garmin trip planner download

Trip and Route Planning

What is Garmin BaseCamp?

Garmin BaseCamp is a free mapping program available as a download from the Garmin website . We use Garmin BaseCamp to transfer our snowmobile and ATV trail maps, routes and waypoints to your GPS device. BaseCamp lets you plan snowmobile and ATV trips then replay your rides, display geotagged photos and share it all with your friends. With BaseCamp, you can manage your waypoints and tracks on your computer for future trip planning.

Plan a snowmobile or ATV ride

Planning a trip with BaseCamp is quick and easy. Plan a quick loop or a multi-day expedition. Calculating distance between food and gas is a breeze. Before planning your first trip you should setup an activity and then set the routing preferences. Select the Edit -> Options menu. Select the " Activity Profile " options. You will notice in the pulldown that BaseCamp provides a default ATV activity but not one for snowmobiling. That’s ok, we can create one. To add a new activity, click the green + box next to the activity pulldown. Enter the name “Snowmobile”. If you have your own snowmobile image you can download it for your new activity type. Now you can set routing preferences for both your ATV or Snowmobile activity by selecting the Routing tab. The Route Preference attribute should always be set to “ Shorter Distance ” and NO Avoidances should be checked off. These routing settings should be replicated on your actual GPS as well. The Speed Customization section does not apply to your GPS trail maps.

NOTE : Setting routing preferences in BaseCamp does not effect the Routing preferences on your GPS. Routing preferences for the GPS must be set on the GPS itself, however a route created in BaseCamp and transfered to your GPS will not be recalculated based on GPS settings, it will remain as calculated in BaseCamp. You do not need to create/use special ATV and Snowmobiling activities, it's simply a way to organize your activity profiles. What's important is the actual settings on the Routing tab, not the activity name.

Now that you have your activity profiles setup you can begin your trip planning. You will need to select the map that provides the ATV or snowmobile trails. From the Maps menu, select either the GPS Trailmasters ATV map or the GPS Trailmasters Snowmobile map. Next you will need to create a place within BaseCamp to store the routes. In the upper portion of the Library and Devices area is where you will find lists under My Collection . To create a new list for your routes, click File -> New -> List . Enter the name of your new list. Make sure your new list is selected before creating a new route.

As Garmin continues to update the BaseCamp software, the way routes are created is being improved. There are actually three different ways to create a route for your trip.

The Trip Planner tool is the first way. The Trip Planner tool is geared towards a very regimented multi-day trip but can be used nonetheless to plan your afternoon ATV or snowmobile trip as well. The Trip Planner will search cities and our trail accessible points of interest but it does so based on the area of the map that is displayed, so it is important to have the GPS Trailmasters trail map zoomed out just beyond the total trip area. From the main menu click Trip Planner -> New Trip . Make sure to uncheck the Round Trip attribute if your trip is one way. Click Continue and enter the Starting Location and the Destination . The tool will automatically search the city and POI database when you start typing in the Start or Destination box. For example, if you type ‘B’, the tool will pull up all locations in the area starting with the letter ‘B’. This can make it easier for you to enter your trip start and destination locations. After you have set the start and destination, click Start Trip . Your route will be automatically calculated using the Shortest Distance (based on your routing preferences). Click the Exit button at the very bottom of the panel or add additional days or points of interest along the planned route.

The second method is the Route Tool and is my preferred method for "rough" planning because it is quick and easy. From the main menu click Tools -> Route . The cursor will change to the Route tool pencil. Move the cursor to your start position and left-click the mouse. Move the cursor to drag the “rubber band” to the destination and left-click again. The shortest distance route will be calculated automatically. Terminate the route with a right-click of the mouse. You can force the route to follow a particular path by clicking on intermediary via points to your final destination. Right click the mouse to terminate the route. Your new route is displayed in the Library and Devices area under your My Collection list.

There is a third method that can be used with our trail map POI database which provides a popup dialog with a nice drag-n-drop interface for selecting the start point and destination. For this method, the map should be zoomed out to cover your total riding area. From the main menu click Find -> Find Point of Interest . This will result in a list of all available gas, food, lodging, parking points of interest and more to be displayed in the Search result panel on the right side of the window. From the main menu click Edit -> Create Route… You can drag start and destination points from the list of POIs to the New Route dialog. You can also begin to type in the Search boxes and a search for all POI and city matches will be performed. Select the desired point or city. This method also provides a quick way to select the ATV or Snowmobile map and the activity profile for calculating the route. Once the dialog is filled in click Go .

If your start point or destination is not in the POI database or a city on our map, you can create your own waypoints with the Waypoint tool and use them in your route.

Regardless of the method used, your newly created route will be listed in the left-hand Library and Devices area within your My Collection list. There are a number of operations that can be performed on a newly created route. These options are presented when you select a route and right-click the mouse. You can easily delete a route if it’s not what you want or if you are just practicing. You can actually “play” the route, rename it, invert it, remove intermediary via point (called shaping points) if you have them. The most useful and interesting action you can perform on a route is examine the details. Double-click the route to see total distance and time. Remember, time is a loose number because of the speed limits assigned to trails, trail conditions, terrain and riding ability but can be used as a gauge. I usually multiply the Total Time by 1.2 for a more accurate time of arrival. Within the Route Directions tab, you can see each individual turn with distance and time in-between. The Properties tab and Route Directions tab are the most interesting. You can also modify the route here, change the display color, invert it and print out directions.

When you have a route that you now want to transfer to your GPS, select the route and then click Device -> Send to Device ->. You can send the entire My Collection list or just the selected route. Note : Not all GPS devices will accept a route from BaseCamp. Check the Garmin site for your model GPS to determine if it has “ Trip Planning ” capability. Depending on your GPS device the route will be accessible under the Route Planning App or possibly a category under “Where To”.

For additional route planning features enable additional toolbars. From the main menu click View -> Toolbars . Enable the Playback , Playback Info and Area Avoidances toolbars. The Playback and Playback Info toolbars can be used to simulate riding the route. It will show the speed, distance and time as the simulation arrow moves along the route. Remember that speed is assigned and not representative of how fast the trail can actually be ridden. The Area Avoidances tool can be used to select an area of the map to avoid – good for selecting an area where known logging is occurring or an area with poor riding conditions. Additional details regarding route planning can be found in the BaseCamp Help documentation and the online training videos .

Save Tracks and Waypoints

When you ride a trail with your GPS, it is collecting and recording the track. You also have the ability to mark places of interest while you are out on the trail, creating a waypoint that is saved in your GPS. These tracks and waypoints can be transfered from your GPS into BaseCamp where you can review them, rename them, share with others and store on your computer for future route planning. Managing your tracks and waypoints should be done on your computer using Garmin BaseCamp and not on your actual GPS. Note that when you transfer tracks and waypoints from your GPS to BaseCamp they are not deleted from your GPS and you will soon accumulate many potentially unwanted tracks and waypoints. Therefor once you have saved them on your computer, they should be deleted from your GPS (unless you want them of course). You can always transfer the ones you want back to the GPS from the computer using BaseCamp. From the main menu click Device . You have the option to Send data to your GPS device and Receive data from the device.

In addition to location, your tracks also contain time and elevation. Speed is calculated from the time values so you can plot the speed and elevation of your tracks. If you have 3D (elevation data) topographic maps on your computer you can see your tracks overlaid on the topo map in 3D view.

Geotag Photos

Your pictures can be geotagged within BaseCamp to show exactly where the picture was taken. Geotagged photos can be transferred to your GPS device with picture viewing capability and shared with your friends.

Create an Adventure

Garmin Adventures is an Internet community sharing application where you can swap trips with friends and share on social media. More about this later.

Garmin Custom Maps

If your GPS device supports Garmin Custom Maps you can transform paper maps and electronic maps into downloadable formats that can be transferred to your GPS. The process requires your map be georeferenced so it can be displayed at the proper location on the GPS. For a list of compatible devices and instructions to georeference your map using Google Earth see Garmin Custom Maps . - Watch our video on how to georeference the NERFC Snow Depth map.

Garmin Explore‪™‬ 4+

Explore with a garmin device.

• #105 in Navigation
• 3.4 • 84 Ratings

Screenshots

Description.

