Garmin today unveiled its new Varia Vue, a front light with a built-in 4k camera that promises to record “crystal-clear video and automatically saves it if an incident is detected”. At £459.99, it’s significantly more expensive than rival light/camera combos that we know of, and you’ll also need to budget in the cost of a memory card and Garmin Vault subscription if you want to use Garmin’s software for storing and editing footage.
The Varia Vue will sit alongside Garmin’s Varia rear light and radar in its product line-up of accessories designed to “increase safety and visibility” for cyclists, the Vue able to sync with the Varia RCT715 radar taillight camera to record rides from both angles.
It all points to Garmin hoping to rival established ride-recording brand Cycliq, whose cameras have consistently impressed. The £299 Fly12 model, a 400-lumen front light with 4k camera, offers up to seven hours of continuous recording.
> Everything you need to know about bike cameras
At a suggested retail price of £459.99, the Varia Vue is significantly more expensive than Cycliq’s offerings or any other competitor that we know of, although Garmin’s light has five modes maxing out at 600 lumens. On the battery life front, the Varia Vue offers seven hours of continuous recording too, when in day flash mode, or up to nine when the headlight is off.
Garmin says its light modes automatically adjust to match a rider’s speed and surroundings when it’s connected to a compatible Edge cycling computer, while the headlight is designed with a cut-off beam reducing the light intensity above the cut-off line, to avoid blinding oncoming riders and traffic.
For convenience, the Vue’s camera and headlight settings can be changed via the Varia smartphone app or through a compatible Edge computer.
The product also has a concealed microphone to record audio alongside the 4k video. It will require a memory card, something that is not included in the £459.99 price, and to store footage in the Garmin Vault that will require a subscription that’s £9.99 a month or £99.99 for the whole year.
Just yesterday Wahoo launched its “cutting edge” Trackr Radar rear light, following in Garmin’s footsteps in offering a radar rear light. Today, Garmin has taken the next step and followed in Cycliq’s footsteps to offer a front light with a built-in camera, the underlying point that we’re seeing more of these premium safety-focused devices from the big cycling tech brands.
In the Vue’s case, the built-in camera records “sharp, 4k video while Electronic Image Stabilisation keeps the footage steady”. The device can detect incidents, automatically saving and storing video before, during and after the event.
When it is connected via Wi-Fi, any saved footage can be automatically uploaded to Garmin Vault for secure storage with an active subscription, and video from a ride can be reviewed and edited through the Varia app too. Garmin’s RCT715 also has automatic upload capabilities.
“With Varia Vue, cyclists can embark on rides knowing they’re more likely to be seen on the road when using the headlight and are equipped with a high-resolution camera that can capture it all,” Susan Lyman, Garmin Vice President of Consumer Sales and Marketing commented.
“We’re thrilled to add another tool to Garmin’s unparalleled cycling line-up, giving riders the confidence they need to pursue their passion with greater peace of mind than ever before.”
Has Garmin addressed Varia issues?
Being able to store your footage in the Garmin Vault does appear to address one of our complaints about the Varia RCT715, the app for that leaving plenty to be desired according to our reviewer. However, the cost of a subscription to use the Vault is significant, £9.99 a month or £99.99 a year. That means you’d need to pay £459.99 for the Varia Vue, purchase a memory card as the device doesn’t come with one, and then pay a penny short of £100 to store and edit your footage in the Vault for 12 months, moving the cost for one year closer to the £600 mark. If you only use video editing software for your bike camera then that £9.99 might be a more affordable solution than some other video editors, but you could of course upload your footage elsewhere, and use free or significantly cheaper editing software to remove that rolling cost.
Garmin promises the image quality will be “crystal-clear” 4k, something we’ll be interested to try out considering our review of the Varia raised issues with the 1080p video quality. Many of the concerns we raised with that device appear to have been targeted for improvements here, although coming at a cost of at least £200 more when factoring in the extra upfront cost, memory card and annual Vault subscription.
We’ve requested a Varia Vue for review. Will the image and camera quality be enough to clearly capture number plates if you’re unlucky enough to be on the receiving end of a near miss (or worse), and can this camera/light combo really justify the heavy premium over the rest of the bike camera market? Hopefully we’ll be able to report back in a few weeks’ time.
You can check out the full product spec on Garmin’s website.
