Forerunner 170: Garmin exits sub-£200/$240 market, gives full physio metrics stack, drops MIP displays, adds FR70 base model.

Garmin announced the Forerunner 170 at £259.99 / $299.99 on Tuesday, with a new £219.99 / $249.99 Forerunner 70 alongside it. The FR70 replaces the FR55 and brings AMOLED and the full physio stack to Garmin’s entry tier for the first time.

There are a few interesting stories here, somewhat surprising for a low-end model launch.

• Sub-£200/$250 Garmin running watches end here. The new floor is £219.99 / $249.99, with prices rising across the line.
• MIP is dead in the Forerunner line. Every 2026 Forerunner is AMOLED.
• The full physio stack now starts at £219.99 / $249.99. Training Readiness, HRV Status, Training Load and Trail VO2max all ship on the cheapest watch.
• The optical HR sensor looks like Elevate 4, the same generation as the FR165. No ECG, no skin temperature.

Clearly, Garmin is betting here on its ecosystem and software depth against Coros and Amazfit, a great move. Coros and Amazfit retain the multi-band GPS edge with low-end models at sub-£200 / sub-$240, keeping the accuracy headline on their side.

On sale 15 May

Three watches go on sale on 15 May with a total of 10 SKUs if you include all the colourways. The Forerunner 70 in four colours at £219.99 / $249.99. The standard Forerunner 170 in two colours at £259.99 / $299.99. The Forerunner 170 Music in four colours at £299.99 / $349.99.

Verdict: Garmin’s Forerrunner range contineus to confuse customers. Apple woudl sell one model at this price point.

Prices rise across the line

Garmin has lifted pricing at every tier. $50 for each step.

The price shift fits the margin commentary Cliff Pemble offered on the Q1 2026 earnings call. Garmin is willing to cede the bottom of the market to Coros, Amazfit and the rest (predicted here several years ago and more recently as a pincer movement working against Garmin) and is repositioning the Forerunner range as a premium-feature-at-an-affordable-price brand rather than a low-cost-of-entry brand. The gap below £200 / $240 is now open.

Verdict: Sensible. Garmin must be nervous ceding the low end to the competition. That was always inevitable, but of course it can keep selling older models and discounting newer ones as it sees fit. At least for now.

AMOLED everywhere

MIP has left the Forerunner consumer line.

Every 2026 Forerunner uses an AMOLED display. MIP survives only on the Enduro and Instinct platforms, where battery life and outdoor visibility take precedence over screen quality. For most buyers in 2026, MIP is no longer part of the Garmin running watch decision. AMOLED is the only choice.

Verdict: Again, sensible. The vast majority of watch buyers want a pretty screen.

Optical HR sensor: looks like Elevate 4

The optical heart rate sensor on the back of all three new watches looks like Elevate 4, the same generation as the Forerunner 165 it replaces. Garmin has not specified the sensor generation in its launch materials.

It also means no ECG and no skin temperature on either watch. Both features require Elevate 5 hardware. They are not on the table for the FR70 or FR170 lineup.

The full physio stack at £219.99 / $249.99

The bigger surprise sits on the software side.

The Forerunner 70 carries the same physiology and running training intelligence as the £299.99 / $349.99 Forerunner 170 Music above it. Training Readiness, Training Status, HRV Status, Training Load, Training Load Focus, Trail VO2 Max, Anaerobic Training Effect, Physio TrueUp, Unified Training Status, Improved Recovery Time and the adaptive Garmin Running Coach all appear on the FR70 spec sheet. So do wrist-based Running Power, PacePro, Quick Workout, Grade-adjusted pace and the Course- and weather-specific race predictor.

Phew. That is a significant package of physio features. Probably all most people will ever need.

The FR70 stops short of the adaptive Garmin Cycling Coach, which is reserved for the FR170 and above. For a runner, this is irrelevant. For a cyclist who wanted Garmin’s adaptive plans on the bike, it is the line in the sand with an obvious place to jump to.

The headline metrics were previously a more definite dividing line between the entry-level Forerunner and the FR255 or FR265. That dividing line has now moved up to the FR255 and FR265 themselves, which retain multi-band GPS (dual frequency) as their differentiator but no longer monopolise the training brain.

What the FR170 adds over the FR70

The step up to the standard FR170 buys five things. All of them will be useful to someone, but I doubt many would feel the need for the full package.

1. Trail Runner. A barometric altimeter, and with it real-time elevation, vertical speed, total ascent and descent, and floors climbed. The FR70 estimates elevation from GPS only.
2. 24/7 Smart Watch. Garmin Pay contactless payments. Useful for water, coffee or transit on long runs without a phone.
3. Niche Swimmer. Open water swim metrics. The FR70 is pool only.
4. Keen cyclist. Power meter compatibility with Vector, Rally and generic ANT+ power meters, plus the adaptive Garmin Cycling Coach and smart trainer control. The FR70 supports speed and cadence sensors and Varia, but it cannot use a power meter.
5. Niche occasional navigator. Compass and gyroscope hardware, useful for navigation and motion-aware features but still short of a decent map.