Map, Track, Sync and Share Your Trek From Anywhere For adventure seekers, explorers and outdoor enthusiasts, the Garmin Explore ecosystem offers a complete mobile navigation solution that — when paired with a compatible Garmin device¹ — lets you map, track and navigate your trek from anywhere with unlimited cloud storage. Garmin Explore provides basic trip planning or viewing of maps you’ve preloaded on your device. Or you can use the mobile app to pair your smart device via BLUETOOTH®² technology with a compatible Garmin GPS device, so you can do and see even more. Access Online Connectivity Garmin Explore provides free online access to a wide range of additional capabilities. For example, you can download detailed topographic maps, color aerial imagery and other navigation aids directly to your mobile device. The maps and navigation data loaded onto your device can be used anywhere, anytime — even when you’re out beyond the reach of cellphone towers or internet connections. Manage Your Collections, Tracks and Routes Review and edit your waypoints, tracks, routes and activities in your library. Add them to a collection to keep all the recorded data from a certain trip together in one place. For example, if you’re taking a long trip, you can plan different waypoints, tracks and routes for each day of the trip and combine them into one collection. Your Mobile Cloud Connection The Garmin Explore app will send and store the waypoints, planned routes, GPS tracks and Garmin activities you've recorded in the cloud, allowing you to access and use that data on the Garmin Explore web site to plan or review your adventures. You can also sync your cloud-stored data with a compatible Garmin device. A Garmin account is needed to store your data in the cloud. Your activities (e.g., runs, walks, hikes, etc.) include data such as distance, pace, activity time, location, etc. that were recorded by your device. More Off-grid Capability with inReach® Technology Use Garmin Explore with your inReach enabled devices, such as the GPSMAP® 66i navigator and satellite communicator, to turn your mobile device into a true off-the-grid satellite companion. In an emergency, you can trigger an interactive SOS to the GEOS 24/7 emergency response team. Two-way messaging and LiveTrack location tracking via the 100% global Iridium® satellite network let you stay in contact globally. The Garmin Explore app allows you to access your phone’s contact list for easier messaging and sharing when connected. What You Get with Garmin Explore • Unlimited map downloads; access topographic maps, USGS quad sheets and more • Aerial imagery • Waypoints, tracking and route navigation • High-detail GPS trip logging and location sharing • Unlimited cloud storage of routes, waypoints, tracks, and activities • Online trip planning 1. https://explore.garmin.com/appcompatibility 2. The Bluetooth word mark and logos are registered trademarks owned by Bluetooth SIG, Inc. and any use of such marks by Garmin is under license.

Version 3.12.1

Various Bug Fixes and Improvements

Ratings and Reviews

Ok. huge potential. big frustrations.

Great 😃= route planning Ok 😐= Bluetooth sync with watch Extremely frustrating 😡 = deleting courses on watch, deletes corresponding course on explore. Why??? Just why Garmin? I want to clean my watch and save / sort routes on explore. It’s also very annoying that you can’t pan / easily zoom in and view a saved course without editing. Potential ✅= gpx route import could be better and allow you to rename / choose sort folder - the current implementation is annoying. Needs to support more maps and satellite map view. Would be great to be able to buy and sync maps to my watch. Os maps would be great. Viewing all my routes on the map and zooming out would be useful. It would be cool for example to navigate with watch and use the explore map as a high res os maps backup device if the route reaches a tricky bit - I love that the route / user location shows on explore, whilst navigating using my watch.

Clunky 1990s-style software

All garmin software is the worst I’ve ever used. Nothing works properly. Design is horrendous. Features are appalling, Bluetooth connection is a fight and only to 1 device (you have to delete the other first). You can’t even use software to add a custom map. And can this software update your GPS? It syncs with it. It has a button that says ‘Software Update” and it tells you what software is available for your device. But, no, it can not. It tells you you have to download another app for that (Garmin Connect) and although Garmin Explore (after a fight) shows as “Connected” to your device, when you open Garmin Connect to finally update the thing, it tells you “Not Connected”! On the same device!!! Then there’s the mapping: they discontinued Garmin Homebase before adding its features to Garmin Explore, which replaces it! The horrific software also forces you to use a PC to upload maps (I only have an iPad Pro and iPhone so I have to borrow one). I could go on and on and on. You only have to go online to see how many people in the world have wasted hours of their life pulling their hair out trying to get Garmin software to work for them. How can this company have got away with churning out such total garbage for so long? I’m praying the day someone produces dedicated GPS kit with REASONABLE useable software. How many thousands of Garmin devices will hit eBay that day!

A fantastic app for orienteering

As a self confessed outdoor orienteering geek I think this app is brilliant. I use it to add and sync all of the tors of Dartmoor National Park to my Fenix 7S so I can easily navigate to waypoints when I’m out hiking without having to find them using the map on the small watch screen. The course creation feature is also really intuitive and allows you to walk, run or cycle the route via your Garmin device instantly. The collections feature allows you to easily manage and sync the geographical areas that you need on the day so you don’t have to scroll through hundreds of irrelevant waypoints and courses on your watch. The only negative is you can’t add waypoints using the British National Grid format but strangely you can do this directly on the watch and they will show on the app using standard coordinates. Such a useful app that unlocks the navigation capabilities of your Fenix watch. It makes your watch data easier to manage and facilitates navigation on the fly.

App Privacy

The developer, Garmin , indicated that the app’s privacy practices may include handling of data as described below. For more information, see the developer’s privacy policy .

Data Linked to You

The following data may be collected and linked to your identity:

• Contact Info
• Identifiers

Data Not Linked to You

The following data may be collected but it is not linked to your identity:

• Diagnostics

Privacy practices may vary based on, for example, the features you use or your age. Learn More

Information

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• Privacy Settings
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• Drone Reviews
• Google (Pixel Watch)
• Power Meters
• Wahoo Fitness
• Weight Scales
• Everything Else…
• Best GPS Watches Buyers Guide
• Best Bike GPS & Cycling Tech Buyers Guide
• Bike Smart Trainers Guide
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• DCR Sports Gear I Use List (2023)
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• The New Display and User Interface
• The Bike Bell
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• Discussion (134)

Garmin Edge 1050 In-Depth Review: Brilliance or Battery?

But it’s not just a new display. There’s also a host of new features, many tied to group riding scenarios, or leveraging the larger cycling community – such as crowdsource identifying road hazards/issues. And perhaps my favorite: A bike bell. Seriously, it’s surprisingly well executed. Beyond shiny features though, the company has also significantly revamped its gradient responsiveness, as well as other algorithms for better performance. Of course, with this power-hungry battery life comes some major cuts in battery life compared to previous models.

In any case, I’ve been putting the Garmin Edge 1050 through its paces across a wide variety of terrain from mountain bike, to gravel, to road riding. Both solo, and group rides, to see how it handles. Note that Garmin provided a media loaner Edge 1050 to test. As usual, I’ll get that back to them here shortly. I’ll go out and pick up my own to continue testing the new features once they arrive. If you found this review useful, you can use the links at the bottom, or consider becoming a DCR Supporter , which makes the site ad-free, while also getting access to a mostly weekly video series behind the scenes of the DCR Cave. And of course, it makes you awesome.

With that, let’s talk newness.

What’s New:

The screen. That’s what’s new. Oh, and a bunch of other features. But really, this is the screen. Oh, and the nifty big bell.

The Garmin Edge 1050 is of course Garmin’s top-end cycling computer, but interestingly, almost every new software feature here is going back to the Edge 540, 840, and 1040 series. Additionally, many are also going back to Garmin’s Edge Explore 2 units. Part of that is because these features benefit heavily from *more people* using them. If Garmin saved these just for the x50 series devices, then frankly, they’d be irrelevant. Still, there are some hardware features on the Edge 1050 that drive the overall newer looking user interface (due to processing power), and of course, the screen itself.

Oh, one quick super important thing: Garmin says the Edge 1040/1040 Solar will not only stick around in the lineup, but continue getting the same updates as the Edge 1050, to essentially give the option of a crazybright display (Edge 1050), or extremely long battery life (Edge 1040 Solar). More on that down below.

