Garmin Debuts Wild New Hybrid Instinct Crossover Smartwatch
A hybrid analog smartwatch? Whaaat?
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Garmin's smartwatches are some of the toughest watches around, which can be said about all of Garmin's products. But the watches are something special and in fact, when The Drive's own Hank O'Hop asked which watch he should get, I replied "a Garmin" because I know how he likes to treat his gear. He bought a base-spec Garmin Instinct and loves it. But maybe he should've waited as Garmin's introducing a new watch called Instinct Crossover, a hybrid watch that blends smartwatch technology with an analog dial. It looks sick as hell.
Built on the already extremely rugged Instinct smartwatch platform, the Instinct Crossover "is a hybrid GPS smartwatch built for those who appreciate a classic analog watch experience but who do not want to compromise essential smartwatch functionality or rugged watch durability," according to Garmin. It's the best of both worlds, featuring
Garmin's new RevoDrive analog mechanism, Super-LumiNova coated watch hands and number ring, along with the aforementioned GPS capabilities, as well as solar charging, a 70-day battery life, sleep and health monitoring, contactless pay, TrackBack GPS route monitoring, satellite support with InReach products, and more.
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Garmin is also introducing a special Instinct Crossover Tactical Edition, which builds on the Instinct 2 Solar Tactical and supports all the functions above, as well as night vision compatibility, a stealth mode, dual-format GPS, a kill switch, and more. It's ready for all your tactical, hunting, or stealthy home arrival situations.
Smartwatches and I have never really mixed, mostly based on user stupidity. I forget to charge them, stop using them, and they then sit on my shelf collecting dust. Not to mention I'm out a couple hundred bucks, which then triggers my wife giving me the same face she does whenever I start up a new hobby, only to leave it in the same state as my watches. But this Garmin has the real possibility of staying on my wrist with its battery life and analog face. And it seems like it could actually hold up to the patent-pending Jonathon Klein Abuse Regimen given Garmin's track record.
The base Garmin Instinct Crossover is on sale now and retails for $499.99. A pricey thing, sure, but when you consider you're getting an analog and smartwatch in one, well, that doesn't feel too bad an asking price. But what do you all think? What's your take on the Garmin Instinct Crossover? Are you gonna cop or not?
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