Here’s What It Means When Your Garmin Watch Flashes Green (ANSWERED!)

Owning a Garmin watch or any fitness monitoring system means you are striving to track your progress and reach fitness goals effectively. With many watches available to do this, we should be aware of what some of the functions mean and how we can understand them. One is having a green light flash on our skin. What does this green light mean?

Green flashes on a Garmin watch mean it has a heart rate sensor installed. The heart rate sensor functions to monitor and update heart rate during any activity. All activities such as running, walking, and sleeping are monitored. Other fitness devices will operate similarly.

As you can see, your heart rate is monitored daily for every task you participate in, however, this topic doesn’t end there. In this article, we will briefly explore further the functionality of the green light, whether the green light is safe for our skin, and how the flashes of the green light work.

Green Light’s Function

As we have stated earlier, the green light that flashes on the Garmin watch means it is detecting and monitoring your current heart rate at that moment. Now, you may be wondering, why green? Or what does the green color signify?

The simplest answer to this question is that blood absorbs the green light better than any other color and in large quantities. Other colors such as red will reflect the light, therefore not making it optimal for heart rate monitoring in this case.

Aside from being a heart rate monitor and having green as the primary color of choice for accurate and proper indicators of heart rate, there isn’t much more about the basic functionality of the green light itself. The only other thing I can say is that other devices besides Garmin follow this exact same method of using the green light as the basis of the heart rate functionality.

It is a reliable method for getting heart rate monitored and is clear that other brands such as Apple Watch, Gorilla Fitness Watch, and Fitbit will keep using the green light as the primary color for heart rate monitoring.

How Safe is the Green Light?

For this segment, we will very briefly disclose the safety conditions of the green light from a Garmin watch and any other smartwatches. It is safe to use.

There is no indication of the green light affecting the blood’s absorption of the green light and the skin that the green light is emitting on. The light is natural and non-ionizing in which cells are never damaged, so do not worry about your health from the repeated use of the Garmin Watch.

What Does Flashing Mean?

On to the green light’s flashing mechanism and what we should learn about it.

The function of the flashing means it is actively detecting your heart rate at that very moment. depending on the model of the Garmin watch, it may flash every 5 or 10 minutes, meaning it will flash often. Per flash means it also is updating its previous scan for a new input. Other than this, the flash’s functionality is as simple as it gets. The real question is, can I turn this flash off?

You can indeed turn this flash off as it will continue to flash, even when you are not actively wearing it, it will continue to flash. This function may be annoying for some eventually and when trying to sleep, it can illuminate the room to a degree where it is disturbing your rest. Every smartwatch has a method for turning off the light, just find the instructions on how to and you’re set.

Can the Green Light Be Inaccurate?

Lastly, for the accuracy of the green light and its flashing mechanism, yes, the green light and its flashing can display inaccurate information regarding your heart rate. This can be because the build and quality of the Garmin watch may be cheaper and low in durability, making it last very little and showing signs of poor performance on the watch’s part.

Another reason could be that the watch is not properly secured on the wrist, meaning it is too loose that it doesn’t detect anything since firm skin contact is not met or too tight, making the user suffer strains and stress.

For accurate readings, place the watch in a snug, but not too tight, about 1 inch above the wrist bone. This way the wrist won’t feel strangled while your device is firmly touching the skin to get any read. Always take the green light’s reading with a grain of salt as many inaccuracies of the heart rate can be from the device itself or improperly wearing it.

Heart Rate Zones and Activities

Now that we have basically covered both the reason behind the green light and the flash, let’s explore some “fun” ways to make heart monitoring enjoyable.

With Garmin watch and the Garmin-associated mobile app allows one to further enhance their training regime and daily activities by seeing something more than just a number indicating your heart rate.

An interesting and fun way to know how much heart rate you are producing is using heart rate zones. Heart rate zones are based off of your perceived maximum heart rate as the starting point. With a maximum heart rate indicated, the heart rate zones will take this maximum heart rate and divide it into different zones.

There are five indicated zones with 1 being extremely low and 5 being the maximum heart rate. Activities such as walking are labeled in zone 1 while fast running is placed in zone 4.

Another personal favorite of mine is comparing and contrasting my watch’s indicator of my heart rate with my physical check of my heart rate via placing my fingers on my neck and detecting my heart rate/pulse in this way.

The reason I love doing this is that sometimes the watches can be inaccurate at times regardless of the quality of the build. I, therefore, enjoy seeing what my perceived heart rate is by “eyeballing” it and comparing it to the measurement the watch gives me. This allows me to judge whether I am truly reaching my goals with a reduction in any deviation from my watch and physical heart rate check.

Overall, the Garmin watch and many others are excellent tools for keeping track of your heart rate. Do not fear the green light and its flashing as this is what it is intended to do to detect heart rate accuracy.

Finally, don’t just let the heart rate indicator tell you what your heart rate is alone, be creative with it and make it fun and enjoyable as you strive and achieve your fitness goals.