Garmin announces Instinct 2 Series smartwatches

Garmin has announced the Instinct 2 Series, its newest addition to the Instinct family of purpose-built smartwatches.

“Instinct 2 Series is built to be bold, stand out from the crowd, and help you make the most of every day,” said Dan Bartel, Garmin vice president of global consumer sales. But there is more than meets the eye with the Instinct 2 Series. It combines adventurous colours with Garmin’s industry-leading wrist-based technology to become more than just a smartwatch – Instinct 2 becomes a trusted tool to help you live life on your terms.”

Paying homage to the Instinct and Instinct Solar Series, Instinct 2 remains built to military standard 810 for thermal and shock resistance and is water-rated to 100 metres.

The Instinct 2 Series has numerous colours including Electric Lime, Poppy and Neo-Tropic, and is available in the Instinct 2 Solar, standard (non-solar), Surf, Tactical and Camo editions. And using Garmin’s Your Watch, Your Way programme, individuals can build customised Instinct 2 or 2S Solar versions to represent who they are, with more than 240 different design combinations available.

In addition to new colour options, the Instinct 2 Series offers a slimmer profile, as well as two sizes – a traditional 45mm bezel and a new Instinct 2S with a smaller 40mm bezel. It has a new high-resolution, easy-to-read display protected by chemically strengthened, scratch-resistant glass.

The Instinct 2 Series is compatible with the Garmin Connect IQ (CIQ) store2, an all-in-one platform for further personalising Instinct 2 Series with free downloads of apps, widgets, watch faces, data fields, and more. Health and wellness features like Hydration Tracking, and Connect Leaderboard, and Menstrual Cycle and Pregnancy Tracking are also available to Instinct 2 Series owners through CIQ.

The series also brings battery life gains to the smartwatch family – Instinct 2 provides up to four weeks of continuous use while in smartwatch mode, and, thanks to advancements in solar technology, select Instinct 2 Solar models offer unlimited battery life in smartwatch mode, setting a new battery life standard for Garmin.

Instinct 2 now delivers Garmin’s full suite of wellness features, including Sleep Score and Advanced Sleep Monitoring, and a new Health Monitoring activity that allows users to record key health metrics, such as Body Battery, stress, and heart rate in a single view. The Instinct 2 Series now includes VO2 Max, Fitness Age, Training Status/Load/Effect, Recovery Time, HIIT Workouts, and Daily Suggested Workout.

The watches come preloaded with sports apps and activities, including a new Multisport activity that allows users to transition between activities and continue to view their total time and distance. Family and friends can follow along with the user’s activities through text messaging, and loved ones can be notified in the event of an emergency thanks to Instinct 2’s Incident Detection feature. When Instinct 2 is paired to Garmin Connect Mobile and an incident is detected, Garmin Connect Mobile can send a message with the user’s name and location (if available) to their emergency contacts.

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Instinct 2 Solar models now include Garmin Pay for payments on the go. With a tap of their watch to compatible payment systems, users can check out quickly and move on to their next adventure. The Instinct 2 Series also provides three purpose-built editions with dedicated features: surf editions, tactical editions and camo editions.

Instinct 2 and Instinct 2S are available now with a starting suggested retail price of £299.99.

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