Here’s what’s new (as compared to the existing Edge 1040 units):

– Changed display to 3.5” Transmissive LCD display (with 1,000 Nits brightness, resolution 480×800) – Added an actual speaker (as opposed to just a beeper) – Added Audible Bike Bell (and can even be triggered by remote shifter buttons) – Added Road Hazards (potholes, dangerous dogs/animals, downed trees, etc…) – Added GroupRide Challenges & Awards – Added GroupRide Incident Detection (notifies everyone in a group ride of a crash) – Added Road Surface Type to on-device data – Added WiFi Map Manager for Updates/Downloads (previously required computer) – Added Garmin Share (direct device-to-device transfers, kinda like before, but to be expanded to numerous Garmin device types) – Added Garmin Pay contactless payments (NFC payments) – Updated PowerGuide to better account for Stamina/Wind – Revamped User Interface to leverage new processor/display – Added on-device tutorials to explain things this review somehow doesn’t – Added new ‘interactive data pages’ (basically swipe up/down to view more/less data, like Hammerhead Karoo) – Added on-device course creator for point-by-point courses (versus round-trip courses previously) – Revamped data page customization (also, like Hammerhead Karoo) – Significantly increased instant gradient responsiveness (e.g. how long to go from 0% to 6% as you start climbing) – Changed to replaceable mount tabs (you can remove the whole thing to replace if it breaks) – Increased the weight to 161g (Edge 1040 is 126g) – Claimed battery life is 20 hours, and 60 hours in battery saver mode (see my testing later on) – Maintains IPX7 water resistance – Maintains 64GB internal storage – Increased length slightly, which may not fit in some mounts – Price is at $699 ($50 less than the Edge 1040 Solar which is technically $749)

Ultimately, the stand-out feature of the Edge 1050 is the crazy brilliant/fast display. It seems Garmin got tired of people asking for a cell-phone-like display on a bike computer. But of course, that display means one thing: Less battery life. It’s a factual reality of today’s tech, no matter the manufacturer. Sure, Garmin’s battery life is basically double that of Hammerhead’s Karoo 3, but that’s still a fraction of Garmin’s existing Edge 1040/1040 Solar units.

Thus, Garmin made sure to reiterate multiple times that the Edge 1040/1040 Solar are seen as viable alternatives, with Andrew Silver, Garmin’s Cycling Product Division Manager, saying:

“Both Edge 1050 and Edge 1040 / Solar will remain core parts of our range, with Edge 1040 / Solar continuing to receive feature and software updates where screen technology and underlying hardware allows. This essentially gives users the choice between super bright screen and resolution and the long battery life that is core to the x40 series.”

As proof of that pudding, Garmin will also be releasing a public beta firmware today (well, hopefully, today) that brings virtually all of these features to the Edge 540, 840, 1040/1040 Solar, and some to the Edge Explore 2. There are a handful of hardware-specific differences that aren’t coming, such as the bike bell, since that requires the speaker. And the revamped user interface, which requires the faster processor and display. But in terms of the actual underlying features like Hazards, WiFi Maps, Garmin Share, Power Guide, etc… those are all coming to the x40 series units.

Here’s the nifty chart explaining it all:

Got all that? Good.

Of course, as always, we’ll have to see long-term just how long that ‘keeping both units equal’ commitment really lasts. To Garmin’s credit, we have seen that last with the Garmin Fenix 7/Epix units getting all the new Fenix 7 Pro/Epix Pro features. Same goes for the Forerunner 955 getting virtually all the Forerunner 965 features. And we’re now roughly a year-on from those announcements. Maybe the times have changed, after all.

Now, I’m going to add in a bunch of sections to this review, including all the ‘basics’ stuff covering things that haven’t changed in years. But for now, I want to dive into what’s different, and whether I find them worthwhile. Expect a full expanded review/guide of sorts in the coming days, but for the moment, I’m curious if a more distilled/focused review is useful.

The New Display and User Interface:

First up is the new display. As noted above, it’s unquestionably the cornerstone of Garmin’s strategy here. But it’s not a new strategy. We’ve seen them first start off doing more brilliant displays in the wearables realm with Venu, then Epix, then Forerunner, and more. Frankly, it’s what consumers are demanding. Or at least, the vast majority of them.

And Garmin has tried to find balance in offering various models appealing to both crowds (battery vs brilliance). Which is what they say they’re doing here by keeping the Edge 1040 in the lineup, and updated with new features.

In any event, as for the display, the backlight is technically always-on now. Whereas with an Edge 1040 unit, there was on/off. Instead, it’s a matter of ‘how much on’. For that, there’s the usual automatic mode, and then that slider takes it from “totally readable but dim” (at 0%) up to “Maine coastal lighthouse level” at 100%. It’s astonishingly bright. In my video above, I show that transition, and how it completely blows out the locked exposure on my camera:

But what matters is outside. Here’s a shot side-by-side with the Edge 1040 Solar and Hammerhead Karoo 3 in mid-day summer sun. Obviously, it’s quite visible there.

Which then gets to the next question people often ask of these displays: Will it overheat?

For better or worse, the last few weeks has found me in constant hot conditions, roughly 90°F/32°C (and warmer) for the majority of my rides. These rides lasted up to about 3.5 hours, and never once did I get any sort of overheating type issues. But, not content with that, I stuck it out for more than 2 hours in the direct afternoon Greek sun, where the air temp was 94°F/34°C, with no wind. Just let it bake, recording. From there I grabbed my FLIR camera, and measured. Basically, it wasn’t much different than the surrounding surface areas:

So, the next question, becomes speed. As we saw with the Hammerhead Karoo 3, it’s got very similar brilliance to the Edge 1050, but it has a bit of lagginess to it. Does the Edge 1050 exhibit that lag? Nope, almost never. In the video I show a slate of fast-moving actions. Garmin said their goal was to get this as close to a phone-like experience as possible, while still giving people the battery life they expect of a flagship bike computer. They clearly delivered there.

Which isn’t to say there isn’t any lag. It can happen. For example, if I zoom out fast/far enough (to roughly 20-30KM range) on the map, you’ll see map tiles might take a second or two to enumerate. Loading a course can take 1-2 seconds. But again, that’s more than fast enough for me. Processing time was never an issue for re-routing, or turn-by-turn prompts, or anything else. It just did what it was supposed to do.

Now within this new display, powered by the new processor, is a revamped user interface. You can see it on all the shots. This revamped UI is most prominent in four core areas:

A) Main homepage/dashboards B) Swipe-down menus C) Some full charts/graph data pages D) Configuring data pages/fields

Which isn’t to say the UI is exactly the same elsewhere, but it’s very similar elsewhere. Starting off on the main homepage, all of this feels cleaned up, and a bit nicer to use. You can swipe left/right in the ‘Dynamic’ area, like with the much-discussed Garmin Connect UI revamp. Here you’ll find recently added courses, recently completed rides, suggested workouts, and so on.

Whereas up above, are your ride profiles, somewhat like before (e.g., Gravel/Road/MTB/Indoor/etc)… The distance shown on each profile is how many kilometers you’ve spent in that given profile. Overall, I’m a fan of all this, it works really well.

However, the singular area I’m not a huge fan of, yet, is the swipe-down area. This has vibes of the previous swipe-down menu, but there aren’t any left/right arrows anymore. Instead, you get to play whack-a-mole with the icons at the bottom, which change around to show other control panel type pages – such as nearby Strava Live Segments, or the Garmin Pay NFC payment wallet, or your actual control panel, etc…

To me, this doesn’t feel finished yet. It’s not bad, but it’s not intuitive – especially for my first few rides. And even now, nearly a month later, I still feel like I’m just stabbing at icons on the bottom trying to find the right one. The ‘Controls’ icon and ’Status’ icons look very similar at a glance, as does the wallet icon. Speaking of which, that’s how you access your wallet, which does first require using a passcode of course:

Then simply tap as expected:

All this worked fine. I wouldn’t say it’s something I’d use often, but then again, neither is that 10EUR bill in my saddle bag. It’s there in case my phone dies and I need to pay for something.

Still, other areas of the UI are improved. For example, the new area to customize your data pages is so much better. It’s basically a knock-off of what the Hammerhead Karoo does for their data pages, but it makes a ton of sense. It’s clearly designed so that you can easily understand what pages you’ve got configured, versus the previous ‘Going in and out’ of all pages titled ‘Data Page 1/2/3/etc…”.

And taking another apparent page from Hammerhead’s Karoo, they’ve made it so you can adjust the height of certain data page panels. For example, the Strava Live Segments or ClimbPro pages can be increased/decreased from partial pages to full-size pages, as you ride. Below, that middle-line between the map and the Strava segment, I can swipe up, to increase the size of the Strava Live Segment piece.

I like this too, albeit, I wish they’d also copy the Strava Live Segments features and layout from Hammerhead while they were at it. Unfortunately, the Strava Live Segments implementation here is definitely behind the times.

Still, on the whole, the UI changes are well done and clean – it feels more modern and certainly feels more polished.

Of course, all of these display things ultimately impact battery life. That’s the big drop here compared to the Edge 1040 Solar, which gets upwards of 90 hours of battery life depending on sun conditions. Whereas the new Edge 1050 is in the 20-30hr range, which of course, is still double their Wahoo and Hammerhead competitors. Here’s the official battery usage chart:

And then, more importantly, here’s my actual test data. Note that in the two cases, this is without any screen recording on, but with everything else enabled: Power meter connected, heart rate sensor connected, shifting connected, LiveTrack enabled, GroupTrack enabled, navigation running, etc… Literally, all the things.

