14.04.2025 
Health tracking with the Garmin vivoactive 6
Although the Garmin vivoactive 6 doesn’t feature the company’s latest heart rate tracking sensor, it does include their newest software and offers many enhancements compared to its predecessor. It even has some features that are unavailable on the more expensive Garmin Venu 3. One particularly cool and useful addition is the Smart Wake alarms. When enabled, the watch utilizes the sleep tracking data it collects from your body to determine the optimal time to wake you up, before the hour you set. This feature is beneficial and can help improve your overall sleep quality while ensuring you wake up when necessary.
The Smart Wake alarms are useful
Garmin vivoactive 6 also features nap detection. While it’s supposed to automatically detect and track the naps you take during the day, it didn’t detect them in my limited experience. Luckily, I could manually start the nap tracking and then get access to the appropriate data at the end of it.
Garmin vivoactive 6 features nap detection
On a typical day, the Garmin vivoactive 6 tracks various health metrics, including the number of steps taken, sleep duration and quality, heart rate, heart rate variability, blood oxygen levels (Pulse Ox), respiration, stress levels, calories burned, and body battery (energy resources). However, it lacks the sensors required to measure the number of stairs or floors climbed.
In order to save battery, the Pulse Ox measurements are not enabled. You must turn them on manually and set these measurements to be done at all times, on demand, or during sleep. Unfortunately, this feature can cut your battery life in half. Therefore, you can keep it turned off but perform a manual reading each day to have daily reports about its evolution. Or you can enable it during sleep so that it doesn’t impact the battery life as drastically as having it always turned on.
Pulse Ox measurements can be made on demand
Unlike the Venu 3, the Garmin vivoactive 6 does not have ECG readings because it lacks the necessary sensors. However, like the Venu 3, the vivoactive 6 monitors your breathing. Tracking this data is valuable for assessing your physical fitness and identifying respiratory health issues. Additionally, to assist users in enhancing their breathing, the watch provides mindful breathing exercises and guided meditations that help reduce heart rate and alleviate stress levels.
Garmin vivoactive 6 monitors how you breathe
The Garmin vivoactive 6 is not just for men; it is also suitable for women and includes women’s health tracking features to monitor the menstrual cycle and pregnancy, along with exercise and nutrition education.
Even though it’s not a perfect device, the Garmin vivoactive 6 has all the necessary features to help you monitor your overall health and maintain it by improving your habits. Speaking of that, it’s essential to incorporate sports into your routine if you want to keep your health in top shape. So, let’s see how this smartwatch performs in terms of sports tracking.
Sports tracking with Garmin vivoactive 6
The biggest improvement introduced by the Garmin vivoactive 6 is that it has a total of 78 tracking profiles for sports and activities. The list includes popular activities like running, swimming, skiing, yoga, or cycling, as well as niche ones like golfing, cyclocross, ice skating, or volleyball. This marks a significant enhancement over its predecessor, making the vivoactive 6 a better choice for people who take sports seriously.
Garmin vivoactive 6 features many tracking profiles
One of the most useful novelties is Daily suggested workouts for walking activities. It’s a great way to keep yourself active, especially when you move around city streets. You might just as well turn those walks into healthy workouts. I haven’t seen this feature before on previous Garmin smartwatches I’ve tested, and I expect it will be included in upcoming models.
The Daily suggested workouts are useful
You can obviously create plans for your own workouts and access features like PacePro, which provides grade-adjusted pace guidance for upcoming races based on elevation and your personal pacing preferences. In an effort to be as inclusive as possible, Garmin also offers workouts for wheelchair users, a welcome feature that is rare in smartwatches at a similar price point.
Garmin vivoactive 6 features PacePro
Runners are going to be especially pleased with the Garmin vivoactive 6. And that’s not only because it gives them access to more tracking profiles, but also because it lets them access Running Dynamics statistics, which measure ground contact time, vertical oscillation, stride length, running power, and other useful metrics.
While there are no offline maps available on this smartwatch, you do get course/route following capabilities, which is surprising to see on a Garmin device with entry-level pricing.
Garmin vivoactive 6 has course/route folllowing
While you don’t get multi-band GPS tracking on the Garmin vivoactive 6, the accuracy of its tracking is good, especially when doing activities outdoors, in the middle of nature. During my testing, I went for a 9 km hiking trail, and this smartwatch didn’t disappoint.
The GPS tracking is pretty accurate
As expected from Garmin devices, the vivoactive 6 provides extensive data after each workout, allowing you to evaluate your performance and the stress your body has endured. One minor improvement I noticed when comparing it to my daily driver, the Garmin Venu 2 Plus, is that the vivoactive 6 performs better at counting repetitions and identifying the exercises I was doing during strength workouts. While the enhancement isn't drastic, it does represent an improvement, which is great. I no longer needed to manually edit the number of repetitions for each workout as frequently as I did before.
As always, Garmin remains very data-driven
When it comes to coaching, the Garmin Connect+ subscription gives you access to a lot of options. However, you also get free access to coaching plans for running and cycling, which is great to see. While there aren’t as many and varied as those you find on more expensive smartwatches, like the Garmin Fenix 8, they’re well-designed and useful. 🙂
You get access to free coaching for Running and Cycling
The Garmin vivoactive 6 excels in sports tracking. It offers a wider range of tracking profiles than its predecessor and includes features that make it an excellent companion for anyone serious about regular exercise, particularly runners.
Do you like the Garmin vivoactive 6?
Now that you understand what’s great and what’s not so great about the Garmin vivoactive 6, you should have a better sense of whether it’s a good fit for your needs. I believe that most people looking to improve their health and fitness will appreciate it, but some of you may want more. In any case, I’m curious to read your thoughts on this smartwatch: Is it a device you plan to purchase? Will you opt for a different alternative? Share your perspective in the comments section below.
