Garmin Approach S60, Premium GPS Golf Watch with Touchscreen Display and Full Color CourseView Mapping, Black w/Silicone Band

Is the s62 better? Probably. But if this is still 260, it is absolutely the best gadget for a golfer to have on their wrist.The bad? Here goes. It’s not winning any beauty contests. To keep it light it’s hard plastic. The battery isn’t that great, I only wear it golfing and I keep it plugged in with it’s proprietary cable. In gps golf mode it will drain 20% doing 9 holes. It has missed a swing here or there. You can only edit what club you used later in app and that is not fun, but doable. I had one issue where it drained itself one night after I unlplugged it and once it didn’t want to turn on. Searching for gps satellites takes a long time to do. For some reason you need two apps on your phoneBut for a second, pretend you thought, yes, but it’s 260 bucks. And you bought it. You plug it in to charge, it takes forever to turn on, you link it your phone, you set up your clubs, and you watch a YouTube video on what settings to turn on in the golf app.You go play. You walk up to the tee, you quickly move the flag using your touchscreen and you are almost if not as accurate as guy using rangefinder. You choose your club and after swinging touch the watch to tell it what club you used. Every club but putting. And you do your his for every club. At the end of your match, it syncs with your phone and you have beautiful full color pictures of every hole and how you hit. It starts tracking your handicap. It tracks your club distances (and you can access this from your phone). Your scorecards, all on your phone for forever. You can go back and look at pictures. Screenshots to text your friends. No guessing what your 160 yard club is.If you golf a lot, you should own one of these. Period.

I love this watch. I read the independent reviews online before purchasing, so I knew the incredible amount of features it has. After reading the negative product reviews on Amazon, I was a little concerned about my ability to learn the settings. However, after some quick Google searches and watching some videos on YouTube, harnessing the S60's capabilities really wasn't that hard. You just have to have some patience to learn - this watch can do a LOT of stuff. After a week of use so far:Pros:* the golf functions are flawless. I spent a round on the course messing around with it. Yardage readings were extremely accurate and it was perfectly visible in direct sunlight. It was also cool (or embarrassing) to see the yardage of each shot automatically, without having to touch any buttons.* the watch is versatile. It's a lot lighter than I expected, for a device with so many options. It feels the same as my FitBit Blaze, as far as size and weight. There are also over a hundred watch faces to choose from, so you can easily change the appearance on a whim. Install the Garmin Face-It app, and you can create your own custom face (included a pic of one I created).* having used FitBit products for the last ~4yrs, I honestly thing the Garmin is a more-accurate step tracker. I noticed my FitBit would register 5-8 'phantom' steps during my 45min commute in the car. I don't know if that's due to vibration in the steering wheel, 'lively hand motions' to other motorists, or whatever. I notice that the Garmin doesn't give me any 'bonus' steps. When wearing them at the same time and actually counting steps, the Garmin was more accurate by a couple of steps.* fantastic battery life. I've worn it eight straight days, including a round of golf, and still haven't needed to recharge. Based on my usage, it uses less than 10% a day (I've just used it as a watch today, and it's only used 3% in the 14hrs I've been awake). Utilizing the GPS and golf features during a round of golf will burn ~25-35% - I was messing with it constantly during my round, and it used ~30%.Cons:* it ain't cheap* even though it's pricey, it doesn't include a heart monitor - the only thing I miss from my FitBit. You can add an accessory for that function...for an additional price.* it's app-happy. I had to install three apps to cover the features I wanted to utilize; Garmin Connect (most of the general settings/features), Garmin Golf (granular golf tracking/stats) and Garmin Face-It (custom watch faces).In the end, I have no regrets over the purchase. I love it.

I am hereby retracting my original review, altho leaving it's text below as a reminder to be honest and humble. While I was originally very disappointed with this watch, half of that disappointment was easily fixed after receiving quick support from Garmin. And over the course of the years since, I've used this watch and found that its functionality, while occasionally a bit finicky, is probably what the company promised and thankfully quite useful on the golf course. As I may have noted before, I think Garmin is a fine company and have actually bought their lower priced model as gifts for friends 5 times, but to show you the extent to which i am retracting my original review, if I had to replace my watch, i would very likely just purchase the same model again. So, go ahead and buy this watch.Original review:Do not buy this watch.I've owned this watch for over a year now and have been thinking about writing a review which a) warns consumers not to buy this watch but b) consider buying the Garmin S20, but the performanc of this watch warrants a strict Don't Buy review. When I was originally considering buying a golf watch, I presumed I just needed a yardage measurement function, but the marketing verbiage described a watch which could do all sorts of interesting things, perfect for the avid golfer who wants more apps and statistics to measure progress. But two problems exist: first, some of the functionality - for example, swing speed measurement - isnt included in the actual watch and requires either other purchases or other apps which sounded way too complicated to bother with (and I generally like gadgets). BUT THE UNFORGIVABLE THING is that the watch just isnt reliable. I have played 4 rounds this year, and in the first round at the Presidio in San Francisco, the watch just stopped working at the 5th hole. No matter how many times I tried to advance the function, or restart the golf mode, or even turn the watch off and on, it just kept stuck at the 5th hole. And then 2 weeks ago, I was playing in New Jersey, and the golf functionality wouldnt even turn on, again after turning the watch off and on and actually rebooting the watch MULTIPLE TIMES. So, I spent several hundred dollars on a watch which just cant give me the simple distance to the green when i need it. This is completely unacceptable.Before my first round of the year I was prepared to write a review saying "dont buy the S60 but think about the S20" because I had bought the S20 for 2 golfing friends over the holidays and they both seemed happy with it after their first round. But the performance this year is so bad, I think it would be wrong to suggest to golfers that any Garmin golf watch is a safe purchase.