If we look at this first 3-hour ride with the default brightness settings, you’ll see I’m on target for about 20 hours of riding time:

However, I went out again, and turned down the brightness to about 20-30%, which is still brighter than the Edge 1040 Solar screen. In that case, with all the same things enabled, I was on target for about 30 hours (again, still with sensors/navigation/GroupTrack/etc.. all enabled):

Yet, keep in mind you can still do Battery Saver mode, which here shows upwards of 70 hours:

And ultimately, that’s what this all comes down to. Garmin is betting that there’s more users that want a pretty/fast/brilliant screen that lasts 20-30 hours, versus one that lasts 50-90 hours. And for those that want the 50-90 hours? Garmin still has that for them too.

The Bike Bell:

Hot take: The bike bell is the best part of the Edge 1050.

Sure, much ink is spilled on the screen and pretty UI, but ultimately, the bike bell is the real winner. Especially if you know you can configure it to your remote/extra shift buttons on SRAM AXS and Shimano Di2. But first, for those without electronic shifting (or the Garmin Edge remote buttons), you can use your finger to tap the screen once, which brings up the bell icon:

And then simply tap the bell. It’ll ding-dong, just like a real bell.

So much so, that nobody in the streets of Amsterdam once looked back and thought it was something electronically weird. It sounded just like any other bell on the streets here. And more importantly, everyone simply shifted out of the way, like any other bike bell coming from behind.

But the real interesting bit here is that you can assign it to a remote shifter option, including SRAM AXS Blips, the SRAM RED bonus button, and the Shimano Di2 extra buttons. This means that to trigger the bell (instantly), I just tap the blip or extra button on my handlebars:

It’s awesome. Seriously – the absolute best feature here.

Road Hazard Feature:

Next up, there’s the new ‘Road Hazards’ feature. Note that again, Garmin is rolling it out to all the 540/840/1040/1050/Edge Explore 2 units. Thus I suspect, in quick order, it’ll actually be pretty darn useful. Not as useful as if they rolled it out to the x30 units too…but hey, can’t win them all.

The goal of the Road Hazard feature is to notify you of upcoming hazards, or nearby hazards (since some hazards can move). As you’re riding along, you can simply tap the screen to mark a hazard. You’ve got five options: Animal (that always-there angry dog), Obstruction, Pothole, Slippery, and generic ‘Hazard’ (for Godzilla):

These hazards are then near-instantly reported back to Garmin Connect (via your phone), and presented to other riders as they near the area. It’s actually pretty darn cool to see how quickly this entire process happens.

DesFit and I managed to get it to work when I was only a few hundred meters ahead of him, for an upcoming dangerous animal (a bunny rabbit, obviously). When you start approaching a flagged hazard (from a few hundred meters out), it’ll show on your screen in the lower corner as a red box:

And then as you get very close, it’ll pop-up and show you more detail:

At this point, you can confirm or deny the existence of that hazard (it’ll go away after a few seconds if you don’t do anything). And this is the critical part – they’re crowd-sourcing the validation of these hazards. As long as the hazard continues to get a 50% upvote, it’ll remain. Though, some hazards also have a time-based component too. Garmin says they’re going to hold off on detailing the time-based pieces, until they get riders out there, as they might tweak the algorithms (similar to how they tweaked ClimbPro algorithms in the initial few months).

If you’ve ever ridden in an area with a known-annoying-AF-dog that chases every cyclist that comes by, this is actually super useful. Most of the time, those dogs are ‘guarding’ their particular driveway. The same goes for that nasty pothole that still isn’t fixed, years later. The ‘slippery’ one will probably be subjective, but again, everyone knows that one road riding hidden corner that’s somehow always got light gravel or water pooling on it.

Now fear not, if you don’t want to know about that grizzly bear or pothole, you can turn this off in the alert settings on a per-ride profile basic.

GroupRide Challenges & Awards:

Garmin is expanding their group features with expanded ‘GroupRide’, which, is different than the ‘GroupTrack’ you’ve probably known from the past. GroupRide is for x40/x50 units, while GroupTrack is for older units (e.g. Garmin Edge 530). GroupRide has allowed you to see the location of others in your group on the map, as well as send them messages. Now, GroupRide is getting three additional new features:

– GroupRide Incident Detection: Simply put, if your buddy crashes, you’ll get a notification, as well as options to navigate to them. Obviously, if you’re in a single group and crash, then you probably don’t much care about your buddy’s body’s location lying atop yours. But, if that person was off the back out of sight and crashed, you’d never know. Now you will.

– GroupRide In-Ride Climb Challenges: This is basically like a live version of Strava Live Segments, for ClimbPro Climbs. It’ll award winners, based on the fastest time up that climb, live during the middle of the ride. It’ll even do this before your buddies get to the top of the climb, if it determines your buddies can’t beat your times at that point (or inversely, notify you that Lauren won, because Lauren already went faster than you could ever make it up the climb given how much ground you have left).

– GroupRide Post-Ride Awards: These are new awards that are handed out after a ride. They’re mostly whimsical, and are a blend of both general ride data (top speeds/etc), as well as sensor data (e.g. power values). In total, Garmin says there’s a starter set of about 50-60 of these, though in my testing I mostly saw the same handful over and over again.

I’ll take a look at both the Climb Challenges and Post-Ride awards a bit closer from my ride testing. First off though, you’ll need to create a group ride. This assumes you’ve got your phone with you, along with the Garmin Connect Mobile app running on it. This leverages a lot of the existing LiveTrack pieces, so those will need to be given permissions too. Though, you probably did that ages ago.

From there, you can either create a new GroupRide session, or join one. Either way, you’ll simply swipe down to enter the code in the GroupRide session area, or, create a new GroupRide. Here’s joining a code:

And here’s creating one. In this case, you can also select a course/route, and that’ll automatically be sent to all other participants. Thus, you don’t have to do the whole route sharing thing.

Once that’s done, off you go. You’ll see the existing GroupRide functionality, notably seeing others on the map, and how far they are from you (keep in mind all of this requires cellular coverage, else, it basically freezes in time):

As well as the ability to message them mid-ride:

Of course, the messaging mid-ride does still depend on your riding buddies actually paying attention to the alerts from their Garmin Edge device. As I discovered with my wife, there’s a 66% chance that my electronic messaging pleas for help will be completely missed, and I’ll be left for dead on the road. That said, the messages only stay for a few seconds on your friend’s units, so if they don’t see/catch the notification – there’s no reminder alert (the messages are still in the message panel, in the event your wife bothers to go into that…).

Next, as you approach a climb, you’ll get the usual ClimbPro bits showing climb status. However, you’ll see others on the climb, and their little icons of where they are:

As you reach the top of the climb, the system will start handing out awards. If you’re the fastest up the climb, you’ll get awarded the win. Note that this is *purely* based on the climb segment time, not the first person to reach the top of the climb. Depending on how others are doing on the climb, it’ll even award the win before others finish. Else, sometimes it’ll award it a bit later.

Here’s an example where the winner wasn’t declared immediately at the top, despite me easily losing and Des winning, which Garmin says they’ve improved in an update since we did this climb a few weeks ago.

Whereas this other climb we did during the ride declared Des as the winner immediately upon me crossing the virtual line:

Additionally, everyone will see the list of climbs, and who won each climb:

During my testing, I had some mixed success on just how quickly it would enumerate the winners after each climb. In some cases, it did it instantly, in others, there was a bit of a delay (minutes or longer). Garmin looked into the problematic cases (now a few weeks ago), and implemented various fixes to address them. However, back in The Netherlands, with only so many friends with Edge 1050 devices here (read: none), I haven’t been able to validate these fixes.

I will make one request though: I wish that Garmin could be a bit more clever in no-cellular areas. Specifically, for riders riding together, I’d love to see Garmin leverage some sort of Bluetooth mesh network to send the data back and forth between units in the ‘peloton’. In the case of some of my rides with Des, we went well beyond cellular range for quite a long time, and all of our GroupRide stuff basically kinda froze (in terms of updates). Sure, it reconsolidated later on, but it’d have been nice to have that updated since we were literally riding together most of the time.

Next, post-ride, we’ve got the awards. There are some 60 different awards given out to participants in a group ride, based on a variety of different factors. These can be fastest top speed, best power-to-weight ratio, most time standing (with Vector/Rally pedals), most time spent off-course (…lost), and so on. Here’s how these look:

These will show up as each rider saves their files, so the full slate of all the awards might not be immediately present if someone forgets to hit save at the end of the ride. Still, you’ll get a tentative list of them. In my case, there was also a bug present that led to the text ‘Not all riders are finished’ text you see there. That was resolved server-side, with a fix last night. It didn’t impact the awards, simply text thinking there was someone still left behind.

