The Corps Vertix 2 is a great looking smartwatch with a raft of metrics and analysis features…if you’re a runner. All other activities only get basic GPS tracking similar to what your phone offers. The screen is beautifully crisp and readable in direct sunlight which makes consulting the maps a breeze and the 5 different GPS networks that the Vertix connects to means super accurate positioning.

The GPS smartwatch/activity tracker market is certainly a crowded one, brands are constantly releasing new products that offer upgrades over their predecessors and the competition. Garmin has long been the king of the hill but that doesn’t mean there aren’t opportunities for other brands to swoop in and take the top spot. One challenger is the Vertix 2 from Coros, a watch that is designed for adventure with a heap of fitness features thrown in for good measure.

4/5

£599 | Buy from Coros

Positives

• Looks great

• Feels premium

• Excellent running specific features

• Crisp screen

Negatives

• If you don’t run, metrics might be underwhelming

• Software shortcomings e.g sleep tracking

• Bluetooth isn’t a rock solid as Garmin’s

The Lowdown

• Offers mapping and navigation

• Connects to 5 satellite systems

• 140 hours battery life

• 1.4 inch touch screen

• Titanium case with silicon straps

• 91g

• 32gb onboard memory

First impressions of the Vertix 2 are promising, the watch comes in a sturdy moulded flight case akin to a Peli case, which Coros say can be used to transport small items out in the field, but the likelihood is that it’ll get thrown into the back of the cupboard never to be seen again; it’s a nice touch but the majority will look past it.

Nestled in the moulded foam the watch face and strap can be found; the watch is a hunk of titanium and glass which looks stunning; and when I say hunk, I mean it. The watch weighs 89g and it quite chunky so isn’t the best choice if you’re looking for a slimline, discreet timepiece. Aside from the chunk, the bright orange straps are far from subtle although I love the rugged, utilitarian design. The supple silicone straps secure the watch comfortably on the wrist and if orange silicon isn’t your thing, they are removable without tools and can be swapped out for something more discreet.

The main feature of the Vertix 2 is it’s astounding battery life; it’ll run for 140 hours with standard full GPS and if you’re heading out into the wilderness for a long period of time, the battery can be stretched to 240 hours in the UltraMax mode. Up time reduces significant when the ‘All systems go’ mode is activated but I’ll touch on that shortly. The real world impact of this mighty battery life is that you don’t have to remember to put the watch on charge every few nights; we fully charged the Vertix 2 and a week later it’s still claiming to have 78% charge remaining and that’s having used it as my fitness tracker on a couple of mountain bike rides.

Whilst on the subject of activity tracking, the Vertix 2 talks to all five major satellite systems; most devices only access one or two concurrently, Coros claim that using five systems increases accuracy and reduces the time required to get a signal. I found both claims true, the Vertix 2 is supremely accurate. When recording rides with my iPhone 12 and Strava, the GPS trace sometimes darts across fields whilst I was precisely weaving around trees (trying not to hit them is probably a fairer assessment of my skill). No such issue with the Vertix 2, the trace is far more accurate than anything else I’ve used. This might seem a pointless feature, who really needs ultra-accurate GPS? Try navigating in technical terrain in low visibility, that’s when knowing your position to the metre really counts.

Time required to get a fix as impressive too, normally I’d have to loiter around on the driveway before heading out to get a GPS fix but the Vertix 2 took a matter of seconds and maintained the fix throughout the ride.

The beautiful slab of crystal glass on the front of the Vertix 2 is where the magic really happens, the 1.4 inch touch screen is crisp and legible even in direct sunlight and the touch functionality means panning around the maps is a cinch. I did find it a little odd that the touch screen’s functionality is quite limited, there’s no flicking through menus here, you’ve got to use the 3 buttons to do your menu navigation. In reality though, the digital crown and buttons are very easy to get to grips and offer haptic feedback which is great when wearing gloves or have cold hands.

The Vertix 2 offers activity tracking for a host of activities from running and rowing to swimming and skiing. One activity I’ve never seen before was the ability to track multi pitch climbing; there’s a whole user guide on the Coros website outlining how it works and how to set it up and having read it I’m still baffled but to some it could be a very powerful feature.

One feature that really impressed me was the ability to control a GoPro or Insta360 camera directly from the watch. Granted there’s no ability change settings but we could switch between stills and video mode on a GoPro Hero 9 Black and the digital crown acted as the shutter button. I could see this being a really handy feature when the camera is mounted out of reach and because the watch is always on your wrist, there’s no remote to lose/drop.

Up until this point, you’d be thinking that the Vertix 2 is a shoo in to knock Garmin of their perch, but there’s a couple of things that really let this smartwatch down.

The first is the vitals tracking; Garmin offer everything under the sun, from Body Battery to activity specific metrics there’s plenty of data to geek out about. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said here.  Data is fairly limited to heart rate, steps, stairs climbed and active minutes; there’s a couple of running specific metrics such as recovery time, fatigue and predicted race paces but they only apply to running which is quite frustrating if you aren’t of that persuasion. Surely the fatigue and recovery information should be agnostic to the activity? The Vertix 2 also offers sleep tracking but requires the user to manually end the ‘sleep’ which given seems odd that the watch could surely work out when the wearer works out from elevated heart rate or movement.

The companion app is nowhere near as feature rich either although it does act as an easy way to load routes and training plans to the device, users can add routes direct from Strava to the device which proved to be very slick. The metrics are still very running orientated however; the Coros EvoLab offers training insights based off the user’s data but only pulls data from runs. In the EvoLab literature, Coros do say that their looking to add other sports in the future, but it remains to be seen whether it materialises or not.

My other small gripe was that the vibration alerting us of a new notification could be more powerful, I missed a few simply because we didn’t feel the very subtle buzz from our wrist.

From the outside, the Vertix 2 is a great looking and feeling smartwatch and one that I’ve thoroughly enjoyed using. The basic functionality of the watch is all there, the GPS is accurate and fast, the battery life is enormous and with a couple of tweaks in software it could be a genuine competitor to Garmin’s Fenix range but now, it isn’t quite there…yet.

If Coros stick with it and offer incremental firmware upgrades to address some of the issues which I’m sure they will, they could be onto a winner with the Vertix 2.