A Garmin watch with GPS for walking/hiking

[supersun23]

My dh has asked for this for his birthday. Does this exist?

It does. You have to download the maps you want, I think.
A friend had one but gave it to his dad so I'm unsure of the model but it could track where you walked so you could find your way back.
If you don't get much help here, there's a Great Outdoors topic.

Yes. They all have GPS except the Lily I think (which he won’t want anyway).

Google Dcrainmaker. His website has loads of detailed reviews about all this kind of thing. They are a bit techy for me but I skip through for the bits I need to know about.

Garmin Fenix 8 AMOLED Sapphire
has topographic mapping.
But I think the Garmin Enduro 3 is for serious hikers. Has pre-loaded maps and navigation tools.
I have a Garmin Venu 3S and I've been very happy with it for what I do.

Thank you - goes the Garmin Venu have GPS?

Lots of Garmins have GPS but only the high end (expensive ones) have full mapping. For example mine only has what they call breadcrumb navigation and you don't see the underlying map with this.

Yes it does.

The GPS alone is only useful if you're good at map reading. The more expensive ones have built in maps and routes which are more helpful. If he wants a navigation aid, a conventional hiking GPS is much better with a bigger screen. If he wants it to track steps, heart rate etc., buy the one with the best battery life you can afford and maybe solar charging since hikes are often long

All of them have GPS, otherwise you wouldn't know how far you'd walked/run/paddleboarded.

The more expensive ones have the ability to download a map and navigate... I've never really felt it's worth the extra money because the screen is too small to be of use to my elderly eyes, I just bring my phone with me.

I think he just wants the GPS to track where he has walked on his phone and for how long.

My Garmin Venu3S has GPS. After the walk it puts a little map on the phone with the route, speed, distance, time and how fast (or not!) I walked in each segment. That might be all he needs, although I'm not sure if it's waterproof. It's cheaper than the dedicated outdoor ones.

As I said, I've been happy with mine. You might call them and ask if this will be enough for DH.

I have a Forerunner 245, use it all the time for runs, but also daily walks and have used it for hiking and trail runs. No maps, but it’s great for tracking distance. Have it almost 4 years now and it is still going strong.

The forerunner is also waterproof, I track swims on it also.

I have a forerunner and then pair it with Strava to download the map, stats etc.

Would the forerunner, that is waterproof, have a map of the route show up on his phone?

Yes, the map comes up on the Garmin Connect app, and also on Strava if you connect to that.

Venu2 is waterproof so I imagine the 3 is

I bought the cheapest Garmin available to actually track my runs and walks in local woods. It's a Forerunner 55 and cost about £130. It does absolutely everything I want it to, a fancier model would have been wasted on me. It accurately tracks your distance/speed/ HR /cadence/elevation etc etc. When the run is completed it's available to view as a map in the app. I also prefer the fact it isn't touchscreen because I find that easier to use when running. It's recommend going for the entry level and seeing how he gets on with it, upgrade next year if he's good?