Looking at all the group ride sessions I saw, for the most part I saw the same awards over and over again, despite the mass quantity of award options. Perhaps we’ll see that get a bit more variable in the future.

Note that the awards are also seen in Garmin Connect Mobile, as well as even on the Garmin Connect website:

And this also includes the climb stats too:

Ultimately, whether or not you’ll find this feature useful will probably depend on how much group riding you do – and whether your friends have Garmin Edge x40 or x50 series devices. In my case, I don’t tend to do a lot of group rides. If I’m riding with someone else, it’s likely to be just another individual, not a group of people. So for me, this feature won’t get much use. But, to each their own.

GPS & Elevation Accuracy:

This section will be boring. Simply because, it’s just as accurate as before. Which, seems to be the theme for today’s reviews.

However, I’ll point out that not only is the GPS and elevation data accurate, but so is all the other ride data. Things like connected sensors have been flawlessly recording as they always should. After all, the core point of a bike computer is recording your data accurately – an area we’ve seen some industry struggles with recently.

In any event, let’s quickly look at a few different rides for funsies. First up, we’ve got this gravel ride in Colorado I did. This one starts off on a famed road canyon route, before going up a very painful 15-18% grade for quite a while into the mountains. Here’s the high-level overview:

And if we look at random snippets along the way, there’s really nothing of note here. It’s all spot-on:

And again, also spot on:

The remainder of the route, from a GPS standpoint, is again, boring. But you can look at it here .

From an elevation standpoint on that route, things were very similar between the units, despite some early rains during the ride, and significantly shifting temperatures. That big flat-line portion at the top there, is when we ate cookies at a cafe (obviously).

Next up, we’ve got some mountain bike tracks here , in…well…said mountains. I saw very little differences between the Edge 1050 and the Garmin Epix Pro or Apple Watch Ultra 2. They were all very close on this ride.

And again, more tidbits from that ride, notably the sharp switchbacks at the right side going up ever-so-slowly in the steep woods, and then the fast downhill switchbacks on the road going down (at left)

Again here, no meaningful difference between the Edge 1050 and other units I’d trust.

All of my other Colorado rides were similar, without anything of note.

Back home, we’ve got a 90KM ride from this weekend on what should be the final firmware. This covers a variety of terrain from some city/bridge/etc stuff, to open fields, to woods.

It literally looked like this, the entire time, from a track accuracy standpoint. All the units were happy.

Finally, I want to briefly mention gradient responsiveness. That’s an area that Garmin says they spent a lot of time on, with an entirely new algorithm for the Edge 1050 (also going back to the Edge 540/840/1040). That algorithm increases the speed of responsiveness.

For long-time followers, you’ll know I’ve made several videos about the differences in gradient responsiveness between Garmin/Wahoo/Hammerhead. In short, Garmin was almost always notably slower when the grade changed steeply, very quickly. You virtually never noticed the differences if it was more gradual grade differences. As a result, if you quickly hit a sharp/steep climb, you’d see Garmin lag sometimes 10-15 seconds before it showed the right value.

That lag is now entirely gone. And more critically: It’s been stable when it quickly shifts.

Meaning, that while Hammerhead and Wahoo almost always changed faster, there were times where it wasn’t quite correct either. In this case, Garmin seems to have found the right balance with being just as fast (and almost always faster than Hammerhead and certainly Wahoo), while not overcommitting for the climbs I tried.

I outlined/show this in the video a bit more in real-time. I might try to find a few more climbs that can better illustrate this, as some of the screen recording sessions I had (thought I had) recorded elsewhere failed in various ways. Still, good to see this change.

I suspect for about 90% of the population, they’ll be thrilled with the more visible, more brilliant screen – regardless of the battery life implications compared to the Edge 1040 series. After all, the Edge 1050 battery life still exceeds that of any unit from Wahoo or Hammerhead, and even more so, it means charging it only once every 2-3 weeks for most riders. Of course, for those that prefer much longer battery life (such as due to multi-pizza-long riding durations), you might have hoped for something else. Thus, I’m glad to see Garmin is committing to continued updates on the Edge 1040 series, and proving it with the immediate public beta updates.

I’ve been pretty happy with the Edge 1050 overall from a riding perspective. Display-aside, it basically feels like an Edge 1040 with a spruced-up user interface and a few social-focused features. It’ll be interesting to see the ride hazards feature mature over the coming months. It won’t take long for people to start flagging hazards (and the community to confirm/reject them). Depending on the road (and dog) conditions of where you ride, this could be a very legit useful feature. Whereas for me personally, I rarely ride with groups, so all the group features aren’t super useful to me personally. But to each their own.

In terms of stability, the unit has been very stable for me. I’ve had a handful of small bugs over my testing period, with virtually all of them having been resolved, and the last user interface one around other GroupRide riders not yet completed, being resolved tonight in a server-side update. My only tangible complaint at this point is that the turn notification loudness/sound got seemingly tweaked in the last firmware update, and is much harder to hear now on a windy day. But that’s easily tweaked in a future update, and Garmin says they’re already looking into what might have changed in recent days. Undoubtedly, other small things will pop up, like most other units. But overall this is a very solid/stable unit, similar to what we saw Hammerhead deliver with the Karoo 3 recently. There’s value in not rushing a product launch, if nothing else, having largely positive reviews across the board from reviewers.

With that, thanks for reading!

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134 Comments

Is is possible to get comparison shots of the screens in low light with a soft, usable lighting? Not sure how the camera would pick those up.

It’s been a big turnoff for me with the color screens over my b&w Wahoo Bolt v1. The V1 Bolt has a nice gentle backlight and great contrast, making it easier to see poorly lit objects outside of the headlight. While the backlit color screens tend to have a higher minimum backlight and washout. I was looking forward to an OLED type of screen for the contrast without blinding me from road details in front of me in low light.

Something similar to this would be the bees knees https://media.dcrainmaker.com/images/2024/05/BikeGPS-NightRider-720×405.jpeg

I took this one, moments after the full brightness one, simply turned around in the shade. Still at forced 100% brightness for all units.

Oh. Later on at night I can. It doesn’t get dark here till around 11PM. :)

I think Ray would provide better insight than I can – however I was lucky enough to find one locally. Side by side, the 1040 holds up well under direct sunlight. However in the dark (mountain biking, or night riding) – the colors hold up better on the 1050, at least from testing in a dark closet. Another thing – the 1040 color separation to me is pretty bad when you view from (beneath) the centerline of the device. I don’t ride with my head out over the bars looking straight down. So when I get back into position, the contrast on the 1040 and 1030 was just never great to me, where the original 1000 was better. The 1050 seems to fix this, especially in dark viewing. I’d say the text is perfectly fine on 1040, but side by side, the 1050 is like putting on a pair of glasses to correct a slight blur. If I primarily did road biking in the day, I’d probably not pay for the upgrade just given the insane price. However, I mostly ride in the woods, often at dusk and I think the 1050 is a much better option for my needs. I don’t do ultra endurance. If I ever do, I’ll just take a power delivery pack since my lights run off them anyway. Oh, and the BELL is just insane. Now I can stop swapping an old bell between bikes.

Ok, here’s a photo I took. In this case, this is with the brightness level of the Edge 1050 & Karoo 3 at their lowest possible settings.

It looked fine in full auto mode too (which brought the Edge 1050 up slightly to like 10%), but the video/photo while riding didn’t come out super great (visually to my eyes it was great).

All they needed to do was add a MIC and let it take calls from my paired phone! At first I was like, 20 hours? That sucks. Then I looked at my riding time per week, and your estimates are dead on. I won’t need to charge it more than once every 2 weeks. I think your right, this probably is a better fit for the 90% of riders out there. I wonder how it would handle night rides. Can you dim it down enough not to be this bright beam blasting me in the face while on a trail?

Thanks for the review.

Agreed – the ability to make calls would be awesome. Play music, voice memos, access Siri/Google, etc.

I bet there’s some patent or other issues similar to how Garmin watches can’t text back on Apple phones. Probably some safety issues as well.

Eventually, I see the Edge just becoming a phone – or becoming obsolete since a phone can do everything that same. UCI regulations will probably prevent that from happening too soon, but eventually I think it’s inevitable.

