GarminInstinct 2X Solar - Tactical Edition, Rugged GPS Smartwatch, Built-in Flashlight, Ballistics Calculator, Solar Charging Capability, Coyote Tan

Husband loves it. Battery never dies and the solar works great and it feels great, on the wrist, like a regular watch. Doesn't get in the way though, even though it's a little bigger than other Garmin watches. He also wears it in the shower and at work where it fell in water, didn't do anything to it, not a scratch or water damage in sight. The fitness tracker is optimal because it switches on by itself, like you don't have to put it in workout mode.

Battery life is endless. Fitness tracker could be better as it doesn’t count accurate steps. The brightness is adjustable so that’s a plus.

I wanted an offline training/sleep tracker. This works well for both. The GNSS functionality is as good as you could expect for anything without a real antenna.I thought the flashlight was a silly gimmick, but ended up using it multiple times every day, despite having a real light on me all the time. If I had to replace the watch, I would still pay more for the tactical variant because of the light alone.The strap material has never irritated my skin.Battery life has been excellent and I'm curious how much it'll improve now that it's Spring.I use this completely offline, so I have never installed the Garmin app.I've run it alongside the fitbit charge 5 for extended periods (days) and the HR numbers have parity.

Bought this to start training for some hiking trips. The battery life has been great and with the solar charging I can go weeks without having to recharge.

Easy to use

In the past few years, I've had Samsung Galaxy watches as my daily wearable. Purchased the Watch6 Classic on release day, August 2023, as I was looking forward to more Google Home integrations. Sadly it still did not live up to my expectations.Fast forward to November 2024 where I started looking into alternatives. I didn't want to break the bank with some of the Garmin options out there and the Garmin Instinct Solar 2X Tactical felt like it would be the right fit for me. After watching walk-through videos on YouTube and reading additional online articles, I decided to checkout. Yea, I would be giving up a color display, rotating bezel and other small features, but what I really wanted was longer battery life while still receiving notifications from my day-to-day apps.This watch has convinced me to never look back. Going from having to charge my Watch6 every night to a month on a single charge is game changing for me. Not only does it have great features, but the watch in Coyote Tan looks so good. I'll most likely have this watch for a while as it did not disappoint!

I have had an Apple Watch Series 7 along with a few other Apple watches in the past and wanted something that I didn't have to remember charging but that still had a decent amount of technology and activity tracking. I chose to go with the 2x Solar tactical due to solar recharging, the coyote color, and green torch light. I have had the watch on for a week and even with heavy usage (going through and setting all the features up, playing with the torch, etc.) I still have 13 days of battery life today. I would have more, but I work a facility without much light and it's winter so I'm not outside a lot. The torch is extremely handy, I have already used it at least 5 or six times now. All of the health features are amazing, and it is very rugged in design without being too big. I will never go to another smart watch, this is the best one I've ever had by far.

I have been using this watch for over a week. Overall, I am very happy with the product -- as expected, good Garmin quality and most of the functions work well (I have not checked the accuracy of the stats it collects, though). The main reasons I am giving it a 4 instead of a 5 are as follows:1. Bate-and-switch Applied Ballistics. This is one of the main reasons I bought this watch, but then I discovered in order to get this function, I need to purchase an additional App license -- basic function costs $100 and advanced $300! This is really annoying. It seems that the calculations are done on the App not the watch. I almost returned the watch just for this issue, but decided to keep as other features work ok.2. The manual can use a lot of improvement. There is no quick reference guide. If they just wrote a quick reference that documents the principles of button controls, I would have figured out the working of the watch much faster.3. Customizing some functions could be more user-friendly. I created a custom Activity to track Canine Training (my business). I had to call customer support to figure out some features (and I am very technically savvy). The good news is that I was able to reach a good customer support rep.!Once I test the accuracy of their stats such as steps, distance, etc., I may update this review. So far, I recommend this watch!