Some of these omissions from the FR70 seem superficial and artificial in equal measure. It is simply Garmin getting the potential buyer to think “Which Garmin?” rather than “Which watch?”. A good commercial move, but a mildly annoying one from the customer-end.

What the FR170 Music adds over the FR170

The next step up buys music storage with Spotify, Amazon Music and Deezer, plus Wi-Fi.

Wi-Fi matters. It is the single biggest functional difference beyond music itself, because activity uploads, software updates and music sync all run qickly without a phone present.

Music is one of those features that people either absolutely must have or do not care about at all. Binary.

The Music variant also picks up the Meditation app and Spoken Watch Face, which the standard FR170 does not list, and adds Teal Green and Red Pink to the colour options. Memory remains at 4 GB shared with the operating system and apps. Usable music storage on the FR170 Music could be tight, again prompting the buyer to think about the next model up.

GPS battery while streaming music drops from 20 hours to roughly 7.5 hours in GPS-only mode and 6.5 hours in all-systems mode. For most runners, this does not matter. For ultra-distance runners, it removes music as an option above a half-day effort. In absolute terms the 7.5 hour battery life with music is in the normal range.

What is still missing

None of the three watches has multi-band GPS (dual frequency). None has maps. None has an LED flashlight. ECG and skin temperature are absent, since the optical sensor appears to be Elevate 4 rather than Elevate 5. The Forerunner 265 and Forerunner 570 add multi-band GPS. The Forerunner 970 and Forerunner 570 carry Elevate 5. Full topographic maps require the top-end Forerunner 970.

The phrase “needing” is somewhat of an overstatement, as none of those features are truly needed, and there lies the rub. The FR170 has all the features to be more than competent. Will FR170 pull buyers down from an otherwise more expensive Garmin purcahse or tempt new ones intot he Garmin ecosystem at a decent price.

Verdict

The Forerunner 70 is the most interesting watch of the three. For £219.99 / $249.99 you get the full Garmin physio stack in an AMOLED case with a 13-day smartwatch battery. Buyers who do not pay from their wrist, do not swim open water, and do not use a power meter will get the same coaching intelligence as buyers spending £299.99 / $349.99. This is a great move by Garmin, as the physiology metrics are increasingly sought after and must be a win at the entry level, where previously its cheapest Forerunner felt like the poor man of the bunch.

The standard Forerunner 170 is for runners who also cycle with a power meter, or who want accurate elevation on hilly runs. It is the most rounded watch in the lineup. That is great for the core running offer, with some interesting options that will appeal to many…at least on paper.

The Forerunner 170 Music is for runners who run with music phone-free, or who value Wi-Fi sync. With Garmin offering one of the best sets of streaming music compatibility on the market, this watch becomes a powerful competitor for the music-loving runner. The Meditation and Spoken Watch Face additions are  merely a novel bonus.

Garmin has chosen software depth over headline specs to defend the segment. I have hardly mentioned here Garmin’s excellent ecosystem and the running training features it includes. The overall ecosystem capability dwarfs that of the competition.

Coros and Amazfit now have a cleaner field to play on in the price war below £200 / $240, and Coros retains multi-band GPS at this price. The coaching brain is Garmin’s bet on success. It will hold runners already inside the ecosystem. It is a harder sell to a first-time buyer comparing the FR70 against the Coros Pace 3 at $229 with multi-band GPS, but that is only because many of the headline comparisons you see are spec comparisons. The true comparisons that look at the ecosystem capabilities will easily rank Garmin above Coros. You just do not see many of those in the reviews.

Does the Forerunner 70 have Training Readiness?

Yes. The Forerunner 70 carries the full Garmin physio stack, including Training Readiness, HRV Status, Training Load, Trail VO2 Max and the adaptive Garmin Running Coach. These were previously reserved for the Forerunner 570 tier and above.

What optical heart rate sensor do the Forerunner 70 and 170 use?

The optical heart rate sensor on the back of the watches looks like Elevate 4, the same generation as the Forerunner 165 it replaces. Garmin has not officially specified the sensor generation. This means no ECG and no skin temperature tracking.

Does the Forerunner 170 have multi-band GPS?

No. The Forerunner 70, Forerunner 170 and Forerunner 170 Music all use single-frequency GPS, GLONASS and Galileo. Multi-band GPS sits on the Forerunner 265, Forerunner 570 and Forerunner 970.

Last Updated on 12 May 2026 by the5krunner