, so my tan line was perfect. LOL ... I have a small wrist as well, and I'm very happy with how it looks on my wrist."
8
0
"I got the venu 3s for all of those reasons and love it."
"it has GPS built in, so I no longer need to rely on a connection with my phone as I did the Lily. ... I don't train for marathons or anything like that, so the Venu works very well for my needs."
"with heavy gps, youtube music. Etc it lasts 3-5 Day depending on usage."
29
3
"Battery lasts me about a week?"
"Have a Venu 3S now and charge it once a week or so which suits me much much better."
"The battery life is measured in days, not hours."
3
2
"I am wearing my Garmin Venu watch since 2019/2020 nonstop! I use it daily. ... very durable ... for like 350 bucks ( in 2019) I got a good watch for six years without problems"
"The Venu is still holding up great."
"still looks brand new without any screen protector"
Disliked most:
1
1
"their sleep data doesn't seem accurate compared to Whoop."
0
2
"The menu compared to the FR and Fenix feels less thought trough and buggy. It is neither fully touch screen, neither fully button. It is a strange mix of touching and pressing the buttons. Especially during exercise it is a pain to use, my wife often needs to stop, dry her hand and wipe the screen to check something, then restart."
"the interface of the watch feels a little clunkier than a true smart watch by Apple or Google"
0
7
"Speaker and mic is useless. Not loud enough, mic needs to be put next to your mouth. We only used it a few times when we bought the watch, and never again. Even for short calls like "When do you get home?", it didn't work as the sound was poor on both ends."
"I somewhat miss voice assistant - it doesn't work on the Venu. ... It says it does. But it has literally never functioned. It takes forever saying it's connecting and then it never sends my instruction to my phone."
"NOT a smartwatch"
0
7
"I feel like I'm missing out on a lot with the data... analysis? it lacks. ... I really wanted the Suggested Workouts, Training Effect, Primary Benefit, Lactate Threshold and Race Predictor."
"It is compromised - not an elite fitness watch"
"I don't find it that useful for monitoring strength workouts"
0
3
"I returned my Venu 3s after a week because I had mega scratching on the watch face from just daily wear in that time."
"I’ve had the 3s for almost a year and it has two scratches. ... they both happened by accidentally hitting the kitchen counters with my wrist. ... just hate the scratches…"
"Screen got scratched very fast."
90sBurnoutKing 1.0Although it's much smaller, I prefer my venu 3s over my galaxy watch 7, will probably upgrade to the venu 3 sooner or later, but for now this is perfect
adepressurisedcoat 1.0I just switched to a Garmin Venu 3s a couple months ago from a Samsung Watch 6.. My god it's amazing. It took some getting used to, but I just select the strength workout and it can figure out what exercise I am doing (for the most part). It's wizardry. They aren't cheap, but the battery is amazing.
aftr_hrs 1.0I've had the Venu 3S since February 2024 and I'm pretty happy with it, being the first smartwatch I ever got and it being a Garmin. However, as I've been slowly getting into running in the past year, I feel like I'm missing out on a lot with the data... analysis? it lacks. I've been low-key thinking about switching to another model, and the smaller size FR 570 is just 1mm bigger than my current 41mm Venu 3S (I'm a girl and have very thin wrists), looks nice and reportedly supports all the training/running data analysis that my current watch lacks + better GPS. But that's where the positives end? Sounds like they're using the same heart rate sensor - and I've heard the Venu 3/3S not picking up heart rates correctly when your HB slows down? - does that mean same quality tracking, or is the software on the FR 570 handling this better? Thoughts?
I really wanted the Suggested Workouts, Training Effect, Primary Benefit, Lactate Threshold and Race Predictor. But now I see that Venu 4 really does have all of those? With the added benefit of Sleep Alignment, and Lifestyle Logging, which seems to be missing in the other models. But I got the lifestyle logging update on my 3S yesteday... I was initially going for the FR 570 because it's roughly the same price as the Venu 3S as when I got it 2 years ago. Something like less than 50$ difference. FR 255 seems fine... but with Garmin fast dropping support and updates for older watches, I'd prefer getting something newer?
Agitated_Pumpkin_ 1.0I also have the Venu 3s and I love it!
ameliiii 1.0I recently got into fitness this year and lost about 60 pounds, I got an apple watch to track my activity (I mainly do cardio workouts) but I didn’t like how it looked on my wrist and the fact that it wasn’t that accurate. Also the battery life was trash, I’d leave my new series 10 in the drawer charged and it’d be dead the next day. I bought a new Venu 3S, it’s beautiful, I exchanged a Vivoactive 5 for it and I can say the Venu’s appearance is better and feels smoother however Vivo wins in terms of battery life. Venu dies much quicker, and I feel like the software design of Garmin feels a little lackluster however I’ve grown used to it and I love the comfortability, accuracy, battery life and design of garmin. I wont be going back to Apple, however the new paid subscriptions and having to pay for some watch faces that look decent, and then the watch itself being very pricey feels a bit like a drawback. The strap doesn’t really feel that strong and having to buy more is just more costs, not to mention it didn’t come with a charging block and it requires a USB port, so I have to use my apple one to charge it. All in all, I love the device for fitness and how much better it looks but there are some downsides imo.
And I absolutely love it, I know venu isn’t the model that I needed but definitely wanted, it’s gorgeous.
I’m in loveee with the venu 3s and i love how you are all enjoy it as well. it’s so pretty right
arcoventry 1.0I love the Venu 3s. It has metrics like V02Max and does all the tracking I need as a cyclist.
arieonis 1.0Tudor Black Bay 58 (Blue) for work / Garmin Venu 3S for sports
Ashe7808 1.0I’m on day 6 with my watch and I’m at 45% haven’t had to charge it yet. It’s doing great compared to my 24 hours of my Apple. Venu 3s was a great choice of change for me
Available-Upstairs-3 1.0How is your sleep tracking experience? I shortly had a Venu 3s, changed it for forerunner570 and then settled on fenix 8. Out of these three i somehow think Venu3 was the best at sleep tracking (couldn’t get forerunner 570 to detect my sleep at all during the two nights i wore it).
awc137 1.0It was time to upgrade my apple watch and when I heard the Venu 3s had a 10 day battery, I was SOLD! I'm so happy with it and I'm really loving the circular watch a lot more too.