50 thoughts on “Could Garmin’s new front light with built-in 4k camera rival Cycliq? £459.99 Varia Vue with auto-incident detection launches”
£450 is insane, who would
£450 is insane, who would consider buying this
Me.
Me.
The price of everything has
The price of everything has gone through the roof. I paid £12 for eight lamb chops yesterday! I can remember quite clearly a few months ago they were £8 (no, they were not US imports).
£450 seems to be about the cost of a top of the line 4k car dashcam.
For around £329 the DJI Osmo
For around £329 the DJI Osmo Action 5 Pro is far better value. Battery (removable) lasts about 4 hours @1080p and the Image quality is superb, just add a front light and you are good to go.
I would probably question on
I would probably question on whether the value is “far better”, if one budgets £100 for a decent front light, we’re up to £430, and that that point I’d pay the extra £30 for the Garmin to have the head unit integration and sync with the rear camera.
I did seriously consider a DJI Osmo too, I have a DJI Mini 4 Pro drone and from that experience, they make great kit.
It’s probably easier to list
It’s probably easier to list the kit that you don’t have! (Intended as a friendly jibe)
No. New world economics
No. New world economics notwithstanding, prices of tech stuff have mostly come down a lot over the decades, sometimes in actual numbers of £s and $s, certainly compared with income levels. It’s essentials like housing, food, electricity that have gone up. Remember floppy disc drives costing £150 and 20MB hard discs at £600.
This light is expensive both to attract buyers with spare cash and because it contains a lot of very high and robust tech that makes it a must buy for tech addicts with cash.
Wonderlights were cheap, even by 1980s standards, … and not very good but car lights weren’t so bright so Wonderlights were just about adequate.
I think I paid around £150
I think I paid around £150 for my Fly12 in the sale and the Fly6 was £99. Granted, £99 bought you more lamb chops in 2015 and the Fly12 I have is 1080p rather than 4K, so this new one is an upgrade (but I’m quite happy with the 1080p image quality).
£450 is a lot of money, but in line with the top-end car dashcams and action cameras. It’s not outrageous when you compare it to other similar devices on the market. It’s the market that’s outrageous!
If I was still commuting to work, I’d probably have bought it though.
£459 would be more than cost
£459 would be more than cost of the bike I ride to work !!!
, it’s a light & video camera, this kind of tech shouldn’t be anywhere near this level of cost by now. This is price gouging by Garmin imo.
Hope it lasted longer than
Hope it lasted longer than mine did…
It’s a lot harder to get hold
It’s a lot harder to get hold of aftermarket mounts for lamb chops, too.
Also check if you have a
Also check if you have a SLamb chop or a Camporknolo one – they’re not interchangeable.
Not me on my pension but we
Not me on my pension but we’re in a world where a lot of people have a lot of money and a lit of people have rather little… not so many in between
If the crash detection is
If the crash detection is anything like on Garmin head units, it’s going to save a lot of footage.
Ah I see you have leaned your
Ah I see you have leaned your bike over more than 6 degrees. Has there been a crash my man?
It is a bit eyewatering
It is a bit eyewatering pricewise. I’d be interested to see if it can beat the Fly 12 for runtime on low flash mode though… I’d be willing to pay a bit more for extra run time or even a neater always on USB connection if it has one. Not £160 more tho…
It will also be interesting to see if Garmin have not used the same aging sensor that got them all the slagging for the RCT715 radar cam.
Mine should arrive by the end
Mine should arrive by the end of the week, so I’ll find out. I’ve been looking for front facing camera (preferably with light) for ages. I’ve tried two models of GoPro, never been able to get much more than an hour, so this at 5-7 hours (a little less than RCT715 at the rear) looks like it’s worth a try. I’m happy to take a punt on the price for the battery life, and remote control integration with Edge head unit.
There’s a fairly in depth review over at DC Rainmaker, seems to be great hardware let down by the software again, as was with the RCT715, but I’ve lived with that for nearly 3 years so hopefully will be good enough to justify the price.
https://www.dcrainmaker.com/2025/04/garmin-varia-vue-light-camera-review.html
how about;
how about;
anyone good with RPi Pico2 boards?
TBF the easiest but not
TBF the easiest but not necessarily cheapest way to do that is just wire a cycliq or Garmin camera light up to a USB battery powered by a dynamo.
