Amazon Music Launches Garmin Watches: All You Need to Know

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When Garmin first debuted in the portable music industry about 18 months ago, I did not think anyone would have sat down and said, "Garmin will become the most widely used streaming music service. in charge on the market ". But oddly, so far, that's what happened. At present, no portable device on the market supports as many music services as Garmin for offline use (no, not even the Apple Watch). And as of today, Garmin's list now includes Amazon Music.

If you own Amazon Music (regardless of its variety), you can now sync it offline with your compatible Garmin music watch. This allows you to run without your phone and listen to Amazon Music. And unexpectedly, there's another first here: the first company to support offline Amazon Music. No other company than Amazon's own app has this capability.

Now, many of you know that I am a big user of Spotify. I'm listening to Spotify all day. Except when I do not do it. It is at this point that the children listen to Wheels On the Bus or that The Girl plays Jack Johnson. In this case, I listen to Amazon Music. While I'm typing this, I'm listening to Amazon Music. I do not pay extra for the Unlimited variant, I come from the one that is free with Amazon Prime.

If you're looking for a video with everything you want, go for it:

With that, let's get ready for everything to be configured. Do not worry, it's painless. Oh, and if you're looking for my previous guide on configuring Spotify on a Garmin laptop, this is it.

Setting up:

I will start with this section noting that these photos probably make it more complex than it really is. Basically, just download the app from the Connect IQ store and follow the instructions to authorize your account. That's all. But, in order to make things very clear and non-short, here.

First, here is the list of compatible watches. In a nutshell, this is all the portable clothing compatible with Garmin's music, and this will undoubtedly be future watches.

Garmin Forerunner 245 Music
Garmin Forerunner 645 Music
Garmin Forerunner 945
Garmin Fenix 5 Plus Series
Garmin MARQ Series
Garmin Vivoactive 3 Music

You'll need this handy watch, and if your battery level is below 50%, you'll need a convenient charging cable to sync music (not required for setup). And finally, you will need WiFi already configured on your device for this to work. As with virtually any portable device, there can be no point of access Starbucks or hotel wifi.

Start by opening the Garmin Connect IQ app store for your device, either on your mobile phone or at the Garmin Connect site (if you're on the desktop), then search for Amazon Music. You can use the Garmin Connect Mobile app on your phone or Garmin Connect IQ app. Two methods, same result:

Once done, you will click to add it to your device, and in a short while, it will be synchronized with your watch, which you can then confirm. At this point, you can access it and access it on your watch by scrolling through the Music menu (it should show up by default there, but if it does not, you can access the Widget settings on your watch and add to the roll of widgets).

Then, according to your music consumption on your Garmin, it will appear immediately in the list of sources or you will have to change your music source in Amazon Music:

You want to be sure that Garmin Connect Mobile is still running somewhere in the background of your phone. That's how the watch talks to Amazon. Minor note, you must have had the time via GPS at least some time in the last forever. This means that as long as you have done a workout, you are ready to go. But if you only have the watch, it will ask you to check the GPS to get the time (it anywhere, you just want the time – the synchronization time of the smartphone is not reliable enough) .

Once you have opened Amazon Music, it will give you a code to connect online to Amazon:

You can use a desktop computer or a smartphone for this. You will be asked to sign in to your Amazon account if you have not already logged in:

This will then confirm that Garmin has access to your Amazon music account:

Once you've done that, Amazon will tell you that you're ready to go:

Within 10 to 15 seconds, the watch receives its golden ticket (authorization) and then takes you to the screen to download music. At this point, you're ready to ride!

General use:

The application allows you to download the music you find on Amazon (or at least I have not found any blockers yet). You will start by clicking on the 'Browse' button of the main application. This gives you a lot of ways to start your music search. Again, Amazon Music Unlimited is not required, only regular Premium membership is required. However, there is a 30-day free trial if you wish.

