Garmin has launched a new Surfline Widget designed to deliver useful information to surfers, at a glance, via a compatible smartwatch. For watersports fans, it could be the new feature that helps justify the not-insignificant cost of a Garmin Fenix 6 Pro (for our money, one of the very best outdoor watches around).
The free widget determines the five closest beaches to the watch-wearer (it's available globally), then pulls in information such as surf quality, tide times, wave height and wind, to help them decide whether to head out and where the gnarliest waves are at, man.
You will, of course, need a compatible Garmin smartwatch to use the widget – alongside the many Fenix 6 Pro models, it'll also work with a bunch of others including the Forerunner range. Although we're surprised to see that it's not available for the Garmin Instinct Solar, even though that has a dedicated Surf edition.
The data is pulled in from Surfline, which means you could of course just access it via the browser, but this seems much quicker and cleaner, and we're all for that. Garmin has put some effort into delivering the info in an easy to understand manner, with clear visual representations that can be accessed at the touch of a button.
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"We know how important it is for surfers to have up-to-date surf conditions so they can pick the best break to surf," says Garmin's Dan Bartel. "Being able to glance at their wrist and quickly scroll through various surf conditions at a moment’s notice is a feature we believe surfers will find convenient and helpful."
While it's fairly obviously marketed at surfers, we reckon it could be useful for beach lovers of all kinds, especially if you want to go paddle boarding along the coast or check the conditions for swimming.
The Garmin Surfline Widget is available globally, and free to download now from the Garmin Connect IQ store. On that link you'll also find info to help you install the widget, as well as a list of compatible devices.
