turn by turn ... A Major Letdown in Navigation

[thanasis]

I’ve been a proud owner of the Suunto Vertical Ti for quite some time now, using it regularly for sports, activities, and even casual events due to its appealing looks and design. However, my recent experience with its turn-by-turn navigation during a trail race has left me deeply frustrated and disappointed. I got lost multiple times because of this and I couldn’t believe it. Let me elaborate…

Frustrating Navigation Experience

The turn-by-turn navigation feature was nothing short of a disaster. Instead of providing clear, helpful directions, it bombarded me with constant, unnecessary notifications. Messages like “turn left in 97m” or “turn right in 537m” appeared incessantly, spamming the screen while I was running through the woods without providing any clear guidance of when should I do what.

Confusing and Distracting Directions

These notifications were not only frequent but also incredibly confusing. With a junction right in front of me, the message on the screen could refer to the next turn or the one after, leaving me uncertain about which way to go. The constant need to clear the message to view the map, only for it to disappear again with the next indication, was extremely frustrating especially when you have S type of routes in quite dense areas. This poor design led me to get lost multiple times.

Additional Annoyances

The climb profile added to the confusion, with notifications about upcoming ascents like “climb or descent of 50m” followed by more turn directions such as “turn left in 99m” or “turn right in 128m” in notifications in a row… The overlap of these notifications made it even harder to navigate effectively.

Design Flaws and Risks

For those who haven’t used this feature, it’s a mess. It’s hard to believe Suunto would allow such a poorly designed feature to persist. The constant notifications are not only distracting but also pose a risk of getting lost in the woods. It almost feels as though the design was intentionally made to confuse users, although I’m sure that’s not Suunto’s intention.

Urgent Need for Change

The turn-by-turn navigation feature needs an immediate overhaul. A possible improvement could be to show the direction on a “tooth” under the map or the screen you’re viewing at the time. Alternatively, removing the feature altogether might be a better option until it can be properly fixed.

This was the first time I felt such disappointment with my Suunto Vertical Ti. The navigation feature, as it stands, is terrible and needs urgent attention to ensure users can rely on it during critical moments, like a trail race.

[Stefano M64]

@thanasis I agree completely with you, I had the same experience while hiking/walking, but being my speed lower I had more time to realise what’s going on and was able to never go lost. Turn by turn is potentially a great novel feature but definitely needs a refinement, messages should be standardised as for example: “in the next 100m…”, with a fixed distance, which could in case depend on the sport mode.

[Mff73]

@thanasis
Despite you are very right, it is well known .
I personally don’t use it, but I would like.

[Audaxjoe]

I agree totally.

I just turn it off, and the line is very easy to use with the maps and keeps you focused on the trail.

A small arrow or similar is all that is needed. You need to be able to see the map at all times if navigation.

I also use a Wahoo and that is as annoying with notifications but the difference is they never block the map and a quick glance down it’s all that is needed.

[The_77]

Oh big time - made a thread on this (again) after the update: https://forum.suunto.com/post/148149

On climb notifications, today I had a bunch of segments with uphills appearing but 0m elevation gain to go displayed - fairly useless.

[Mff73]

@Audaxjoe
I question myself about just arrows indications. I am eager to see how Suunto will improve this.
Question : if one unique arrow, it would be next turn, right? What about arriving at the turn? Just before it, just near it, it has then to switch to next turn, just after… How to manage this “just” delay?
In case of short distance/time between two turns… .
Btw, when navigating, I always look at the map, but would really love a workable “turn reminder” not to miss one while thinking to something else

[Mff73]

@The_77
I also reacted there also https://forum.suunto.com/post/148164

[Shrek3k]

@thanasis fully agree, turn-by-turn-navigation has been and is nearly useless for me due to the more or less constant ‘spamming’. I love the maps, I love and use navigation a lot … but currently never ever with turn-by-turn-navigation, but by quite often checking the map and changing it’s size … rather effectively preventing the use of other screens during runs in unknown territory.
Nevertheless: I really like my Vertical (although still suffering from massive battery drain (yes, restarted the watch, drained the battery etc) … hoping that it will disappear and go back to normal sooner than later )

[thanasis]

@Mff73 said in turn by turn ... A Major Letdown in Navigation:

@thanasis
Despite you are very right, it is well known .
I personally don’t use it, but I would like.
Thanks .
Still I felt I had to share my view .

[seanvk]

@thanasis Agree with you. It is a mess and why I still prefer my Epix Pro (gen 2) for anything using route guidance (i.e., hiking or trail runs)

[Dimitrios Kanellopoulos]

Have you ever used turn by turn in the past?

Since this was introduced and because it’s abusing the waypoints notifications to provide the feature I always hated it.

On the other hand the same kinda happens with me and google maps.

[peegee]

@thanasis
i can’t agree with you more!
i was so excited with the turn indication arrows at the bottom of the map which you can choose to notice or ignore… but screens that appear constantly with turning info is most confusing and irritating.
subsiquently i choose to navigate without the turn by turn option until it might (hopefully) be improved…

after saying this…
i definitely enjoy the remaing distance at the bottom of the map but would be overly happy if it would be possible to choose the data i want or even more so, to rotate between data fields.

[thanasis]

@Dimitrios-Kanellopoulos said in turn by turn ... A Major Letdown in Navigation:

Have you ever used turn by turn in the past?

Since this was introduced and because it’s abusing the waypoints notifications to provide the feature I always hated it.

On the other hand the same kinda happens with me and google maps.

I have used it in the past … yes and it was also awful, but this time I got very frustrated and I felt I should be writing about it.

[duffman19]

100% agree. I’ve been commenting on the poor implementation since I got my Vertical. It’s hard to imagine that there are people who tested this feature and decided, “Yes, this works well.” There are some glaringly obvious solutions that just never seem to get implemented.

I’ve given up on it for now.

[slurpnik]

I agree with your points @thanasis - I have also given up on using this feature completely.

The biggest annoyance is when I forget to turn it OFF for a new route I create, only to find out when I start the activity…

[Audaxjoe]

@slurpnik you can turn off turn by turn during the activity. As I found out the other day when I forgot to turn them off

[thanasis]

@Audaxjoe do you mind sharing the guide here so that people refer to it when needed ?
Thanks

[duffman19]

@thanasis I believe you have to pull up the route on the Suunto App, uncheck “Turn-by-turn guidance,” and the route will re-sync without the turn notifications, even in the middle of an activity. One of the great features of the navigation implementation is that routes can be updated on the fly.

[far-blue]

100% agree. It’s even more confusing on the older watches that don’t have a map to refer to. It’s been raised many times in the forum and no-one can understand why you get the notification for the next turn just when you are supposed to be taking the previous turn. While less of an issue with breadcrumb nav I can certainly see why covering the map with a turn notification would be frustrating. It would certainly be useful to have both the current and next turn available to show as a ‘tooth’ or even as their own screen to view any time rather than having to remember the notification.

[isazi]

@far-blue totally agree, except the “no-one can understand why you get notifications for the next turn”. That is just the default waypoint behavior of the watch, that shows the next waypoint when you get to the current one. Unfortunately the TbT navigation is just based on waypoints, so the behavior is that one. To have something that really works waypoints and TbT should be separated, the same way climb guidance is separated from the waypoints (at least from the UX point of view).