Customer reviews for Garmin Index™ S2 Smart Scale, Black forMember photos
Verified Purchase
Love it
Wow! Who knew that this could be so easy!
Good way to keep track of progress
Had the scale for some time now. Great for keeping track of progress on weight, % body fat and Muscle mass. Recently changed WiFi in house and was a little tricky to change and had to reset scale, lost a few weeks of data. After factory reset was able to set up with new household wifi. Garmin for some reason thinks this is a new scale after the reset which is why I got asked now for a review after owing the scale for several years. Would by again.
Best scale I could have ever imagined!
I absolutely love this scale! The weight and BMI are very accurate. The remaining measurements seem also good, but you have to keep in mind that when you first take these measurements with the scale, that these are your baseline measurements. Then going forward you look to see how the measurements change compared to the baseline. Are the baseline measurements accurate? I don't know because I don't have anything to compare them to. But I'm not too concerned with that and more about improving them. I love that it exports the values to Connect. It was easy to setup. I also like the weather!
Great scale
I love the scale. It works well. Connectivity to the Garmin app was simple and the results of the app are amazingly close to what my doctor says. Your scale does a good job and I recommend it and have recommended it to my friends.
Great product - but ....
There is a lot to like about the S2 Smart Scale. It offers a useful and actionable package of data regarding your body composition and interfaces directly with your Garmin Connect Account to make that data readily accessible. A big benefit is that you can calibrate the % Body Fat based on a current DEXA scan. This allows you to overcome one of the known disadvantages of BIA scales. It has an attractive footprint and Garmin's high quality fit, finish and functionality. There is one thing I don't like, which is why my rating is a 4 rather than a 5. The scale allows you to program it for use with multiple users. You do this through the Garmin Connect App, which is a little confusing but not all that difficult to work through. You "nudge" the scale just the right amount to turn it on and then step on it to determine your weight. It uses your weight to match to your account. All well and good if it gets it right. In my case the second user weighs close to the same as I do and the scale can't tell us apart. The solution is to "nudge" the scale again when the wrong name comes up and to keep "nudging" it until you get the right user name. This is a giant pain, especially since you have to get the "nudge" just right! This likely won't be a problem for every user - but give me a button to select the user before getting on the scale. Overall, an attractive and useful product.
Seems more like a promising beta
The positives first: The scale is consistent from day to day, had a great display, and I like the day to day weight chart. The negative: On first weighing, the scale showed my weight 5 lbs higher than two other scales available, and my body fat percentage went from 16% on my Index (and verified periodically on other scales) to 28% on the index 2! I understand some variance, and I'd read that a different testing algorithm could show a higher body fat percentage, but a 12% jump to a number that makes no sense based on my height, weight, and fitness tells me there are problems. Fortunately, this is correctable by "calibrating" the scale, but that shouldn't be necessary. I'm continuing to use the scale because of its integration with the Garmin ecosystem, and it does seem to eb consistent day to day, but I am nowhere near as impressed as I was with my original Index. Also, "waking up" the index 2 is a tricky process. The Index would wake up from floor vibrations as I walked up up it, but the Index 2 requires me to play the tap tap game, taping the scale in various places, 4 or 5 times before it will wake up. FWIW, I bought this because my orignal Index got frozen on the wrench screen, and Garmin no longer supports it. That's beyond frustrating, as the scale worked great for years. Was consistent, accurate, and gave me useful information.
Hillariously inaccurate for athletes
As a long-time Garmin loyalist currently using the Forerunner 970, I expected the Index S2 to be the final piece of my data puzzle. Instead, it has proven to be the most inaccurate tool in my kit. The scale's "smart" algorithms seem incapable of processing an athletic profile. The S2 appears stuck on a basic BMI-style interpretation. It measures me (54 y/o, 5'10", 175 lbs, 52 VO2) at 23.5% body fat—a figure that is physically impossible given my very lean physique (visible 8-pack), dense musculature, and high-performance output (Zone 3 @ 6:30/mile pace, 315 lb bench, and 505 lb deadlift). The scale consistently reports an absurdly low bone mass and tells me I need to lose weight, ignoring the high muscle density required for these performance markers. While it might work for the average user, if you're an athlete, save your money—it likely won't recognize your physique. Pros: Seamless integration with the Garmin ecosystem. Cons: Highly inaccurate metrics for fit/muscular individuals.
Calculations need improvement
I am active and not overweight, I am 5'08” at 220 lbs. with it being a smart scale that can compute your muscle weight, it has my BMI and body fat percentage extremely high (straight off a chart reading instead of calculating the actual muscle mass, body fat percentage and BMI)
Verified Purchase
Overpriced garbage. inaccurate, drops pairings, cant have multiple users. 15 lb difference stepping off then back on
Expensive paperweight
Honestly I'm a little conflicted writing this review because I really like Garmin and I enjoy their products a lot. This is probably the worst "smart" device I have ever bought. I have spent the past hour and a half trying to troubleshoot this device to figure out why it won't connect to my Garmin connect app. This is in contrast to every other fitness watch and device that I've bought from Garmin before, which have easily connected to my connect app. This isn't the first time I've even tried to buy one of these scales. Last time I bought one it did the same thing, but I stupidly thought that this time would be different. I just don't understand how a device like this makes it to market. In case anyone else has the same problem I am having, I think the problem with my device is that it can't figure out how to connect to the Wi-Fi on setup, and for some reason that causes some kind of insane critical error that completely cripples the device. Now it's just stuck in a loop trying to connect to the Wi-Fi over and over again. Again, Garmin seems to do fine with all of its other devices, so I don't know why this one is so janky. I am definitely not impressed at all. Just to clarify, I have tried resetting the device. I have tried factory resetting the device multiple times. I have tried taking all the batteries out and holding the reset button down which apparently somehow resets it even more than just resetting it. I have tried clearing the cache on my phone. I have removed the device from my bluetooth settings many many times. I tried restarting my phone. I tried setting my phone up as a Wi-Fi hotspot and then connecting my tablet to it and then having the tablet try to connect the Garmin device. It just keeps crashing as soon as I try to connect it no matter what I try to do. This is the most frustrating experience I've had with a Garmin device, and if it weren't for my past experience with Garmin watches I would never deal with this company again.









