Tech

Review: Garmin Edge 820

Words and images by Iwan Kemp

· By Bike Hub Features · 0 comments

Garmin launched their Edge 820 GPS bike computer a little over a year ago to bolster their Edge range of cycling devices.

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The Edge 820 rolled out of the gate with several new features including some previously only found on its bigger brother, the Edge 1000. All of this in a compact size and controlled by a touch screen.

Highlight Features

  • Lightweight and compact with 2.3-inch high-resolution, capacitive touch display
  • GroupTrack feature keeps tabs on everyone in your riding pack
  • Advanced performance monitoring includes VO2 max, recovery advisor, Strava live segments, FTP, performance condition and advanced cycling dynamics
  • Built-in incident detection included; compatible with cycling awareness accessories such as Varia Vision, Varia smart bike lights and rear view radar
  • Bike-specific navigation preloaded with Garmin Cycle Map for turn-by-turn navigation

Edge 820 Device Only

  • Edge 820
  • Mounts (standard on bar and extended out-front)
  • USB cable
  • Tether
  • Manuals

The Bundle retails for R 8,899.00 and includes:

  • Premium heart rate monitor
  • Cadence sensor
  • Speed sensor

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Battery Life

Battery life is quoted as 15 hours. This can only be achieved by using all of the many battery saving functions turned on, which include:

  • Turning on Battery Save Mode
  • Decreasing the backlight brightness or shortening the backlight timeout
  • Selecting the smart recording interval which records key points (e.g. where you change direction, speed, or heart rate). For comparison, the 1 Second option records points every second. It creates a very detailed record of your activity and increases the size of the stored activity file.
  • Turn on the Auto Sleep feature
  • Turn off the Bluetooth wireless feature
  • Select the GPS only setting. Using GPS+GLONASS reduces battery life quicker than using only GPS.

Conservative use should get you 8-10 hours of battery life with heavy use including navigation will see that drop to 4-5 hours. Fortunately, when the battery runs low, the 820 will automatically switch to power saving mode which will turn off the display, but at least continue recording data.

Connect IQ Store

For those not familiar with Garmin, the Connect IQ is their online store where you can download apps and widgets to customise your Garmin device. Everything is free and one can find anything from a GU Fuel Reminder to a widget that will tell you how much daylight is left or a Training Peaks app that syncs your training plan with your device.

Quite a few apps/ widgets simply stylise the available information into a graph or colored data field, but this can help to get the most vital information across, especially when all you have time for is a quick glance at the screen.

Getting Started

On the Bike

The Garmin Edge 820 bundle comes with Garmin’s magnetless speed and cadence sensors as well as their premium heart rate monitor strap. These need to be fitted before your first ride but is thankfully an easy task that will only take a minute or two.

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Before you head off on your first ride these and/or other smart devices (like a Quarq power meter in my case) must be paired with the head unit. This is a relatively easy and quick task as the Edge 820 does well to identify any devices within range. Once paired, you won’t have to do it again and I’m happy to report it works exactly as advertised. Once set up, it really is a case of switching the head unit on, selecting your ride or training mode, and heading off into the distance.

There is the same level of ease and convenience transferring data after your ride. The Edge 820 can be configured to automatically uploads to Garmin Connect and other cloud services when your head unit connects to your phone or WiFi network. Looking back at recorded activities, it was great to see that the Edge 820 does a remarkably solid job of staying connected and recording all data received from the sensors.

The device includes accident detection which sends out an alert to a preset contact when it detects that you have had a crash. The Edge 820 uses information from accelerometers and GPS to determine whether there has been an incident. Once activated, it gives you a 30-second timer to cancel the warning before sending a message out in order for you to avoid falls alarms and moments of panic at home.

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Another nifty feature is Group Track which allows you and shared contacts to follow, and potentially join, rides by tracking them real time as they or you ride along. For it to work, your friends need to have a LiveTrack-compatible Edge computer (Edge 520, Edge 820 Edge 1000) paired to their smartphone with the Garmin Connect app on, paired and running LiveTrack.