Both Cycliq’s and the Garmin RCT715 can take permanent USB power whilst still running afaik.
If you get the older cycliqs (maybe bought super cheap with duff batteries) that still have Ant+ onboard you can run them all through the Ant+ lights functions on most GPS’s include Edges, or get the Edge Remote.
No Pico needed.
The biggest/only problem is getting a waterproof USB connection – particularly on the Fly12 with its side mounted panel.
For us using ebikes, a live
For us using ebikes, a live power feed shouldn’t be too problematic
I did buy a Pi camera module
I did buy a Pi camera module with the IR filter removed to have a go at making a lashup ANPR evidence camera. It’s still in a drawer. 🤣
Maybe I’ll get round to it someday, but probably not!
I use a cheap motorcycle
I use a cheap motorcycle dashcam on my e-bike (~£100 for 2 cameras and a common recording box). Comes with a wired remote that I don’t bother with. Powered by a USB adapter connected to the lighting circuit so it switches on and off with the lights.
If you don’t mind loads of wires on your non-electric bike, this approach should work with a powerbank. I wonder if you would would get enough from a dynamo to power both cameras and lights though. My camera set up draws 5W on its own and the full set up (Cameras + 2 front and 2 rear lights) is close to the max 18W that the bike’s lighting circuit will provide.
I really hope the review can
I really hope the review can cover what the experience is like both with and without the Vault subscription – if the unit is perfectly good on its own and the Vault is a nice-to-have extra that’s a very different proposition to a device that’s severely hobbled without the subscription service.
Honestly, what I mostly want from Garmin is just a very slight refresh of the RTL515….
As linked by mark1a elsewhere
As linked by mark1a elsewhere in these comments, DC Rainmaker has a fairly detailed review out already. According to that review, it’s absolutely fine to use without the subscription. In fact, any appeal of getting the subscription is significantly diminished by the fact that it will only sync videos that are explicitly flagged to be kept (either manually or automatically if triggered by the incident detection). Other footage won’t be uploaded, and will (eventually) be written over.
The answer to your headline
The answer to your headline is no – not at that price.
Weight approx 200g vs Cycliq
Weight approx 200g vs Cycliq fly12 Sport ~150g.
Dan Alexander wrote:
I had a Cycliq 6 (2nd gen) which lasted a fair while before inexplicably giving up the ghost. When I was looking for replacements for front and back, the greatest impression of Cycliq I formed was the legion of comments on relevant boards of Cycliq models bricking after rain.
At that money, though, I shall be looking for separates.
Mine didn’t brick after rain,
Mine didn’t brick after rain, it was just an effective partial brick its entire life. I had a 1st gen cycliq 12, it just never worked reliably, almost never got the Android app. to talk to it. Forever deciding after an hour, a day, a week, that sd cards were “corrupt” regardless of type or rating. Worst fault in a combined camera/headlight is that it would sometimes hang in a state that YOU CANNOT TURN THE HEADLIGHT ON until you can find the tiny hole and a tiny poky thing and reset it
Once it was a year old the warranty isn’t valid and the company wanted me to buy the new model
The Android App seems pretty
The Android App seems pretty good these days – I sold my original Fly12 Mk1 to the guy who writes the app.
I’m now on my third Fly 12 (Mk1 developed a weird intermittent fault and was repalced under warranty with a 12ce, that developed a fault after I crashed my bike so I replaced it) and 2nd 6 (had the old 6v and upgraded to a 6ce).
I commute in Glasgow and haven’t had an issue with water – the 6 is under my saddle and protected by a mudguard, and I fittted third party silicone cases to both after the accident that broke my 12ce.
The first batch of the 6 gen3 (the model that replaced my 6ce) had a terrible reputation in the forums but they seem to have gone quiet now so I assue the problem is resolved.
IanGlasgow wrote:
Layman here – is it naive to expect that the person writing the app might be given the product itself to work with?!
I had a 6 brick in the rain.
I had a 6 brick in the rain.
Although, it was a torrential down pour and I didn’t have rear mud guards on, so the IP rating was probably exceeded.
I found that an under seat mount, and a rear mud guard has helped prevent further bricks.
I’ve never had a Fly 12 brick through poor weather though.
I have had the mounting tabs break on a Fly 12; I’d accidentally put my full 110kg weight on it to try to stop me from going over the bars.
