Garmin Forerunner 570 Review: A Great Running Watch at an Odd Price

Introduction

The Garmin Forerunner 570 is the new mid-range option in Garmin’s running watch line, effectively taking over from the Forerunner 265 going forward. It costs £459 in the UK or $549 in the US, which makes it more expensive than the 265 it replaces, and that price is the thread that runs through this whole review.

After a month of wearing the 570 around the clock, using it for training and racing and draining the battery more than once from full to empty, the short version is this: it is a fantastic watch and a very solid performer, but not a great value pick at its launch price. Whether it is right for you depends almost entirely on how much you care about the display and the design.

Design: Garmin’s Most Expressive Watch Yet

Garmin has traditionally stuck to conservative watch designs, and the 570 is a clear departure. Bold bezel colours, loads of customization for watch faces and data fields, and a genuinely fun look make this Garmin’s most expressive watch yet. If that is all a bit much for you, there is always a black option. At around 50 grams, even the larger 47mm model tested here feels light and wrist-friendly 24/7, and a more compact 42mm option suits people who want less watch on the wrist.

The built-in microphone and speaker let you take calls over Bluetooth when the watch is paired with your phone, and new evening reports summarize your day and suggest what tomorrow should look like. Neither feature will change how you run, but together with a rejigged interface it is arguably the best smartwatch experience you will find on a sports watch.

Display: Garmin’s Brightest AMOLED Yet

This is the headline upgrade. The 570’s touchscreen is noticeably brighter and more vibrant than the 265, punchier in all lighting conditions than even Garmin’s premium Fenix watches, and fast and reactive to use. Garmin has not published exact brightness figures, but put the watches side by side and the jump is obvious.

That brightness comes at a real cost, though. With the always-on display set to full brightness, the larger 570 lasted around 3 to 4 days per charge, dropping to roughly six or seven days with raise-to-wake outside of activities. Garmin has since released a free update intended to improve battery life on the 47mm model, but no dramatic change was noticed in the days after installing it. If you are used to traditional Garmin battery life, plan on using raise-to-wake.

Accuracy: Impeccable GPS and Heart Rate

GPS performance was on point throughout testing, from urban commutes to tree-covered forest runs, and it regularly matched the much more expensive Fenix 8 for overall distance. During a roughly 90km race, the 570 came within about half a mile of a Forerunner 970 over the full distance. Even in the lower-power all-systems GPS mode, tracks stayed largely a good match for the Fenix 8 in dual-frequency mode, with only a few minor wobbles.

Heart rate accuracy was equally impressive. The Elevate Gen 5 sensor (minus ECG support) matched a chest strap about as closely as any optical sensor seen so far, across short intervals and long races alike. It occasionally held a high reading when stopping, but overall it is solid enough that some runners could reasonably consider leaving the chest strap at home in warmer conditions. Battery drain during activity with max-accuracy GPS and full-brightness always-on screen came to around 8% for a 90-minute run, or 5% using all-systems GPS with raise-to-wake, and claimed battery life is 10 to 11 days in smartwatch mode or 13 to 14 hours in the most accurate GPS mode.

Running Features: Solid, With Some Gaps

You get multiband GPS, improved interval mode, Pace Pro pacing strategies, race predictor with projected race times, breadcrumb navigation, and Garmin’s latest safety features. Two new touches stood out: an auto-lap feature that snaps laps to known race route markers for more accurate splits, and a suggested finish lines feature that trims unwanted data if you forget to stop your watch after a run. The 570 also detects when you hit the track and locks you into lanes for better accuracy.

What is missing matters just as much. There is no offline mapping at all, which is a big omission when rival brands now include maps on mid-range watches costing closer to £300, and Garmin’s own routable maps are among the best in the business. There is no ECG either, despite the sensor technically supporting it and cheaper Garmin watches like the Venu 3 Plus offering it. Several newer training stats available on the Forerunner 970, such as running economy, are absent here too. Add a strap that never quite sat flush and no sapphire screen protection, and the value equation gets harder.

Buying Advice: 570 vs the Alternatives

If you already own a Forerunner 265, there is probably not enough here to justify an immediate upgrade unless the brighter display and the bolder design really pull you in. The 265 is now cheaper, still a fantastic running watch, regularly discounted, and offers better battery life. In fact, on pure value the 265 is the easier recommendation.

The more interesting alternative inside Garmin’s range is the Forerunner 965, which often now sells for less than the 570 while including full maps, a fantastic AMOLED screen, and a very full feature set. Outside Garmin, the Suunto Race S and Coros Pace Pro in particular offer similar run-tracking performance plus offline maps at significantly lower prices, and the Polar Vantage M3 undercuts the 570 as well.

If you love the design, want a sports watch that feels more like a smartwatch, and the budget can stretch, the 570 will not disappoint. For traditionalists chasing maximum features per pound or dollar, look elsewhere, at least until the 570 starts seeing real discounts.

Conclusion

The Garmin Forerunner 570 is a very good running watch with impeccable GPS and heart rate accuracy, Garmin’s brightest ever AMOLED display, and the best smartwatch experience in its class. It is also a significantly more expensive watch than its predecessor and its rivals, with fewer new features than that price jump implies. Buy it for the design and the screen, not for the value, and consider the 265 or 965 if money matters more than looks.