APEX 4 Coros adds maps, a speaker and weeks of battery

What is new about the Coros APEX 4?

The APEX 4 is Coros's mid-priced mountain watch, sitting between the lightweight PACE running watches and the big VERTIX expedition models. It launched on 15 October 2025, when Tom's Guide and Treeline Review published their reviews, and Coros skipped a version 3 to bring the APEX name in line with the rest of its range. Coros UK sells it in two sizes, 42 mm at £389 and 46 mm at £429, in black or white. This page covers the 46 mm black version, reference WAPX4-BLK-46.

The headline additions are about navigation and the wrist as a phone accessory. There is a new action button that jumps straight to the map during an activity, downloadable global landscape and topo maps with trail and street names, and touchscreen map control. Coros has also added a speaker for hands-free calls and spoken alerts, and a microphone for voice commands, training logs and Voice Pins, which drop a recorded note at a spot on your route. Believe in the Run calls the map button its favourite update, and says maps now load faster and look better.

How big is it, and how will it wear?

Coros lists the 46 mm case at 46.2 x 46.2 x 13.7 mm, and that height does not include the optical heart rate sensor on the back. The screen is a 1.3 inch third-generation memory-in-pixel touchscreen at 260 x 260 pixels. Tom's Guide and Believe in the Run both give the weight as 64 g on the silicone strap, and Treeline Review puts it at 52 g on the nylon strap. Both straps use a 24 mm quick-release fitting and, according to Coros, fit wrists from 140 to 215 mm.

Tom's Guide describes it as fairly thick, though it avoids much of the bulk of the larger adventure watches. If you have a slimmer wrist, the 42 mm version is the one to try first: it costs £40 less, with a smaller 1.2 inch screen and shorter battery life.

What does it track, and how long does the battery last?

Battery life is the reason most people shortlist a Coros. For the 46 mm model Coros quotes 24 days of daily use, 53 hours of GPS with all satellite systems on, 41 hours in all-systems dual-frequency mode and 65 hours in its endurance mode. Music cuts those figures sharply: Coros quotes 16 hours in all-systems mode with offline music playing. Charging takes under two hours.

Independent results so far back the claims up. Tom's Guide wore the watch for 12 days, running almost every day, and still had 34% left. Believe in the Run reports that it only needed charging every few weeks, and Treeline Review says the battery comfortably covers a multi-day backpacking trip.

The sensor list covers optical heart rate, a barometric altimeter, accelerometer and compass, and the dual-frequency chipset uses GPS, GLONASS, Galileo, BeiDou and QZSS. There are 32 GB of storage for maps and music. Tom's Guide found multi-band tracks very close to the routes actually run, even under tree cover, and called that a clear step up from the APEX 2 and APEX 2 Pro. It found heart rate usually in line with a chest strap, with occasional spikes. Coros's EvoLab tools cover training load, recovery, VO2 max, race predictions and threshold zones.

How well is it built?

The materials are the main thing that justifies the APEX price over a PACE. The screen is sapphire glass, the bezel is grade 5 titanium alloy and the case is fibre-reinforced polymer. Believe in the Run reports no wear after drops on concrete and hardwood. Water resistance is 5 ATM, which Coros says suits surface water activities but not diving. Coros rates it to work from minus 20 to 50 degrees Celsius.

Is it good value against its rivals?

At £429 the 46 mm APEX 4 lands at exactly the same price as the Suunto Race 2, which also has sapphire glass but uses an AMOLED screen. Garmin's Forerunner 570 has a UK RRP of £429.99 and also has an AMOLED screen, plus Garmin's larger app and payments ecosystem. Believe in the Run notes that both the Race 2 and the Forerunner 970 are heavier.

Treeline Review frames the APEX 4 as a rival to the Garmin fenix 8, which adds a torch, payments, music streaming and 10 ATM water resistance, but costs more than twice as much. If you want maps, a titanium bezel and weeks of battery without fenix money, the APEX 4 is one of the most complete packages at this price.

What is the catch?

The memory-in-pixel screen is the trade for that battery. Tom's Guide found it quite dull indoors and under cloud, though as readable as AMOLED in bright sun. Smart features are thin: there is no NFC payment, no music streaming from Spotify or similar services (only stored MP3 files) and no torch. Treeline Review reports phantom and missed turns in turn-by-turn navigation and no climb-by-climb breakdown like Garmin's ClimbPro. Believe in the Run also notes that older Coros chargers do not work with the new USB-C charging dongle.

“The APEX 4 trades a bright screen for weeks between charges, and for mountain days that is the right trade.”

What do owners say?

Themes from public owner feedback, paraphrased. We never copy Amazon reviews or ratings.

• After several weeks of use, reviewers report the battery claims hold up, with charging needed only every few weeks

  Believe in the Run (opens in a new tab)

• Turn-by-turn directions can give phantom or missed turns, and there is no music streaming or torch

  Treeline Review (opens in a new tab)

• A fully charged watch once dropped to 8% overnight, which a firmware update fixed

  Believe in the Run (opens in a new tab)