The methods of application are as follows:

– Try Amazon Music Unlimited: if it is not already the case, it will offer you a contract to register.
– My music: everything you have recorded in the normal Amazon Music application on your phone / computer / etc …
– Playlists: This gives you the recently played playlists, as well as sorted by moods / genres, and the best playlists.
– Charts: Top Songs, Top Albums, Top Playlists
– Recommended: tracks, playlists and albums recommended by the Amazon Magic Music Machine
– New: explicit

We will simply download something that I have already selected in my account by choosing "My Music". This will list the different playlists I have recorded through other Amazon applications. This will allow me to choose my playlists, artists, albums, genres, tracks:

I will select playlists and then these from my account are displayed:

The down arrow means that you are downloading the playlist. So, once you have pressed it, the software launches the WiFi search:

If, however, your battery is less than 50%, you will need to plug it in. I've always thought that this limitation of Garmin (identical to that of other Garmin streaming music streaming platforms) was a bit too conservative. I would prefer something like 25-30%, then cut everything to 10-15% of the remaining battery.

In any case, once you have logged in or added to a plug-in, it will tell you the status of the download:

Amazon Music on Garmin devices is slower to download than Spotify on the same device (even if it's done back to back). On Amazon Music, I get about 3 to 5 songs per minute (download speed), while Spotify is almost double that, at about 10 songs per minute. However, I often only have 1 to 3 songs per minute on Amazon Music.

We are currently testing all compatible Garmin devices (for realz, I loaded them): MARQ Athlete, FR945, Vivoactive 3 Music, Fenix 5 Plus, FR645 Music and FR245 Music. And this is with average download speeds for home and office being 450-500Mbps. Garmin claims that this is somewhat expected and that download rates vary from one music service to another depending on many factors, including encoding rates.

Anyway, just a warning about it.

Once downloaded, the playlist appears at the top of the Amazon Music app:

You can simply select it to start playing it. At this point, if your headphones are connected, playback starts automatically. Otherwise, you will be asked to connect them:

And then it will start playing:

From there, the / etc commands are identical to any other music you have on your watch. Skip / play / pause, etc. Unlike Spotify, you'll get album covers for all songs:

xxx

When Spotify made a presentation at the Connect IQ summit in April, they said they made the specific choice not to include album covers because it did not convey anything to the user, except to remove the rights for the title of the song, etc. Although this may be true, I would say that the cover of the album reflects the artist's emotion, and it's a very important part of the music. I like album covers, even if they seem to be rendered on a Commodore 64 and delete some text space. Here side by side, Spotify vs. Amazon Music (obviously different songs).

Finally, if you want to update your playlists with the latest music, just choose the 'Sync' option. This will go to Amazon and will retrieve all new / added songs added to the playlists you have already downloaded.

Overall, it "works" for me. No complaints here about the functionality for the most part. I will note that from time to time, I will download a playlist from certain sections (not in "My Music") and that it will say that this playlist is only available to Amazon Music Unlimited users. It's like a passive-aggressive thing. It feels sticky (since the first option every time I browse to download new music is already an Amazon Music Unlimited announcement), but let's shrug.

packing:

We have seen a fairly impressive transformation of Garmin over the past 18 months. They went from a company that did not even have portable music on the market to a company that now has half a dozen devices and supports more music streaming platforms than anyone else. They have a dedicated team from the music industry on board, and the results are starting to pay off.

From Spotify, last fall, to Amazon today, these are major platforms to register. But I have the impression that Garmin is just beginning in this space. It probably starts with a certain level of neutrality in their devices, they are able to convince these platforms more easily to make it run. But to talk to some of them is also because the underlying interface of Garmin's music provider is simply more advanced and more easily adaptable to these streaming platforms.

Of course, that does not mean that Garmin's solution is perfect. All of these options require downloading your music via WiFi in advance. None of them support continuous on-demand cellular connectivity, even Garmin's Vivoactive 3 Music LTE device. There are flaws in the hardware and battery design that make it more difficult for Garmin than other watches with a battery life of about a day.

Finally, if you already own Amazon Prime (which many boats do), it's not hard to think of music on your watch that costs nothing more. I added it to my devices just to mix things up a bit. It probably will not become my daily driver, but I like having it there just for variety.

On that, thank you for reading!

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