Maybe we can use it as a headlight now 😎

I agree! All my rides end in the same way with my wife calling and shouting “You are late!!!”. Having the possibility to answer without stopping it would be great. And in this AI world maybe we could just use the mic by saying “Hey Garmin, please find a new excuse for my wife”

This is the best post. I need the Ai excuse generator for my wife!

Question about the bell! Can any SRAM groupset that’s compatible with wireless blips do this, or does it have to be the new RED groupset?

It should be any SRAM with Blips.

Will the new functions affect the 1040 battery duration? In the end the 1050 has a new hardware.

Remains to be seen.

Keep in mind that the Edge 1050’s larger battery is to drive that big screen, and much bigger processor.

You can tell you’re a big DCR fan when you watch a bike computer review and you aren’t into cycling or even own a bike!

do we know or can quantify how much better/faster the chipset is in this unit vs the 1040? 20% faster? 50%? a little? a lot?

also, regarding gradient, is garmin still getting it from the active gps connection, meaning if you stop pedaling or are going really slow during a climb the gradient is reduced to 0% even though you’re standing on a 19% grade in real life? hopefully this was fixed here as it is REALLY ANNOYING

I vaguely remember it being double the speed, from some meeting I had.

It’s a new dual-core processor, that much I wrote down. Gotta find the notes elsewhere.

I haven’t tried it without GPS for climbs, to see what it does. Unfortunately, I lack an easy climb nearby at the moment to trigger it well. Else, I’d go out and give it a whirl.

Unlikely to work without some way of measuring distance. Maybe it would work with no GPS and a speed sensor. They’re just doing change in elevation/change in horizontal distance. What they’ve probably changed is maybe how often they do the calculation and what kind of smoothing they use on the time series of grades. I’m looking forward to trying the new algorithm on my 1040 to see what it’s like, but it’s never been something I care much about.

749,99€ 🤔 I think I‘ll get me another bike instead 😁

Will the NFC payment stuff make it to 1040 too or is that one missing the hardware for it?

Thanks for the great review!

No, sadly requires hardware.

I’m totally with you on the bike bell being the best feature of this bike. It means that I will be able to remove that ugly bell from my road bike (or won’t have to yell “Bike” when riding my TT bike that has no bell at all).

I’m curious about the road surface feature. I know that Komoot is big on that and for every Komoot route you can always see of breakdown of road types and road surface types. Do you know if those will be supported?

P.S. Probably should consider finally retiring my 1030+. All those new features are just too nice to ignore.

Does the new GroupRide feature provide stats about other members of the group like power or heartrate? It would be really helpful for pacing my rides with my Significant Other :-)

Not that I see, unless it’s a specific award (like the one shown for my wife for W/KG).

Have a look at Groupetto. We just released a feature similar to GroupRides: RideTogether. And there is the option to send and receive LiveData from riders close to you. For iPhone 11 and newer.

I have both the 1040 and the K3. I didn’t know that the K3 has interactive data pages where you can swipe to get more/less data. How does that work? Where do you set it up? I’ve didn’t know is was there and never found it by accident.

It’s slightly different, but the same concept. It applies to:

A) Strava Live Segments (orange tab) B) Climbs (blue tab) C) Navigation (yellow tab)

You can have it all the way down, half-way up, and then all the way up.

how many data fields this time? is it the same as the 1040840/540?

you seem to have skipped over the most obvious and critical thing here – if i’m not mistaken this is touchscreen control only, no buttons? how usable is that in practice – accuracy when bumping along off road, use with full finger gloves and/or wet, ghost actions due to rain/sweat drops on the screen etc

It’s identical to how it’s been in the Edge 1040 (and others before it…).

There’s still a power button on the side, and still two buttons on the bottom front (start/stop, and lap). No changes here, and no issues in rain in my rides.

Thanks for the great review, do you know if they are planning on bringing out a 1050 Solar?

I’m confused. The feature chart in the What’s New section indicates that it is unlikely that gradient responsiveness will be added to the 540/840/1040.

However, in the GPS and Elevation Accuracy section, you write, “That’s an area that Garmin says they spent a lot of time on, with an entirely new algorithm for the Edge 1050 (also going back to the Edge 540/840/1040).”

I can see how my chart is confusing.

In short, it’s referring to the Edge Explorer 2 there. I’ll tweak the style/design.

At the moment all changes to devices are gradual and tinkering more than anything.

So my questions is, the next big step up for bike computers using AI to map the best routes without you even having to plot them, voice control etc ?

I see no reason at this stage to upgrade my Karoo2 for example. For most of us battery life at the levels is not an issue now.

I think we see the plotting and such happening more on the platform side than the bike computer side. At least at this point. And realistically, a lot of that is already happening with Strava/etc…

In some ways, there are really only so many viable bike routes. Humans are pretty good at mixing and matching routes together, especially for areas we know. And existing machine learning is pretty darn good at creating routes for areas we don’t know. Strava’s automatic routes have consistently been exceptionally good.

I see more potential in hazard, dangerous routes, avoidance/etc, but that’s less about AI, and more about companies like Strava and Garmin actually using the darn Varia radar data that’s sent in the files to them.

Are custom bell tones possible? I want to have Roadrunners “meep meep” :-D

Not yet, but that’d be amazeballs!

Maybe we’ll see some Connect IQ options for custom tones…

My wife will like this. She is content with my hand-me-downs and has been waiting for me to pass along my 1030+ to replace her (my old) 1000. The 1040 wasn’t worth it as an upgrade for me but this one definitely is, if only for the screen and bell.

Thanks, as always, for a great review. Two questions: One, do you think the edge remote can be configured to ring the bell? And, two, any chance you can now run Strava segments while running a RidewithGPS course as you can with Karoo?

Delighted that they apparently fixed the slow gradient changes. That has been driving me crazy on my 1040.

A) Edge Remote: Yes, it’s supposed to. I’m gonna dig one out tomorrow and do a quick post on it.

B) No for Strava Live Segments, only with Strava Routes.

thanks for this and always in-depth reviews!

The one aspect I found missing in the otherwise excellent YouTube review, was a “snappiness” comparison between the 1040 and 1050. I have a 1030, and snappy it is not ! So much so, that it really gets on my nerves, that it takes seconds (!) after a swipe for the data-screen to scroll, or for something to happen after a button is pushed. For me that would warrant an update. But 1040 (I like a giant battery life, like on my watch which I rarely need to charge (Epix2 Pro 51mm)). On the other hand, speedy CPU after a slow as molasses 1030 sounds really attractive. I don’t mind the screen, although OLED is pretty, the 1040’s is good enough for me. So with the 1040 getting a load of new features, without the fancy new 1050 processor sounds a bit risky. I don’t want to end up with a new 1040, that feels laggy, because too many features from the 1050 are ported to it. Thoughts ?

The Edge 1040 is pretty darn snappy to me. In my Karoo 3 review, I think I used that to show side-by-side with it, as a comparison.

I don’t see much of a difference in snappiness between Edge 1040 and 1050 in most areas. The Edge 1030 though, yeah, not so snappy.

One area where I feel my Edge 840 it’s not very snappy (or at least it takes some time to “load”) is when moving/zooming the map to check roads or places. End up checking my phone most of the times. Do you think the Edge 1050 is somewhat better in map discovering? Thanks for the review!

Thanks a lot for your answer !

Too bad that it won’t fit most of my k-Edge mounts. Maybe I’ll wait for the 850 or a new wahoo unit.

Fwiw, it fits the K-Edge XL just fine. It’s a tight squeeze, but does rotate in.

Will it still rotate if you put a case on the 1050? I do have the XL so that’s a slight relief.

I don’t have a case for it, but my guess is probably not. It barely just skirts in there, I don’t think it has a mm to spare.

Great review once again. I am curious, do you think this pothole reporting (or maybe only the resulting hazards on the map) will be available for the Fenix series through an update any time soon?

I haven’t asked yet, but I’d almost guess not. I’m not sure how well the UI would convert to the watch. Here it’s just a quick tap, versus on the watch it’d be messier while riding. :-/

Have you noticed any improvements on the structured workout data screen? I think it is surprising that no reviews talk about it, considering that most competitive cyclists use structured training nowadays.

On older Garmin devices, I’ve always been annoyed by this screen for several reasons: – Lack of customization of the data fields – Hard to see the progress in the workout and intervals are not colored based on power zone. – Some data fields are not very readable – Bad user experience when skipping or redoing a set of intervals (the device creates a lap for each skipped interval).

That’s why I switched to Bolt v2 when it was released. The UI and UX especially on this screen are night and day compared to Garmin.

The screen seems pretty much the same as the Edge 840/1040 screen.

