The refurbished product arrived in good shape. Not 100{60f78fc10f9d225dae0ba0255c415eaf093f5a3220b43cdf3df82aaf7b5f9e5d} perfect like a new product as the plastic housing had some very small wear marks on it, but that comes with the territory. The glass was unscratched. And the watch looked good- I’ve put more wear onto it in a week of use as I have been doing home improvement.

This watch does what I wanted it to do: it tracks my running distance, pace, elevation, and cadence as well as giving me notifications from my phone. And it does all of this well. In the week that I’ve worn it, I’ve ran a 5k and the distance was accurate within +/- 0.01 miles. I also ran twice- a 3 mile run and 4 1/2 mile sprints.

The battery life has been good. One week and 3 runs later I was down to 30{60f78fc10f9d225dae0ba0255c415eaf093f5a3220b43cdf3df82aaf7b5f9e5d} this morning. I recharged it for 45 minutes while I got ready for work and it hit 70{60f78fc10f9d225dae0ba0255c415eaf093f5a3220b43cdf3df82aaf7b5f9e5d} charge. So it’ll need another charging session tomorrow morning.

The size is great- I have small wrists but it doesn’t look gaudy like many smart watches do. It’s thin profile goes under dress shirt cuffs well. It looks really good.

The one thing I wish it did was interval training for runs. It doesn’t have that functionality built in. But there are some applications that are approaching something close to this- some gym applications allow you to do HIT and keep your pace going. Recording the data, though, is not there. If it did interval running the watch would be perfect.

I use this with an Apple Iphone 6. I have it sync up my runs to Endomondo to share with my friends, which it does automatically. And I have worn in for a week straight: in the shower, giving my kid a bath, in the rain. In the dust and dirt of my basement. And it’s durable so cosmetically it’s still in great shape. And it’s definitely water proof.

It’s no apple watch- the display isn’t bright and high definition. It doesn’t do gestures or NFC payments. It’s a watch that tracks your runs very well, gives you notifications from your phone. gives you the time whenever you look at it (the display is always on), and you only have to worry about charging it once a week. It looks like a normal watch and wears like one. That’s pretty good stuff to me- it adds to my life without being cumbersome or bothersome.

edit: BE SURE TO UPDATE THE FIRMWARE WHEN YOU FIRST GET THE WATCH. This should fix sync issues with your phone.

I am loving this watch. Had it for a few days now. Took it with me for a couple of runs and everything seems to be fine. Like the notifications feature; very handy during long runs.

First time buying a re-certified product. Had all the components as in a new box, minus the fancy box. So far so good. Comes with a 1 year limited warranty from Garmin.

If you use a Dexcom or Medtronic continuous glucose monitoring system, I would wholeheartedly recommend Vivoactive because you can get a Nightscout App to see your blood sugar on your watch, have all the benefits of proven technology of a strap type heart rate monitor (HRM), and you have an activity tracker in the same device. Pebble or Apple watches can display your blood sugar too, but they do not even come close to what Garmin has built in for HRM and activity tracking. If you are not familiar with Nightscout, just Google it and you will be amazed at the volunteer resources that have banded together to make this happen. Include the developer name Phimby to find the Garmin watch app. It’s a pain to set up, but well worth it.

I gravitated toward the Vivoactive because I did not want another device to charge. Vivoactive claims up to a three week charge, but I just throw it on the charger only during morning coffee and it keeps up with the day’s usage just fine.

I have learned that very brisk walking for just 20 minutes can instantly drop my blood sugar by 40 mg/dl. If I waited for a meal time bolus of insulin to kick in, that same 40 mg/dl drop wouldn’t happen for at least an hour, and by then, the food impact would be a 90 mg/dl increase.

Brisk walking is now an important part of my management of Type 1 Diabetes. My A1C is in the 6.5 to 7.0 range. I have dropped my BMI from 32 to 23 by walking within the past 18 months. I average 15,000 steps per day. I log food with MyFitnessPal which is integrated into the Garmin Connect App. I see that I eat about 150 carbs every day, and I get support from other T1D’s at MyFitnessPal. The Garmin Connect App will throw you into a step challenge with people at your activity level if you ask it to. The Garmin challenges have helped me stay motivated to keep moving.

By the way, If you read my Vivofit review, you will see that there is a problem with not counting steps as your walking speed gets under 15 minutes per mile. Vivoactive does not have this problem.

As far as refurbished Vivoactive vs new. No big deal. Get a refirb and save yourself 0.