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{{DISPLAYTITLE:Garmin VivoactiveHR Vivoactive HR Review}}
[[File:VivoactiveHR-comp.jpg|right|thumb|250px|The VivoactiveHR is an upgraded version of the Vivoactive, but I prefer the original.]]
The {{Garmin VivoactiveHRVivoActiveHR}} is an upgraded version of the [[Garmin Vivoactive]], the main addition being Optical Heart Rate Monitoring (OHRM). In this review I'm going to argue that you're probably better off with the Vivoactive than the VivoactiveHR. This is not a clear cut choice, and buying the VivoactiveHR is not unreasonable. Pretty much everything I mention in the Vivoactive review applies to the VivoactiveHR, so I'll focus on the important differences.
* '''Optical Heart Rate Monitoring'''. If OHRM worked, it would be a great convenience over using a chest strap. The ability to monitor heart rate continuously would be an even bigger advantage, giving insight into sleeping heart rate and overall activity levels. Sadly, ORHM works rather poorly in practice and I believe you're better off with no heart rate monitor than one that's inaccurate. It's a case of misleading information is worse than no information, and the VivoactiveHR is inaccurate all too often. The continuous OHRM is a little misleading as the watch only periodically polls your heart rate, but that would be okay if the reading were right. I was expecting the OHRM to influence the estimate of calories burned, but it doesn't appear to.
* '''Activity Tracking'''. The Vivoactive has become my favorite activity tracker. It's small and comfortable so I don't mind wearing it all day and all night, and the [https://apps.garmin.com/en-US/apps/7ef071c3-4a14-4eb3-aca9-e3a531262711 ActiFace] watch face that's available on all Garmin watches that support Garmin's [[Connect IQ]] is outstanding. It provides a lot of data on the small screen, and the graph of the last week's activity is a great motivator. The VivoactiveHR will track the number of flights of stairs climbed and the number of active minutes which are better in theory than practice. The stairs climbed seems way too inaccurate for it to be of value to me, and the "active minutes" ignores intensity.
* '''Price'''. My table below will pull the prices from Amazon in real time, but as I write this the VivoactiveHR is about 50% more expensive.
I have both watches (as well as a vast array of others), and having used the VivoactiveHR for every day for 7 months, I'm glad to get back to the original Vivoactive. While there are far better running watches out there, the [[Garmin Vivoactive]] is my favorite activity tracker.
{{BuyAmazon|AZID=B01BKUB6BA|AZN=Garmin VivoactiveHR}}
=Gallary=
|[[File:VivoactiveHR-week.jpg|none|thumb|250px|The chart of the weeks intensity minutes might be useful, but it shows how much better the ActiFace user interface is.]]
|}
=GPS Accuracy=
The VivoactiveHR has rather poor [[GPS Accuracy]], and it's slightly worse than the [[Garmin Vivoactive]] on which it's based. To help visualize the quantitative assessment, I've included the image below of the GPS tracks from one part of the testing course. You can see the problems where the path curves in the middle section, something that most watches have problems with. Notice that the VivoactiveHR has red lines here, indicating that it's consistently getting this segment wrong. The only green line is where it gets a bit lost and goes wide, offsetting the otherwise short reading. You can also see there are problems going under the bridge where the VivoactiveHR sometimes struggles to reacquire the GPS signal. You can see the lines jump off track near the bridge, and some of the tracks wander after the bridge. The sharp turn on the right side of the picture is better, again something that's common. It seems that watches do much better with a sharp change in direction than a series of curves. The blue lap markers are surprisingly tightly clustered given the overall GPS accuracy.
[[File:BridgeGarmin VivoActiveHR.jpg| None | Thumb | x300px |This diagram has tracks color coded with green indicating good accuracy through to red indicating poor accuracy, and the lap markers as blue dots.]]
=Comparison Table=
{{:Best Running Watch-table}}