The Garmin fenix 9 Pro has a GPS problem when third-party apps are involved, according to a Connect IQ developer. He says the watch stops recording location about 14 seconds into a session. By his account, that happens on more than half of all sessions when a non-Garmin app is doing the tracking. He set the behaviour out in detail on Garmin’s own Connect IQ developer forum.
Who the Fenix 9 Pro GPS Bug Actually Breaks
Every workout and navigation app built outside Garmin leans on that location feed. A run tracker that loses GPS after 14 seconds produces a worthless recording. The owner sees a broken app rather than a broken watch, and the one-star review lands on the developer instead.
The developer behind the forum post attached numbers to that gap. Their app holds 4.8 stars on iOS but struggles to stay above 3.5 on Garmin. Garmin users account for roughly 30% of their user base and about 90% of their support load.
Not an Isolated Glitch
The same post catalogues other Connect IQ failures. The Forerunner 170’s gyroscope was never exposed to third-party apps at all. New sensor timestamps, offered through the includeTimestamps option, misfire on some watches by dumping 100 samples in a few milliseconds and then going silent.
On average every other week there is a new problem, and it takes forever for Garmin to resolve it. It looks like Connect IQ is not a priority. I have some direct contacts at Garmin, and whenever I report a critical bug like the ones above, the reaction is annoyance rather than thanks for reporting a basic flaw.
That is Michael, the developer who opened the thread. Several other developers replied with grievances of their own. They described simulator results that do not match real hardware, plus bug reports that go unanswered.
What This Means If You Are Buying
The fenix 9 Pro is a Garmin flagship, and Connect IQ support is part of what that price buys. A location feed that fails on half of sessions in third-party apps undercuts that pitch. Our view is that this belongs in the buying decision, not in a footnote.
Garmin also has a record of slow fixes on its own software. We covered a fenix 8 brightness bug that can leave the screen stuck at full brightness, with a fix still pending at the time. A problem affecting someone else’s app is unlikely to jump that queue.
As of October 10, no public Garmin response to these reports has surfaced. Anyone buying a fenix 9 or fenix 9 Pro for a specific third-party app should test that app inside the return window.
Sources: Garmin Connect IQ forum, via Notebookcheck, Android Authority
