Garmin has launched the new Vivoactive GPS smartwatch at the annual Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, marking the company’s first venture into the increasingly popular smartwatch market. This is a watch that can be used for multiple sports with full GPS capability, can sync with a smartphone to provide SMS and call alert, and can be worn all day without looking out of place. It's a growing market, with the likes of Apple and Samsung both launching feature-packed smartwatches last year.

Garmin has plenty of experience in the fitness market to call on though, it already has a wide range of Edge GPS cycling computers, and introduced the Vivofit fitness band not so long ago. The new Vivoactive bridges the gap, a device that offers much of the functionality of an Edge computer but is sleek and light enough to be worn all day. It's a light weight, thin (just 8mm, much less bulky that most other GPS watches) and stylish design packing a high resolution screen. The battery lasts a claimed 3 weeks in watch and activity tracking mode, or 10-hours using GPS.

“Vívoactive combines signature Garmin fitness technology, such as built-in GPS, long battery life and a sunlight-readable display, in an ultra-thin smartwatch that lets users stay connected and achieve more,” says Dan Bartel, Garmin vice president of worldwide sales. “Designed to be worn all day, vívoactive can be personalized in many ways – from interchangeable bands to watch faces, apps and widgets – making it versatile, stylish and functional for your life. ”

Smartwatches such as the new Vivoactive are designed to be worn all day, not just when cycling or running. So you  can wear it round the office, use it at the gym at lunchtime, track your cycle ride home in the evening, everything.  It’s designed to track and monitor your level of activity constantly. It'll even kindly alert you when you've been lazy and inactive for a long period of time.

It can be used for numerous activities, including cycling, swimming, running and even golfing with the built-in sports apps. The cycling app can provide all the usual metrics like current speed, distance etc, and can also be synced with heart rate and cadence sensors for further data collection.

Pairing with a compatible smartphone means it can display alerts for incoming calls, texts, emails and calendar events, plus alerts from social media apps. You can also use it to control your tunes and if you have a Virb Elite video camera, well it can remotely control that.

But Garmin already has the Forerunner 920XT GPS multi-sport watch doesn’t it? True, and on the surface there does seem to be quite a bit of crossover. It looks like the Forerunner is a more dedicated sports watch for serious fitness freaks and athletes, with much more detailed data analysis compared to the Vivoactive, which is aimed at a broader section of the market and where appearance, for something intended to be worn all day, is equally important. It’s also more versatile as third party apps can be downloaded to it, such as a calendar app to keep track of appointments.

We’ll be interested to get a closer look at the Vivoactive when it’s available, which looks like being sometime this spring. It does remain to be seen whether smartwatches will really capture the imagination of consumers, but it’s still early days for the product sector and there's definitely a lot of interest from the big companies in offering the right blend of design, usability and functionality.

The Vivoactive will cost £199.99, and you can pre-order it from the Garmin website now.

www.garmin.com