If you’re that way inclined, you can choose to see incoming texts and calls notifications on the screen during a ride, but I had this switched off from day one. Post ride information includes Recovery Advisor, Stress Score, personal records, and information on your VO2 Max and FTP.

If you’re that way inclined, you can choose to see incoming texts and calls notifications on the screen during a ride, but I had this switched off from day one. Post ride information includes Recovery Advisor, Stress Score, personal records, and information on your VO2 Max and FTP.

The biggest letdown is the touchscreen. I’ve found the screen large enough and easy to read in all conditions, but the touch side of it is not what one would expect. Regardless of whether it is wet or dry, you have gloves on or not, it is just simply not responsive enough and very inconsistent, working sometimes while at other times it takes several swipes or pushes to get the screen to respond. This is quite frustrating and distracting when trying to to get to another screen mid-ride.

Strava

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The Edge 820 is Strava Live Segments enabled. It involves an initial setup process which includes starring segments on your planned ride or by working your way through previous workouts on Strava and starring the segments that you are keen to tackle or keep an eye on.

I used this feature to track progress (and maybe feed the competitive monkey on my shoulder) and add instant goals, but found it frustrating that once a segment has started the device automatically flips to a Segment screen. In the run up to this, there is a time/distance countdown until the start of the segment which gives you time to get your head in the game. I quite like those, but would prefer for them to be overlaid at the bottom of my current data screen and not take me to a new screen that I have no real interest in keeping an eye on – especially on longer segments or on rides where PB’s are at the very back of my mind.

Adding to the annoyance is the fact that the screen can be quite frustrating when trying to swipe back to my “default” data screen.

Other than that, the feature works great and as long as you can stay focused during a structured training ride, having segment notifications to aim for is a nice to have in my books.

Navigation

The Edge 820 offers several options to start from to make things a little bit easier. Courses, Addresses, Search Tools (POI’s, Cities, etc) Saved Locations, and Recent Finds. Using a device for routing is something I hardly ever use, so I found it easiest to plot a route on Garmin Connect and copying it over rather than doing things from scratch on the unit itself – partly due to the somewhat frustrating touch screen.

Navigation was spot on in terms of directions, but I did find the prompts to be on the slow side, as I’d quite often pass a road I was meant to turn into as the GPS still showed 10 meters to go. In suburbs, where roads can follow each other quite quickly, this can be a bit confusing if you are not familiar with the area. Testing this a bit more, I found that the prompt was a bit on the slow side rather than wrong. In other words, going a bit slower gave it time to catch up with where I was and would then be accurate.

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Testing the navigation on a circuit also showed that it was very accurate with the “10 meters to turn” prompt popping up at more or less the same marker on each lap.

The mapping is good, but not near what we’ve become used to using apps like Waze or Google Maps and the additional information (like live traffic updates) they offer. Fortunately, the turn-by-turn navigation includes street names meaning you can also look out for those if the traffic and your riding allow. Navigation can be on in the background with prompts popping up at the bottom of your current data screen meaning you can use your normal data screens and still enjoy turn-by-turn navigation.

While navigating you will lose live Strava notifications although the feature will still run in the background to keep track of your segment times.

The competition

Wahoo’s Elemnt range of devices are breathing down Garmin’s neck. Their use of good old fashion buttons makes them easy to navigate, the menus are well laid out and intuitive to use, the devices are easy to setup and pair, and they come with all the modern day features one would expect with the only real drawback being the lack of Discovery Health integration and associated rewards.

Verdict

The Garmin Edge 820 continues Garmin’s tradition of quality training devices, with the touch screen the only real chink in its armour. Unfortunately, this is a big part of the user experience and the frustration that goes with it distracts from the overall user experience. If they can sort that out, they will have a real winner on their hands as most of my gripes (e.g. auto change to segment screen) could be user preference or are fairly minor issues (e.g. navigation being a bit slow).

Pros

  • Perfect size
  • Excellent features
  • Live Strava segments adds another element to your riding and/or training
  • Screen clarity
  • Discovery Health integration
  • Ticks all the connectivity boxes

Cons

  • The touchscreen lets the rest of the package down and can do with faster and more accurate response
  • Auto screen swap is frustrating
  • Turn by turn navigation struggles to keep up with the pace

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