What you need to know
- Garmin added four free holiday-themed watch faces to its Connect IQ app.
- The "Snowman" and "Christmas Tree" watch faces change based on your current step count or intensity minutes.
- You can find dozens of other holiday-themed watch faces on Connect IQ, but most of them are community-made and require a payment.
Do you want to bring a little Christmas spirit to your Garmin watch? Now you can, thanks to four new winter-themed watch faces found on the Garmin Connect IQ app.
Advnture first reported these four watch faces, which are currently highlighted in the Connect IQ app Store page at the top, as well as linked below:
The snowman and Christmas tree watch faces have a particularly fun gimmick: They start off with empty snow and a bare tree, but change into a full snowman or decorated tree as you complete your daily or weekly goals. As you can see in the top photo, my snowman is only half-built so far this week.
After you hit Install, the watch face will be sent and saved to your default Garmin watch. At that point, you can hit Settings and change which data determines your progress: Steps, Floors climbed, Elevation Gain, Intensity Minutes, Calories, Distance, or other data. You can also change whether it judges by your daily total or your seven-day average.
If you want to keep things uncomplicated, the Golf in the Snow or Ski all day watch faces give you a fun Santa-themed scene or a beautiful wintery landscape, regardless of your fitness progress.
These watch faces should be available on most of the best Garmin watches, aside from hybrid models or the Instinct series. And unlike most of the community-made Christmas- or Hanukkah-themed watch faces, you won't have to pay for them.
Aside from these watch faces giving us a pinch of holiday cheer, it also reminded us just how many free watch faces Garmin offers. If you look at the Apps by Garmin section in Connect IQ and ignore the actual apps, you'll find literally hundreds of watch faces themed after other holidays around the world, upcoming races, cool data packaging, or beautiful art.
That list includes some old Christmas-themed watch faces like "Christmas and Snow," "Christmas Jumper," and "Golden Christmas," so check those out if you're not inspired by the new picks.
After you've installed your favorite holiday-themed Garmin watch face, I'd recommend stocking up on some other new faces for after the holiday period ends! You have so many to choose from; my personal (adorable) recommendation is Panda Baby, with its pixelated art style and different art depending on the time of day.
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