This was soon sorted by an aftermarket Garmin 1/4 turn male stuck to the other side of the unit.
That was a real but overblown
That was a real but overblown problem IMO, made worse by their shady returns behaviour. I had a 2nd hand Fly 12 work perfectly for years til the batteries died. Bough a new Fly 12 Sport and thats been solid. Biggest complaint is that its too hard to open the super seally rubber battery cover!
Cycliq certainly seemed to
Cycliq certainly seemed to let a lot of people down in the early days. I held off until the 12 Sport came out, but have been impressed.
The battery life began to fall, some time after warranty expiry, and Cycliq just shipped me a replacement unit.
Two submissions to TVP. One driver re-ed course, one court summons.
Prettttttttty sure Garmin’s R
Prettttttttty sure Garmin’s R&D and pricing teams and now just on a constant cocaine and Stolly fueled binge-giggle to see what they can get away with. Meanwhile, over at Wahoo, the bang-for-the-buck guys and girls are acing it…
Bigtwin wrote:
Have you read any reviews of the Elemnt Ace?
Oh excellent. More expensive
Oh excellent. More expensive tech to hand over to the bike jacker.
Just had the ads for one here
Just had the ads for one here in Aus. For reference, that’s a cool $AU999 before you spend a few extra dollars for a memory card – just the thing to put on the $100 pub bike …or not!
459! why? and 9.99 a month
459! why? and 9.99 a month for a subscription. That’ll be a no from me. I’ll stick with the cycliq and continue to upload videos for the police to ignore. It makes me feel so much safer knowing that I have a camera to record who killed me…
The subscription is at least
The subscription is at least optional.
Certainly not on my shopping
Certainly not on my shopping list. I did by the Fly 6 gen 1 (just as gen 2) was comming out at a cheap price just to try it and a first gen VirB also (again just as gen 2 was getting launched) but I didn’t use them for long and I still can’t see the benefit of them over firstly observation and more lately a radar.
HLaB wrote:
That’s apples and oranges isn’t it? Agreed, I’d rather avoid an incident in the first place, but for me the cameras aren’t there to replace observation, they’re to provide evidence afterwards if necessary.
I don’t really trust the
I don’t really trust the police to do anything with that evidence, given my experiences the few times I contacted them previously. Its not worth festering over so I ditched the camera’s myself. I am playing about with a cheap one I got of Amazon but its more for enjoyment of scenes but I suspect it’ll go the same way.
Ah, I see what you mean. I
Ah, I see what you mean. I know what you mean about festering – I do sometimes resent that you end up reliving the event while processing the footage to make a report, while the miscreant has just gone about their day giving you no second thought.
It’s not 4k though. It’s a
It’s not 4k though. It’s a 4k sensor. But when image stabilization is on, that’s chopped down to little over a 1080 image.
And then there’s the image stabilization. Anyone using a Garmin rear camera will know it better as “Wobblecam”. On Britain’s crappy roads, I wonder if this new camera will be able to cope.
Cycliq is a company that has had mixed products for years. But one thing it does offer is excellent stabilization. And a reasonable price. And a quick release mount that does not require the camera being unscrewed to remove it from bike. This Garmin camera is much more expensive and has the ludicrously priced Vault alongside questionable software. No need to upgrade at this cost.
Why didn’t RoadCC have a
Why didn’t RoadCC have a review sample before this article? Then it would be less speculation and more fact. Never mind, DCRainmaker and DesFit have had it for testing for some time and have done the work that RoadCC haven’t.
In short, the camera is average to poor, the light is good, the £10-a-month Vault online storage system doesn’t automatically upload (unlike GoPro’s, which is half the price) and it’s way, way too expensive.
Buy Chillitech’s 4k wifi camera for £100, a Magikshine light for the same again, and upload to the OneDrive/iCloud/Dropbox account you already have.
TimC340 wrote:
…and go and ride your bike for two hours or less.
TimC340 wrote:
This is a news article, not a review. Ok, so some other outlets have done a review already – but this isn’t purporting to be one.
Long post alert…
Long post alert…
I’ve just returned from my first ride out with the Garmin Varia Vue, and in no particular order, thought I’d share these observations, there’s a lot of assumptions & speculation about what this will and won’t do.
TLDR; works very well as a safety cam, particularly if using with a Garmin Edge head unit and RCT715.
