5 Hacks Every Suunto Run User Should Know

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When I reviewed the Suunto Run, I found it to be a delightful little watch. It's lightweight, with a big, bright screen, and it does a lot of what an entry-level Garmin can do, but at a much better price. It's easily one of the best affordable running watches out there, normally costing around $200. Here are some of the best tips and tricks I've found for getting the most out of the watch—starting with a hard-to-find fix for one of its most frustrating default features.

Make the Suunto Run read your splits in miles, not kilometers

Credit: Beth Skwarecki

Even if you set your units to Imperial (miles and so on), the Suunto Run will mark a lap and beep at you after every kilometer. When I first reviewed it, I searched in vain for a setting that would let me switch it to miles, or at least turn off the auto-laps. I couldn't find one. Judging from the number of people asking this question on Suunto forums and on Reddit, I'm not the only one who has this problem. Supposedly, autolap can be turned off in settings, but I checked Exercise Options and didn't see it. I just resigned myself to the kilometer beeps. (Five miles is eight kilometers, for example—a fact I'm now quite familiar with.)

But it turns out there is a setting to change the autolap. You can find this either within the app or on the watch itself, but either way, the trick is that you have to choose a type of exercise (like Run or Trail Run) and then, instead of going into Exercise Options, select Free Training. This is the mode you'll normally use when you run, and that's where you'll find Autolap, which is set by default to 0.62 miles. Change that to 1.00 miles or turn it off, as you prefer. You'll have to go into each activity separately to change the autolap. I wish there were a more general setting for it, but at least there's a workaround.

Put a stopwatch at the top of your widget list and start it with a swipe

Credit: Beth Skwarecki

Every watch has a stopwatch feature, but it's often not easy to get to (or requires you to program and remember a button shortcut). Suunto does something special, though: you can put a stopwatch right into your widget list. This way, all you have to do is swipe up from the bottom of the watch. These widgets are where you would normally check how many steps you've taken today, or how you slept, or what the weather is or when you can expect the sun to set. But you can also add a stopwatch, and I recommend that you do.

When you're looking at your widgets, click the top button (it will have a pencil icon). Here you can add new widgets to the list, or rearrange them. Add the stopwatch, and do yourself a favor and put it right at the top. Now you can start the stopwatch with just a quick swipe-and-tap from the watch face. Best of all, you can exit the stopwatch screen, and the next time you pull up your widgets you'll see the stopwatch's time displayed live on its widget. It's the handiest little thing.

Long-press the top button to switch the type of run you're doing without starting a new workout

Credit: Beth Skwarecki

This is another feature that most running watches have somewhere, but Suunto makes it so easy to access that you'll end up using it all the time. If you're running on the road (activity type Run) and decide you're going to finish your run on the trails (activity type Trail Run), you can switch between them by long pressing the top button. Once you select the new sport, your run is paused and the watch shows how long you've been paused at this "transition." Hit the start button when you're ready to go, and Suunto will record the two segments as different parts of the same workout.

This is handy because Suunto offers so many different activity types with slightly different data screens and settings. If your trail run turns hilly, you might prefer the Vertical Running activity to get more data on your power zones as you climb. Or maybe you'd prefer to just change to a Hike, something I've done a few times in this miserable heat wave. You can also create custom activities if you want even more control over your data screens and settings.

Calibrate your altimeter and set storm alerts so you'll never be caught out in the rain

One interesting feature of many Suunto watches is the ability for the watch to alert you when it detects that a storm might be coming. This is possible because the watch has a barometer/altimeter that measures air pressure. When the weather is constant, changes in pressure hint that you're climbing up or down hills. But if pressure drops dramatically, that can indicate that a storm is on its way. To turn on storm alerts, go into Settings and then Outdoor and turn on Storm alarms.

While you're in this menu, you may want to make sure your barometer is calibrated. Also under the Outdoor menu, you can select Alti & Baro, and then you have the option to either Set altitude or Auto adjust altitude. The auto-adjustment uses a GPS reading to make sure the altimeter is calibrated. But if you know your current altitude from a map, you can set it manually.

Make a library of "points of interest" for your favorite hiking areas

Credit: Beth Skwarecki

Suunto makes it surprisingly easy to save points of interest and navigate to them without a lot of fuss. I use these "POIs," as the watch calls them, to mark interesting or useful areas in my local park. We're blessed with dozens of miles of trails in a small area, and I can't keep everything in my head. For example, I mark water taps so I can find them the next time my hydration pack is running low. I also like to mark places that I might like to return to on a future trip—say if I see a spot I think my kid would like to hike to.

Suunto's library of POI types is broader than I've seen in other watch brands. Besides the obvious—water, campsite, where you parked your car—you could also do some pretty detailed scouting for hunting, fishing, foraging, or wildlife watching. There are built-in POI types for noting where a deer seemed to have rubbed its antlers, where you've seen marine mammals, or where you've spotted mushrooms. You can save your current location as a POI from the watch or plan a trip before you leave by saving POIs on the map in the Suunto phone app.

I used this feature today to navigate to a favorite scenic overlook. You just have to plug in the POI as a Navigation Target under the options for your trail run or other activity. There's also a navigation app, accessible from the bottom of the widget list (select All Apps), and you can navigate without having an activity running.