Garmin presents Forerunner GPS watch with music storage

Garmin has announced a new GPS watch in the form of the Forerunner 645 Music at the CES trade show in Las Vegas. It is the manufacturer’s first watch to have onboard music storage, in this case for up to five hundred songs.

Garmin does not state exactly how much storage is on the watch, but according to Ars Technica it comes down to 3.5GB. It is possible to store offline playlists of different services on the device, for example via Deezer. The watch measures 42.5×42.5×13.5mm, weighs just over 42 grams and features a 1.2″ color screen with a resolution of 240×240 pixels. The battery should last up to five hours when the GPS function is used. If the watch is only used as a smartwatch, the battery life is up to seven days, according to Garmin.

There are several sensors on board, such as for GPS and Glonass, and a heart rate monitor, altimeter, compass, gyroscope, accelerometer and thermometer. The watch is able to establish a Bluetooth connection, for example with wireless earphones or an Android or iOS phone. Garmin Pay is also available, but there are no banks in the Benelux that support this service, according to an online overview.

Linked to a phone, the device can show notifications and a user can, for example, respond to messages or control music. Furthermore, the Forerunner 645 Music is able to store two hundred hours of performance data and various tools are on board to measure performance for various activities. The watch is suitable for swimming with a rating up to 5 ATM. The glass is Gorilla Glass 3.

The watch will be available in the first quarter of this year and costs 449.99 euros. The Forerunner 645 is also available without music storage and costs 50 euros less in that case.