I’m not sure which unit you’re coming from, but I compare the differences in the workout functionality here: link to dcrainmaker.com

It’s essentially the same as that.

How about road closed / construction. Always fun to be on a route to find the road closed and have to reroute that adds 10 miles to the plan

They considered that, and then the FirstBeat folks veto’d it, and decided it’s better for your training to simply do the extra 10 miles…

I noticed the brief mention of the Sram Red bonus buttons. Any word if these bonus buttons will work with existing Garmin Edge units such as the 1040, or will this be limited to the 1050? Thanks

They already do. :)

It was released in a firmware back 2-3 weeks ago.

Is it still compatible with the garmin charge bank?

Yes, same connector.

I no longer have a varia vision since the 1040 quit supporting it. If anybody still has one, and a 1050 – I’d greatly appreciate if you could see if Garmin kept the Vision in the supported sensors. I don’t see an option for it, but was hoping the ‘search all’ option might work.

With the higher contrast screen, Is the map easier to read and follow when navigating? I sometimes struggle to see my route on the 1040 which equates to taking wrong turns or taking my eyes off the road too long.

To me, it doesn’t seem any different in terms of map design readability. The styling is the same. It’s just that the brightness is better. But I’d still argue that Garmin’s map design isn’t as obvious/clear for complex road/route intersection situations.

I am actually a bit surprised by this one. If I compare the readability of my Epix to my Edge(530) the Epix is so much better/cleaner/easier to read. I kind of expected that the Edge 1050 would enable the jump to this cleaner mapping style.

Do you know why this is the case? Just map style choices that Garmin made or does the OLED enable an even nicer screen than the 1050 currently has?

Any feedback on timing to an Edge 850? Would like the screen with a smaller package as it is mainly for MTB. Thanks!

I’d expect a two-year release cycle for 540/840, so probably next April-ish again (they were announced last April 2023), and the Edge 1040 came out almost exactly two years ago as well.

Generally speaking, we see roughly 2-year cycles for Garmin Edge units (saving some COVID timeline wonkiness), 2-year cycles for Garmin Forerunner units, and roughly 14-18 month cycles for Garmin Fenix/Epix units. Garmin Venu is the only one that’s managed an annual-ish cycle.

So on a 2 year release schedule, the 1090 will be out in 2032 and have a 65 page feature list, and your review video will run 6.5 hours.

Garmin cycle should talk to Garmin avionics, I’d like color weather radar with dynamic rain fall minimization.

Any chance that the improved ClimbPro lag will roll down to older models, i.e. 1040?

Already there, the public beta’s released a few hours ago. :)

Incredible! Thanks

I feel like the last man on earth who prefers MIP displays sometimes. It really does get tiresome when every review implies that having yet another bright, eye grabbing phone screen on the wrist is an unmitigated good, because this will drive companies to stop making MIP displays and put those of us who prefer a healthy relationship with our electronics out in the cold.

Other than that its a great review with tremendous depth, as always.

Is there an option to control a Smart Trainer?

Yup, still there as before.

Hi, super dumb question: do you know where I can try Garmin device in Amsterdam? Bever only have fake sample devices

I’m not sure where the Edge 1050 is in stock yet (if anywhere).

But for all other Garmin devices, Cor Mantel usually has all of them on-hand: link to cormantel.nl

I know that Ride Out has Wahoo devices, but I don’t remember off-hand if they’ve got Garmin ones too.

Hands down the only feature I’m super excited about is the bell I can set up with my AXS shifters. I know it won’t come to my 840 but damn I wish it could.

Lots of great updates here, but damn that UI still looks like crap.

I wonder why they went with MTP.

MTP (as in the file transfer), or something else?

Yes, media transfer protocol (MTP). Apparently, Garmin uses it on some of its GPS devices (the “Tread”, apparently). But it’s a change for the Edges.

Yeah, they’ve been using it on the watches for a while now, a couple years I think.

I do prefer regular USB enumeration, but I suspect there’s some specific backend reason they went to MTP.

Writing programs to use MTP is harder.

MTP might keep people from reformatting the device.

So with the mounting location changing I am worried that the new 1050 won’t fit with the integrated mount built into my bar/stem comb (Cervelo Caledonia). Could you provide a measurement from the center of the new 1050 mount on the device to the end of the unit compared to the 1040? I know you said it barley fits in the kedge xl mount but would rather use the integrated mount that comes with my bike. This could be a huge issue for users that I am surprised there are no details on.

I did some measurements using the images from the garmin website as reference. The distance from the middle of the mounting interface to the bottom of the new 1050 should be roughly 63-64mm.

It’s a bit tricky to measure, because there isn’t a perfectly flat surface I can measure it against.

But both trying to eyeball it, and then cross-refrencing marks on paper, it appears about 61.1mm. The Edge 1040 looks roughly about 55.1mm

Thanks Ray,

When looking at the edge 1040 measuring this morning, if I look to put the 1040 in backwards (so measuring top of the device to center of mount) it is around 60-61mm. So about the same distance as the new 1050 when oriented properly (bottom to center of mount). Due to this if your mount will let you put in the 1040 backwards, then the 1050 should probably fit.

Thanks for the great tip! I did a test of my 1030 Plus backward and it worked in one of the Edge Max XL but not the other one. It turns out I have two versions of the Max XL, an earlier one (with two screws on the bottom) and the most recent one (with no screws on the bottom). The older XL is shorter and has a lump that interfered with the 1030 Plus backwards.

Just for reference my 1030 Plus backwards measures 62.5mm without a silicone cover and 64.5mm with a silicone cover.

One issue I found is that even if your 1030 Plus or 1040 test out fine backwards you may or may not have enough clearance to press the buttons. But since the 1050 button are angled maybe this won’t be an issue. Only time will tell. Also, I use a silicone cover on all of my GPS units because without it it’s hard to handle and easy to drop it. The silicone adds 2mm to the outer dimension. So ideally a longer mount is needed if one wants a cover and to make pressing buttons with ease.

Great review (as always)! Thanks! Does the Garmin use USB-C to charge?

First thing I asked myself when I saw this new computer. Zooming in on his photo, it does in fact look like a USB-C cable.

Yes, it does look like a double USB-C cable. Great, that’ll be one less cable I’ll have to carry around on road trips for my old 1030+. Thanks!

Yes, it’s usb-c

I currently own a 1040 solar and a spurcycle bell. Is this an upgrade?

The Spurcycle bells are the cherry on the sundae for any classy bike. I’m glad Garmin is putting the bell on their computer because I’m tired of getting buzzed on my morning commute by gram counters without one … but nothing beats analog.

any chance we can now assign different gear (bike) to an activity profile (without manually editing afterwards) ?

Please let this happen!!!

Will the Group Ride awards using CyclingDynamics data (like the “upstanding” award) work on any power meter reporting that data (i.e. Assioma), or has Garmin locked that to require their power meters?

A bike bell?!

I know technology is amazing but surely a €1 bike bell would do the same job for a lot less. And doesn’t have to come in black.

Do also wonder as these computers now start to look and perform more like smartphones, whether the differentiator becomes only the software.

I’ll go back in my box… (Self-confessed commuter cyclist).

Still nasty looking pages. Not very legible, wrong colors. Ugly font. The map layout and data layout are still nothing pleasing to the eye. Still no selection of more data fields. The layout still wins Hammerhead and Wahoo. I’m now waiting for a new one on Wahoo.

So the screen is actually an LCD? If it’s that brilliant why won’t they use it on their watches? I’d rather have that on my watch as it’s more durable and long lasting than AMOLED which is probably why they didn’t use the latter on a bike computer? What do you think?

Have Garmin taken advantage of the better screen to make any readability improvements especially on the maps? As someone with worsening near vision thats not bad enough yet to require prescription cycling glasses, its so frustrating that the navigation element on the 1040 does not allow you to make arrows, colour of upcoming track etc more distinct from the rest of the map.

Im sure Garmin doesnt have many middle aged men on their UI/programming team, otherwise this would have received attention looong time ago.

I completely agree with you . With an higher resolution screen , garmin should allow us to increase the infamous triangle and maybe the line contrast. I am now spending more money in sunglasses with prescription lenses than in bike gadgets 😂

Do you know anything about the battery size, as in mAh?

The one in the 1040 was slightly smaller than in 1030/1030+, exactly half way between Bolt and Roam. This one must be much bigger, obviously. The 1040 was (is, hopefully) absurdly heavy for the size of its battery which makes me wonder if the 1050 has finally brought Garmin into the reasonable range of “battery to total mass ratio”.

