The team over at The Run Testers have been testing out a lot of running watches over the past year or so to find out the best running watches to buy. However, choosing favourites is almost impossible as there are so many different use cases, so we’ve broken our guide into four sections.
Those sections are best allrounder running watches, best top-end running watches, best budget running watches and best smartwatches for running.
Here’s the full video where we discuss the best running watches in each category. If you think we’ve missed something or we’ve made a glaring error of choice, let us know in the comments section. The full best running watch list is below the video.
Best all-rounder running watch:
Garmin Forerunner 245
Price: £249.99/$299.99
Weight: 38.5g/1.4oz
Battery life: Smartwatch Mode: Up to 7 days; GPS mode: Up to 24 hours
Water rating: 5ATM
Best top-end running watches:
Polar Vantage V
Price: £439/$495.95
Weight: 66g/2.3oz
Battery life: 40hrs in training mode (GPS and wrist-based heart rate) or up to 7 days in watch mode with continuous heart rate tracking
Water rating: WR50
Garmin Fenix 6 Pro
Price: £649.99/$749.99
Weight: 93g/3.3oz
Battery life:
- Smartwatch: Up to 21 days
- GPS: Up to 60 hours
- GPS and Music: Up to 15 hours
- Max Battery GPS Mode: 120 hours
- Expedition GPS Activity: 46 days
- Battery Saver Watch Mode: 80 days
- Water rating: 10ATM
Best budget running watch:
Garmin Forerunner 35
Price: £129.99/$169.99
Weight: 37.3g/1.3oz
Battery life: Up to 9 days, watch mode; up to 13 hours in training mode
Water rating: 5ATM
Best smartwatch for running:
Apple Watch Series 5
Price: £399/$399
Weight: 30.8g/1.1oz (case only)
Battery life: Up to 18 hours of battery life
