Garmin Fenix 8 vs Apple Watch Ultra 3 – here’s which one I’d buy on Black Friday

The Garmin Fenix 8 and Apple Watch Ultra 3 are, respectively, Garmin and Apple‘s premium adventure watches. They’re both packing accurate GPS and powerful navigation features to ensure you don’t get lost on the trail, advanced workout tracking capabilities which deliver a load of useful metrics, and cool lifestyle features.

• Black Friday Garmin deals

Below, I’ve broken down my decision-making process, along with which features are most important to me, to determine which one I’d buy on Black Friday. Let’s start by looking at the specs:

Garmin Fenix 8 vs Apple Watch Ultra 3: Specifications compared

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Header Cell – Column 0	Apple Watch Ultra 3	Garmin Fenix 8
Price	$799 / £749 / AU$1,399	From $999 / £849 / AU$1,699
Size options	49mm	43mm, 47mm, 51mm
Touchscreen	Yes, LTP3 OLED	Yes, AMOLED
Battery life	Up to 42 hours	Up to 48 days
Onboard storage	64GB	32GB
Speaker/mic	Yes	Yes
Operating system	watchOS 26	Garmin OS
Compatible with	iPhone	Android, iPhone
Dive mode?	Yes	Yes

Right away, you can see there are some clear advantages the Fenix has over the Apple Watch Ultra 3. For one thing, it works with iPhone and Android devices: it only needs the Garmin Connect app to work, and you can install that on any smartphone. The Apple Watch Ultra 3 requires an iPhone.

Battery life is another big one. The biggest, most powerful Fenix watches last up to 48 days, while the Apple Watch Ultra 3 operates for around 42 hours on average. That’s a huge advantage for the Fenix: runners can complete battery-sucking GPS workouts and hikers can go on multi-stage trips off-grid for days, and never run out of juice. Fenix users simply don’t need to think about charging very often.

operating system, which is miles ahead of Garmin’s own OS. It’s buttery-smooth and can even be operated remotely thanks to gesture controls and a raise-to-speak connection to Siri, Apple’s voice assistant. It also has LTE capabilities, allowing you to add it to your phone’s data plan.

The Apple Watch Ultra 3 is seamless and intuitive to use with an iPhone, with plenty of AI smarts and a smorgasbord of third-party apps available. Its display is brighter and clearer than Garmin’s, too.

There’s also an argument to be made for accuracy: on testing Garmin’s Elevate V5 heart rate sensor against the sensor in the Apple Watch Ultra 3, using a proper chest-mounted heart rate monitor as a baseline, Apple’s was a shade more accurate.

Heart rate graph cropped screenshot

(Image credit: Future)

However, Garmin has too many quality-of-life features over the Apple Watch Ultra 3 for me to ignore. I’m not usually someone who does multi-day off-grid camping trips, but I do dislike charging my watch every other day, and it’s a load off my mind not to think about it.

I love the simple things that Garmin’s ecosystem offers, such as following a map of my running course within the Workout app. On the Apple Watch Ultra 3, I’d have to switch between two different apps and run the Workout app in the background. I used the Fenix 8’s LED flashlight, separate from the screen, quite often during night runs and it’s more battery-efficient than the Ultra 3’s screen-orientated flashlight mode.

The Apple Watch Ultra 3 is a phenomenal watch, but the Garmin Fenix 8 is the one I’d buy.

Garmin Fenix 8 AMOLED watch on wrist

(Image credit: Future / Matt Evans)

Garmin Fenix 8 vs Apple Watch Ultra 3: Deals compared

The Garmin Fenix 8’s recommended retail price is more expensive than the Apple Watch Ultra 3, so on first glance, the Apple Watch Ultra 3 is cheaper. The Garmin Fenix 8 starts at $999 / £849 / AU$1,699 for its cheapest model, while the Apple Watch Ultra 3 costs $799 / £749 / AU$1,399.

At the time of writing, I’m seeing more details for the older Garmin Fenix 8 than I am for the much more recent Apple Watch Ultra 3. However, I’m not seeing many that brings the Fenix 8 below the Apple Watch Ultra 3’s $799 / £749 / AU$1,399 base price.

Of course, any discount on the Ultra 3 is significant, as it was only released in September, while the Fenix 8 was released late last year and discounts will be more common.

I would say that if you see a Garmin Fenix 8 deal that’s been reduced to $799 / £749 / AU$1,399 (the Apple Watch Ultra 3’s RRP) I would snap it up without question. Below, you can see the best prices from around the web for both models using our deals-checking widget.