Approach S72 Garmin's golf watch learns to read greens

What is new about the Approach S72?

Garmin announced the Approach S72 on 6 October 2026, with sales starting later that month. It replaces the Approach S70 as the top of Garmin's dedicated golf range, below the far dearer MARQ Golfer. It comes in 43 mm and 47 mm sizes; this first look covers the 47 mm model with the carbon grey DLC titanium bezel, red button accents and a black fabric band.

The biggest additions are on the course. Garmin says the watch can show green reading, meaning the direction of break and the average slope of a putt, using green contour data. It also adds aerial imagery of each hole, a scramble scoring mode and a driving range mode that records hand speed, backswing length and wrist rotation from the watch alone. Breaking Eighty adds that it logs swing plane and tempo too, with no extra sensors on the club.

The hardware has moved up as well. According to Garmin and Breaking Eighty, the S72 gains a sapphire lens, a titanium bezel, the Elevate Gen 5 heart rate sensor with ECG, a built-in speaker and microphone for calls, a white and red torch, and 64 GB of storage, up from 16 GB.

How big is it, and how will it wear?

The 47 mm case is 47 x 47 x 13.5 mm and weighs 48 g on its ComfortFit fabric band, according to Gadgets and Wearables. Breaking Eighty notes that this is lighter than the 56 g S70, partly thanks to the band. The 22 mm QuickFit band fits wrists from about 154 to 229 mm.

That makes it a large watch. On a wrist under about 16.5 cm, the 43 mm version, at 43 x 43 x 12.93 mm and 41 g, is the more sensible choice; it fits 130 to 200 mm wrists and costs the same.

What does the screen and battery offer?

The 47 mm model has a 1.4-inch AMOLED touchscreen at 454 x 454 pixels, with an optional always-on mode. Garmin quotes up to 16 days as a smartwatch and up to 20 hours of golf with GPS running, which is in line with the S70 according to Breaking Eighty. The smaller model drops to 10 days and 15 hours.

GPS is multi-band with SatIQ, which picks the most accurate mode for the conditions to save battery. There are 43,000 preloaded courses, plus road and trail maps for use off the course.

How well is it built?

• Lens: sapphire, the most scratch-resistant option Garmin offers.
• Bezel: titanium with a DLC coating on this colourway.
• Water resistance: 5 ATM, so swimming is fine but it is not a dive watch.
• Buttons: two rather than the S70's three, with a touchscreen for the rest.
• Extras: Garmin Pay, Wi-Fi, music storage and a full set of Garmin health tracking, including sleep, stress and Body Battery.

Breaking Eighty's one reservation on build is that it feels slightly less substantial than a fenix 9 Pro, which it puts down partly to taste.

Is it good value against its rivals?

The UK RRP is £699.99 for either size, as published by Golfshake at launch. The closest rival is its own predecessor: T3 lists the 47 mm Approach S70 at £649.99, so the S72 costs £50 more for the swing metrics, green reading, aerial maps, torch, speaker and sapphire. Breaking Eighty points out that the S70 now often sells for well below its launch price, which widens the gap in practice.

Above it sits the MARQ Golfer, which Breaking Eighty lists at $2,800 in the US. Below it, Garmin's cheaper Approach models and rangefinders will give yardages and scorecards for a fraction of the money, if that is all you want.

What is the catch?

The membership. Green reading, aerial imagery and putting analytics need an active Garmin Golf membership, which is a recurring cost on top of the £699.99. Without it, several of the features that make the S72 new are switched off.

Breaking Eighty also found green reading less reliable than it sounds: the course's GPS pin position does not always match the real flag, and walking to the hole to set it can slow play. Shooting the flag with a Garmin Z10 or Z30 rangefinder does not feed green reading, and the swing data comes without coaching, so you need to know what good numbers look like.

Finally, it is big. If you do not play golf at least weekly, a fenix or Forerunner will give you most of the fitness features without paying for the golf ones.

“The S72's cleverest tricks live behind a subscription, so budget for more than the watch.”

What do owners say?

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

• Early independent use suggests green reading is helpful but can be thrown off when the course's GPS pin does not match the real flag.

  Breaking Eighty (opens in a new tab)

• Swing metrics such as hand speed and tempo are logged without extra sensors, but come without guidance on what good numbers look like.

  Breaking Eighty (opens in a new tab)