If they finally started to get by with less dead weight, I might retain some hope for the future edge that *I* would like to see: 1040 screen (or a slightly improved tech? As in 840?), side buttons (they can even fit them in tiny watches, can’t be that hard!) and a light battery that only gets the device into the ca 1050 runtime range (or even down to 1030 range, if it makes a difference which I doubt). That way the device would be so low weight that they could offer a successor to the “Charge” that sits *between* holder and Edge, so that it’s compatible with all mounts, raising the screen a little. Rationale: The original Charge had to be done “through the mount” because there’s no way the garmin quarter turn format could reliably hold the sum of a 1030-class device plus a charge-sized battery pack. But with 1040 generation efficiency and a low dead weight device with a (much) smaller battery, a meaningfully big “Charge 2” could easily fit into the mass budget the quarter turn can hold. Design outline: flat spring contacts instead of pogo pins, sitting between a fore and an aft flat cell (connected in parallel, obviously, parallel cells are happy cells), with again a slide lever mechanism for turn-less linkup to the edge. Much less awkward than the double “not-turning quarter-turn” of the original Charge, but it requires the device on top to be somewhat low weight or it will be a holder massacre (I guess we’ll see quite a bit of that already with the 1050?).

As for why-no-AMOLED speculation: my guess would be that a flagship edge just won’t see the numbers required for a custom production run and that available off the shelf suppliers don’t have any AMOLED in that exotic middle ground between phone-sized screen and watch-sized screen occupied by the big Edge. Or only AMOLED with so much DPI that the chip (designed to drive a watch-sized screen, no doubt) would be overwhelmed by the number of pixels. As I said, speculation, but sufficiently plausible to stop my brain going wtf about wy-no-AMOLED. Garmin surely has plenty of made-to-order watch screens (all those Vivomove!), but even their most exotic watches probably sell an order of magnitude more than their flagship Edge.

Hello Ray, Once again thanks for a great review. Any chance of seing the bell arring to the 1040?

Have a great day

He already answer no, it is a hardware feature ,1040 has no speaker. Maybe someone could come up with a IQ app that triggers the 1040 beeper…but it will never be as loud and the 1050 real speaker

Could you please ask if Garmin Share[1] will be backported to the 530, 830 and 1030? The missing autonomous Device-To-Device Transfer is the reason why I switched from the 840 back to the 530. I couldn’t transfer routes via Bluetooth and everyone uses a device from the 30 series. Reading through the manual [1] indicates the need of a six digit code to be entered and I’m afraid the 30 series cannot handle that currently.

[1] link to www8.garmin.com

Aside from Device-To-Device Transfer[1] I couldn’t used the new GroupRide[2] once with the newer 840. As everyone uses a 530, 830 or 1030 we can only use rely on the more complicated but similar GroupTrack[3]. I’m afraid Garmin underestimates the importance of backward compatibility, they miss to use the broad availability of the user-base. It makes more sense to buy a new 50 or 40 series device if it can interact well with the existing ones from the 30 or even 20 series.

Anyway GroupRide lacks the autonomous transfer of routes which Device-To-Device-Transfer provides. Usually you need it seldom but then you need it desperately. The group splits for different routes, the weather becomes bad and especially in the mountains the cell coverage isn’t guaranteed. Aside from people which tentatively don’t use Garmin Connect because they prefer to keep their personal data locally. But I’ve admit it is also complicated and the requirements list is long: 1. Cell Coverage with Internet connection 2. Abroad: Roaming 3. Modern Smartphone from Google or Apple 4. Garmin Connect Account 5. Garmin Connect App 6. Garmin Connect Servers available (and we all know that they could fail shortly and did for weeks in 2020).

We’re here usually all have it available. In practive I had in the group: “My “ride smartphone” doesn’t have the Garmin Connect App installed” -> LOL “I only use a feature phone. Lasts a week and no worries about updates” OKAY “My phone battery is empty” WELP “The app doesn’t sync because” -> CRY “I cannot send you the GPX because this is a 840” -> That was me :(

That being said also Device-To-Device Transfer sometimes fails. I suspect that some people never update the software. And it would be helpful if the progress indicator displays value between 0 and 100. Because I’ve seen only these numbers 0 and 100 after some time.

[1] link to www8.garmin.com [2] link to www8.garmin.com [3] link to www8.garmin.com

No plans to backport to Edge x30 series.

Oh :( Thany you!

So I will keep using the 530 for indefinite time.

I have 1030+ and since grouptrack will be not backported, I will not upgrade – I could use it with the old computer, not going to but two…. Anyway, NFC is totally useless as I am always riding with my phone, so there is absolutely nothing that can justify the price. Will wait for 1060 then :D

Probably you mean GroupRide but I understand :)

GroupRide seems a lot easier to use than a GroupTrack which requires setting up LiveTrack, GroupTrack below (hidden behind the three something menu), add all Garmin Connections, share a track upfront and cross your fingers.

is it possible to get rid of background photo of activity? i don’t understand such wasting display space with useless graphic

thanks for the review!

Is the back of the unit still metal like the 1040, or did they switch back to some plastic-ish solution (which was so prone to breaking while inserted in the bike mount)?

The mount is now removable/replaceable. :)

It’s hard to tell if it’s metal or plastic, tapping it sounds slightly more plastic than the other Edge 1040 mount.

Picture attached… Edge 1050 in foreground.

Hello from 1030’s owner. Do we still have that annoying restriction of max 100 Strava Live Segments on device?

As far as I know.

Do you use the original rubber bands from Garmin? Are they now providing longer ones?

The rubber bands are actually my preferred solution but they’re too short for aero handlebars and also some round handlebars. I struggle to remember anyone using the included Garmin front mount[1] which doesn’t fit most modern handlebars (either aero or round with different diameter). Luckily most aero handlebars come with a specific mount or have two aligned screws underneath.

[1] link to garmin.com

The vast majority of my riding with it, was just using the rubber band.

No need for longer ones, since it’s still going around the same parts as before.

Thanks. Seems my handlebar is wider.

some thoughts on display vs. battery/weight – too bad they couldn’t stick to MIP. I would have hope for some technical progress to increase resolution and vividness. – the penalty on weight is massive. This brick cannot be used on some mounts which are more fragile (e.g. when a mount is part of a between-the-arms hydration solution) – I am wondering how the success of the 840 will look like. Screen is smaller, but so is battery. I really don’t want to go back to e.g. 15h runtime.

Long story short: I know the market demands are different, but i would have preferred a hypothetical MIP screen with higher resolution and let’s say 90% of the vividness of the 1050.

Great review. I am still not sure if I will upgrade from my 1040

The bell is nice, but the light they know how to put on the watch would be better.

More questions, to Ray or others who have the device:

Audio has been revamped (speaker, bell): do we finally get an option to silence some audio cues but not all? Yes, I’m looking at you, Virtual Partner, but also at your partner in crime, the Strava live segment fanfare. Seven years and counting of being a Strava subscriber and carefully avoiding the live segment feature because the sounds are so annoying and I don’t want so silence them all because I do want to hear nav prompts.

Dimensions: the Garmin product comparison claims 16.3 mm thickness for the 1050 vs 20.0mm for the 1040. Safe to assume that the 1050 is quarter turn excluded, perhaps even the bump the quarter turn sits on. Garmin has been doing the same thing with watches occasionally, claiming thickness without OHR. How much fatter than the 1040 is the 1050 in reality?

Hey Ray, one of the killer features for me on the Karoo is the ability to mute radar easily. Is it possible to mute radar on the 1050 and is it as easy to to while riding like it is on the Karoo? Maybe a IQ app is available?

Sucks to live in Sweden after looking at this review and realizing that it’s another $100 here 😱😭

$250 more here in NZ.

How loud is the bike alarm with the speaker?

Hi Ray, Just curious if you have an Edge Remote? If so, can you confirm that it stays connected, rather than giving red blinking lights half the time? I have a remote working fine with an Edge 1040 and after multiple resets, I can’t get it to work consistently with a 1050. (1/4 to 1/2 the time it just blinks red). This was a very long-term issue on the 1030 and 1040 that was fixed after a LONG time via update on the Edge. I was hoping if you replicate, that Garmin take your input a bit more serious if it gets reported to them.

I’d love to be able to program that bell. For example, on some long mountain bike downhills where the twisty terrain and fast speeds create a hazard for hikers, I could program it to ding every 2-5 seconds. That would be cool.

This bell is awesome, once it’s down to 850 I am pulling the trigger I suppose. Does anyone know if it’s possible to get a 3rd party button to trigger such a feature over ant+ or BT? I have 105 di2 so it does not come with buttons.

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