Garmin has revealed its new outdoor smartwatch, the Garmin Instinct Tactical – which adds some pretty niche military features to the company’s existing outdoor watch.
The Garmin Instinct was released last year, which brought trekking and outdoor features from the top-end Fenix range into a more affordable package.
New features mean you can pair your watch to your night vision goggles, when you’re behind enemy lines, so you can use waypoint projection to navigate your way around the future battlefield.
Next up is GPS stealth mode, so you can record your activities and see your GPS location without it being logged into Garmin Connect or sent to the cloud. That’s clearly an effort to combat recent controversy, where sports tracking services have inadvertently leaked the position of secret military bases.
Finally, and one for the paratroopers out there, Garmin has added Jumpmaster mode, which lets you see two sets of co-ordinates at the same time.
Garmin has always been a company to fulfil niches in the fitness world, so military types now have a consumer-focused GPS watch that's fit for purpose. It’s built to military grade toughness and is water-resistant to 100 metres.
Of course, the average outdoors type might find these new features a little overkill. But the original Garmin Instinct is still a great buy. The new Instinct Tactical is $349.99. You can pick up a standard Garmin Instinct for around $300.
