Discrepancies Between Phone app and Watch?

The Muppet

I hope this is the appropriate forum for this question apologies if not.

I,m having some issues with accuracy while recording my runs on my phone a Samsung s5 and I'm just wondering if anyone else has had this and found a fix.

For my park run on Saturday my Garmin FR15 recorder the run at 3 miles in 26:53, My Strava app on my phone recorded the same run at 3.2 miles at 26:04 , while my official parkrun time was 26:51.

I first noticed this when I change phone , I used to have an I phone 5 and my run data was always around the same as the watch so I think its something to do with the phone. I've used different phone apps and they all have the same issus Endomondo, Strava and Wahoo Tickrx

Any Ideas?

lgk

Not all GPSs are created equally. It's likely the Garmin is a lot more accurate than the phone. Even the differences between recording intervals will see a noticeable discrepancy, with longer intervals resulting in less accuracy as corners get cut.

Take a look at some of the DC Rainmaker articles on the subject, which include some comparison testing.

Rantan

Yeah. I had same prob with samsung/strava versus my old reliable garmin 205. Just went back to the garmin in the end. I found strava way too fussy anyway..

The Muppet

ÌI changed location mode from high accuracy to gps only and in my location settings and it recorded yesterday's run perfectly . Distances and time were the same on both devices. I trust the watch the most but with the 15 I have to hook it up to a pc to upload it which is a bit of a pain

robinph

The time on the Garmin will be accurate as you pressed the button each time.
The distance measured may not be.

The time and distance on Strava will be less accurate as the phone is not as quick to respond to pressing the screen, the GPS component for the distance is just as unreliable as the watch GPS, and the Strava app may cut off sections at the start and end where it considers you to have been stationary. Have had Garmin measured courses then be uploaded to Strava and show different distances and times between the Garmin watch, the Garmin website and the Strava app as they all calculate things differently.

The time and distance from parkrun will only be accurate from the person saying "go", thr volunteers with the timers hitting the buttons to start on the watches, you not crossing the line at the same time as they said "go", them not pressing the stop button at the exact same moment you did on your watch, the person putting the cones out to mark the course not putting them in the exact same place as last week or the person who measured the course taking a slightly different line.

Put most trust in the parkrun time and your Garmin time, which should always be very similar, and trust the parkrun course measurement over any GPS measured course.

rom

This should answer all what you need re GPS http://fellrnr.com/wiki/GPS_Accuracy

As you can see the 205/305 is the best garmin for gps accuracy.

Technique

rom wrote: »

This should answer all what you need re GPS http://fellrnr.com/wiki/GPS_Accuracy

As you can see the 205/305 is the best garmin for gps accuracy.

As someone who has just bought a Polar M400, this makes me quite sad.

Krusty_Clown

rom wrote: »

As you can see the 205/305 is the best garmin for gps accuracy.

...of the models he has reviewed/based on his interpretation.

rom

Krusty_Clown wrote: »

...of the models he has reviewed/based on his interpretation.

I would have to agree with him the 205/305 being the best of the Garmin for GPS accuracy.

Have owned Garmin 110,305,405,410,610,620,310XT,920XT and none of them are any good for intervals other than the 305 and all have GPS issues. Only reason I moved from the 305 was it took 5 mins to lock on for me.

Looking back to some of my activities of my 305 it would have me on the footpath on the right side of the road always. Interestingly I have GLONASS turned on for my 920xt and the reading is much worse with that.