Garmin Forerunner 245 Music

Slimmer and lighter design ; New training insights ; Easy to use music features

Battery drain with music streaming ; Missing altimeter ; No Garmin Pay

If you are taking your running more seriously and you can’t stomach paying big money for a top-end Garmin, the Forerunner 245 should offer you all you need and give you a solid smartwatch experience too.

Accurate and detailed sports tracking ; Music playback and Spotify support ; Breadcrumb navigation ; 24 hours of GPS battery life

No native support for power meters ; No triathlon mode

There are a few notable omissions from the Forerunner 245. I get the feeling Garmin has left these out purely to encourage people to buy other pricier watches, but the Music variant still offers more than anything else in its price bracket.

Lightweight, comfortable design ; Vast amount of customization ; Long battery life ; Affordable price ; Spotify and Deezer support

No barometer

Bright colorful display ; Onboard music storage ; Good battery life ; Loads of training metrics

Menus can be difficult to navigate

After all these years and all those miles, my Garmin Forerunner 235 still works great, but it doesn't do music. If I were to upgrade, the Forerunner 245 Music would be my pick.