First of all, unpacking the box, it’s seems bigger than I thought it would be. Not sure why I had any preconceptions, but comparing it to the Garmin UT-800, it’s the same length and twice the width, which makes perfect sense, and I guess in order to achieve a decent battery life, those cells have to go somewhere. Overall, it’s not too heavy (200g, similar to light & camera separates), and the build quality feels very good. No microSD card supplied, which is fine with me, most cards supplied with devices are unbranded small capacity, so I slipped in a Sandisk Extreme 256Gb and formatted via the Varia app.
Initial setup, very easy, with the Varia phone app, simply add a new device, which will be found after placing the light in pairing mode. First thing it did was download a firmware update, being an early model. No problems there, next put it pairing mode again and add it as a sensor on the Garmin Edge head unit. Same situation as the RCT715, the Edge sees it a both a light that will form part of a lighting network, and a camera, with configuration and controls for both.
I’ve configured the camera to record continuously, with the RCT715 at the back to record on radar as it was before. Have left defaults set (4K30 EIS at front, 1080p30 as back), light network set to auto so both lights will change mode depending on the ambient light sensor in the head unit. Although today was a bright sunny day, part of the ride went through a tunnel on a disused railway, and light switched from day flash to solid and back again.
For locking clips (e.g. after an incident), tap on the head unit screen, and tap again on the “save clip” icon. This has changed recently (since the last RCT715 firmware update) on the x40 and x50 units, I think on x30 and previous models, it’s still a swipe down and across to the camera widget and hitting the camera icon. You can also tap “film ride” to record and lock the whole ride, and “take photo” to take a still. It’s even easier if you have Shimano Di2 hood buttons, I’ve configured press and hold the right hand hood button to save a clip. So this means for any incident such as a close pass, simply holding the button takes the footage front and rear, into separate 2 minute clips and places them the locked folder on the card where they won’t be overwritten. The overlays with speed, location and timestamp will of course be synced via the head unit.
Audio is way much better than the RCT715, and picks up voices clearly.
Wide angle view means that the unit can point slight downwards so that the light doesn’t dazzle other road users, and camera view remains effective.
After a one hour ride in 4K30 EIS and day flash, there’s over 80% battery left, so claimed runtime seems it will be as advertised so far.
Standard mount is GoPro style so should fit standard action cam mounts, in the box there’s a quarter turn adapter to fit on the bottom of Garmin out-front mounts (there’s one of those in the box too).
The Vault sub is completely optional, I won’t bother as my clip workflow works just fine without.
Clips can be downloaded via the Varia app, and this is considerably faster than it is with the RCT715, taking less than 30 seconds for a 480Mb file, the RCT715 takes over 2 minutes for a 300Mb file, so the wifi access point the Vue creates is clearly an improvement. You can of course plug it into a USB port and access as a drive volume or pull the card and insert into a card reader. I generally use the Varia app, it puts the videos into the iOS Photos app, which then syncs across all devices via iCloud. Other photo cloud services are available, I’m confident the Android version will do something very similar.
Finally – the quality and price…
Yes it’s not as good as a GoPro or DJI in terms of footage quality, but remember this is a safety cam not an action cam. I gave up using a GoPro because the runtime just didn’t work for me. In terms of the footage from my first ride today – it’s better than the RCT715, and in the 3 years I’ve been running that, I’ve never not been able to grab a legible plate for the Op Snap prize draw submissions. So I think this will be same and/or better. This is probably the best combination of quality and runtime I’ve seen.
For the price, for me I’m happy with the functional use case that I have, namely a safety cam, and light, which are extremely easy to operate, ability to quickly and easily save clips for submission, integration with the Garmin ecosystem, which means remote operation of lights and cameras from Edge head units, synchronised overlays with accurate timestamps, location and speed.
The combined price of this and the RCT715 buys good quality front and rear lights, high resolution front and rear cameras with accurate overlays, a rear radar all with head unit control. Add all of that up as separates from the competition, you’re going to be getting very close to the same price, or if not, nowhere near the quality and ease of use.
For reference, a still grabbed from a video, edited to show a zoomed area of a number plate. Hopefully it will survive road.cc resizing.
Here’s another grab a little
Here’s another grab a little nearer:
Another grab, I’ve pixellated
Another grab, I’ve pixellated part of the plate because the driver did nothing wrong, but still enough to show detail.