Garmin's new watch adds an Oura, Whoop feature we've been missing for years

I’m pretty good at pretending I don’t know why my sleep score nosedives. It’s usually because I’ve necked a coffee post-5pm, had "just the one" at the pub (which ended up being four), or doom-scrolled myself silly before bed.

The trouble is, most smartwatches or fitness trackers shrug at all that context, treating it as background noise. You'll get the numbers, but not the real “why” behind it all. Well, Garmin thinks it has the answer via its latest feature - Lifestyle Logging.

While this feature is something that Oura and Whoop have done for ages with their journals, now Garmin is building it into its own setup, launching it alongside the all-new Venu 4 smartwatch, which goes on sale from 22 September.

But is this logging feature something you actually need?

Why care about Lifestyle Logging

Garmin’s Lifestyle Logging feature lets you tick off daily behaviours - from early/late caffeine and alcohol to sunlight, naps, cold plunges and more - and then it plots how those things affect sleep, stress and HRV over time.

The idea is that, after building up a few weeks of entries, you’ll see 4- and 12-week trends that highlight what helps (hello, morning sunlight) and what hinders (that chocolate bar before bed). You can also create your own custom behaviours, so if “kids up at 3am” is your reality, you can capture that, too. Adding it to your log will help give a better "bigger picture" of your health and what might be affecting your energy levels, fitness performance, sleep or general recovery.

The health feature was announced as part of Garmin's bigger push of the Venu 4, which is being slated by the brand as a “personal on-wrist fitness and wellness coach". Alongside Health Status trends (heart rate, HRV, respiration, skin temperature while you sleep) and its Garmin Fitness Coach plans, both the Venu 4 and Lifestyle Logging are Garmin's latest attempt to turn random numbers into something you can actually act on.

But, thankfully, it's not only Venu 4 customers that can make use of the new tool.

Get Lifestyle Logging without a Venu 4

The best bit is that do you don't need to buy a brand new Venu 4 to take advantage of Lifestyle Logging, it's rolling out to existing Garmin watch users via the Connect app over the coming days. What's more, it’s free and with no subscription wall.

To get it, update the Garmin Connect app and look for Lifestyle Logging on the home screen (or go More > Health Stats). Add it as a home tile so you won’t forget, and switch on morning/evening reminders.

It's worth noting, however, that you do need to log what you did and what you didn’t each day, which is a bit of a faff for now. The pay-off, though, is clearer, more insightful data. And, obviously, it’s only as good as your consistency.

The Venu 4, on the other hand, has been built around Lifestyle Logging, so it'll be easier to log entries via its on-watch glance feature, meaning you can add bits right from your wrist.