The Google Pixel Watch 4 recently launched, and it’s immediately shot to the top of our list of the best smartwatches on the market. Yet so did the Garmin Venu 4, and having written about the best Garmin watches for the past decade, I’ve been impressed with it. Both of these watches do a great deal more than just track your steps — they are designed to be worn 24/7 and can track your heart rate, sleep, and menstrual cycle.
As a fitness editor, one place I always start when comparing two fitness trackers is by examining how well they perform the basics. Do they accurately predict which workout I’m doing? Can I easily navigate around the watch and check my sleep score when I first wake up? And how well do the watches count steps?
To dive into my testing, I strapped the Google Pixel Watch 4 and Garmin Venu 4 to my wrist and went out for multiple walks, manually counting my steps using a clicker as I did so. When I got home, I downloaded the data and looked at which watch came closest to the manual recording. Read on to find my results. You can also take a look at our Google Pixel Watch 4 review and Garmin Venu 4 review here.
I walked 14,000 steps with the Google Pixel Watch 4 and Garmin Venu 4
I split my steps over several walks, counting as I went. Both watches count steps in the same way, using an internal accelerometer, which measures the swing of your arm.
Each swing counts for two steps. It doesn’t matter whether you wear your watch on your dominant or non-dominant hand, or whether you’re walking with your hands in your pockets, or holding something; the accelerometer should still measure your body’s movement.
Here are the results:
| Row 0 - Cell 0 | Manual recording | Google Pixel Watch 4 | Garmin Venu 4 |
Walk one | 4,209 steps | 4,218 steps | 4,228 steps |
Walk two | 2,688 steps | 2,702 steps | 2,704 steps |
Walk three | 4,842 steps | 4,865 steps | 4,862 steps |
Walk four | 3,147 steps | 3,186 steps | 3,210 steps |
Total | 14,886 steps | 14,971 steps | 15,004 steps |
As you can see from the results, both watches were pretty accurate over the course of the seven miles I walked. The Google Pixel Watch 4 overcounted by 85 steps, whereas the Garmin Venu 4 added 118 steps to my walk. That’s a difference of 36 steps, which is relatively minor when considering a 15,000-step walk.
This means we can conclude both watches are pretty spot on when it comes to counting your steps. The average person takes 2,000 steps in a mile, so missing or overcounting by 100 steps isn’t a lot in the grand scheme of things. That said, the Google Pixel Watch 4 was ever so slightly closer to my manual recording.
To really compare these two watches, you’d have to do more testing and look at a lot more than just steps. Both watches are packed with sensors and trackers to help you live a healthier life. Both have HRM, ECG, SpO2 and Skin Temperature sensors.
From a smartwatch point of view, the Google Pixel Watch 4 is fantastic, and is like having an extension of your phone on your wrist.
It also has Google’s Gemini AI assistant on board, which can be activated by raising your hand, and can tweak your workouts based on how well you’ve slept and recovered. The Garmin Venu 4, on the other hand, has some of Garmin’s top training features on board, including Training Readiness, Body Battery, and Health Status. It’s also worth noting that to use some of the Pixel Watch 4’s premium training features, you’ll need to pay extra for a Fitbit Premium subscription.
The Venu 4 has a higher price point, starting at $549 for the basic model in both the 41mm and 45mm versions, and $599 if you want to add a leather strap. This is a $100 jump from the Garmin Venu 3, which launched at $450. The Google Pixel Watch 4 starts at $349.
We’ll be doing a lot more testing and comparisons between the two new watches, but if step counting is a metric that matters, you can rest assured that both do it pretty perfectly, meaning, unlike me, you won’t have to worry about keeping count as you go.
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