Garmin has just launched a series of luxury smartwatches under its new Marq line. The company released five Marq smartwatches, each of which is meant to fill a different role. The watches cost between $1,500 to $2,500, and are targeted at the traditional high-end watch market.
Garmin goes behind traditional timepieces
Garmin is targeting a niche section of people with it new Marq line of smartwatches. The company is trying to replace the traditional high-end mechanical timepieces with smartwatches. It’s offering build quality and materials of a luxury watch, merged with the internals and flexibility of a smartwatch. The watches offer titanium cases and sapphire crystal, with Garmin’s suite of smartwatch features, like notifications, activity tracking, heart rate sensors, and built-in music storage.
However, the new Marq watches are designed to fill different roles where traditional timepieces would typically live. Each of the five Marq watches are targeted at different section, and are also priced differently. Here’s a quick look at what each of them offer.
- The Marq Athlete is the cheapest of the lot. The $1,500 priced watch, as the name suggests, is designed for athletes. Naturally enough, it focuses more on fitness features, such as performance metrics, and running apps and maps.
- The $1,750 priced Marq Expedition is a luxury version of Garmin’s existing GPS watches designed for hiking. It comes with an “Expedition Mode”, which basically reserves battery for longer trips. You also get topographical maps and a compass in it.
- The Marq Captain, which has a special regatta timer, tack assist, autopilot and boat data functions, is designed for sailing. It costs $1,850, and also offers a “man overboard” feature that helps track a person on board.
- Garmin’s Marq Aviator is made for pilots. It offers some pilot-specific functions, such as emergency navigation guides to the nearest airport, and course needle. You also get a map, weather reports, and flight logging features. This watch will set you back by $1,950.
- The most costliest Marq watch, at $2,500, is the Marq Driver. It is a watch for racers, and comes preloaded with track data, including lap times and top speed, for over 250 tracks.
While these five Marq watches look pretty nice, Garmin may have missed the trick by limiting the unique functions and apps to the specific models. There’s no reason why each of these watches can’t run every app or function. After all, they are smartwatches.
Nevertheless, it’d be interesting to see if Garmin’s shot at the luxury watch market hits the bull’s eye.
