Enhance Your Performance with a GPS Watch
Whether your destination is a fitness goal or a grocery store, it's easy to get where you're going with a GPS watch. Made to suit an active lifestyle, GPS watches track your activity and location, giving you precise feedback on your daily performance. GPS smartwatches are designed to help you tackle your next milestone—no matter what it is.
What is a GPS Watch?
GPS watches are used to track your route while engaging in outdoor life. They provide customized insights about your exercise routines, adjusting for factors like distance and elevation as you go.
Most GPS watches connect to your smartphone or similar device using Bluetooth, helping you to stay connected while focusing on the task at hand. They encourage you to connect with your peers on similar fitness journeys, and draw conclusions from your personally-generated data to help you optimize your workout. Plus, with convenient touch screens, you can get the most out of your daily run with a GPS running watch that lets you queue up the perfect soundtrack for your best time yet.
Bluetooth and Wireless Connectivity
Many GPS watch models are Bluetooth capable, allowing you to stay connected to your smartphone while remaining focused on the task at hand. Bluetooth technology makes it easy to share your post-workout data on popular websites and social media, and connects you to a community of like-minded fitness enthusiasts.
Convenient Apps
Applications with pre-loaded maps make it easier to navigate where you're headed and keep track of where you've already been. Heart rate monitor and altimeter apps allow you to take fitness activities like hiking, biking, jogging, skiing, and walking to an entirely new level.
Take Your Music on the Go
Most of the latest models of GPS watches come equipped with 2 to 3 GB of on-board music storage – that’s enough space to hold hundreds of your favourite motivational workout songs. Some models feature an easy-to-use touchscreen, making it easy to quickly find the power song that’ll help you get through that last rep, lap, or kilometre.
How Do GPS Watches Work?
Through a process called triangulation, GPS watches use a network of satellites that circle the earth in precisely tracked and synchronized orbits. At any given time, the GPS receiver detects a minimum of three satellites to measure latitude and longitude, and four satellites to add in altitude. A GPS watch with full capabilities can calculate your latitude, longitude, speed, and altitude down to the last few metres, removing the need for the accelerometer usually seen in fitness trackers.
Wearable GPS smartwatches combines this information with map data to help you stay at your ideal level of workout intensity. They use features like heart rate monitoring to let you know when to slow down, and when to push a little harder. They can even use your heart rate and distance travelled to create a more accurate calorie counter, so you know exactly how much you're getting out of every workout.
What are some different usage situations?
Whether you're into running, jogging, hiking, or swimming, you can conveniently track your distance, speed, and calories burned with a GPS sports watch. Some specialized models feature thousands of pre-loaded golf courses, making them the perfect golf watch for enthusiasts: not only can they give you feedback on how to improve your swing, but they can guide you through the green to optimize your game.
Others GPS smartwatches track factors outside of workout activity, using their heart rate monitor to measure your recovery time or the quality of your sleep. Multisport GPS watches may include a compass and thermometer for a richer experience, and watches engineered for mountain running measure critical data such as vertical speed and altitude.
GPS watches come in different colours, shapes, and sizes—so that you can change up your style to match wherever you are in your fitness journey.
Differences between GPS Watches and Fitness Trackers
Also called activity trackers, fitness trackers are similar to GPS watches, except instead of a GPS receiver, fitness trackers use an accelerometer to measure motion performance in real-time. In addition to tracking steps taken, a fitness tracker also counts calories burned, workout duration, sleep quality, and heart rate. Most activity trackers are smart enough to automatically recognize when you’re exercising and tracks your performance accordingly.