Garmin has released the public beta of Edge 1050 features, for the Edge 540/840/1040 units.
This allows those eager to start reporting that angry dog on the road as a ‘road hazard’ (or Dairy Queen as an obstruction), now you can. All the non-hardware features of the Edge 1050 were released last night in public beta on the Edge 540, 840 and 1040. The Edge Explore 2 public beta has not yet appeared.
I want to briefly admit that I think this is the first time Garmin has actually pulled new hardware + beta firmware for existing devices on the *same day*. Historically, that gap of new features coming to older devices has been anywhere from a few weeks to ‘never’. Earlier this month, when I met with the Edge team, they said their goal was to release it on the same day as the Edge 1050. I smiled and said “That’s awesome!”, while inside my head I said “Uh- huh … of course you will, just like my kids will pick up Legos on the floor.” So kudos to them for actually pulling it off.
I legitimately think there is a difference, from a brand perception point of view, when companies do this. It’s become a bit more popular over the past few years, but it’s still kind of rare to do both of these things at the same time.
In any case, in detail!
New features:
If you’d like to see the full release notes, you’ll find the 09.23 public beta details here:
– Garmin Edge 540/840 Public Beta
– Garmin Edge 1040 Public Beta
As a reminder, Garmin switched to WiFi downloads a long time ago (so you don’t have to manually copy files back and forth), and so you just need to change the beta option for your device in Garmin Connect:
Anyway, let’s get to the big-ticket features (there are more listed in the release notes above that are minor things or fixes). I’ve included screenshots of what it looks like on the Edge 1050, although the functionality is the same on the Edge 540/840/1040.
Added GroupRide prices and climbing races: This includes both mid-ride climbing challenges/competitions and post-ride prizes. Here is the mid-ride boarding price:
And then after the ride, with my wife on the Edge 840 beta the other night, and myself on the Edge 1050:
Added GroupRide incident detection: Now, in a GroupRide, if it crashes, it will notify others in your group, with a very loud and overwhelming alarm. Your friends won’t miss you, even if you do.
Added support for road hazards: This allows you to report road hazards (dangerous animals, obstacles, potholes, slippery objects and general hazards) as well as see them. You can then confirm/decline any risks that are seen. Here’s what an upcoming hazard looks like, first the little red block and then if you tap it, to see more details:
Added surface type support, including on the map: This includes upcoming unpaved road alerts during the trip and road surface types in the post-trip summary. Here is an example of the next surface alert:
Added Wi-Fi map download support (840/1040 only): This eliminates the need to connect a computer to download maps for other regions or to update your existing maps. It will now do this over WiFi. Edge 540 is not supported due to memory issues.
Add Garmin Share: This allows you to transfer courses, locations and workouts to other Garmin devices, directly, without the need for an internet connection. This is just like the transfer capabilities of old, but completely revamped and designed to be the new standard for Garmin cycling gear, wearables and other devices (you’ll see it in future public releases of the Garmin series Fenix 7/Epix).
Updated course creator added (840/1040 only): This allows you to create multi-point courses directly on the unit, compared to previous round-trip and one-way courses.
Added wind and stability adjustments to Power Guide: Essentially, PowerGuide will now account for instances where your Stamina is draining too quickly or the wind conditions have changed.
Updated grading algorithm to be much more responsive: I described this in my review, but in short, it causes gradient feedback such as when you have a short/steep section that changes quickly from 0% to 10%, be almost instantaneous. It is now on par or better than the Hammerhead and Wahoo in my testing.
Final thoughts:
As always, remember that this is a (public) beta. As such, there will probably be quirks and things that need to be fixed. I’ve been using the Edge 1050 software versions for a while, and it’s been very stable. But I haven’t spent much time on the public beta versions of the Edge 540/840/1040. Although, my wife has a few rides on the Edge 840 beta, and so far it has survived. However, some features like Garmin Share between Edge 840 beta and Edge 1050 seemed a bit…beta (worked fine for me from Edge 1050 to Edge 1050). But again, that’s the point of beta.
As for other features, you won’t see things like the bike bell or the completely revamped UI design style, as both of those require new hardware found on the Edge 1050. In the case of the bike, this requires the new hardware version of the speaker capable of talking and more (as opposed to a simple buzzer on the Edge 540/840/1040). And then the new interface requires a much faster processor, found in the dual-core processor on the new Edge 1050.
But otherwise, almost every other feature has been removed. Garmin says they see the Edge 1040/1040 Solar as an essential part of the line for those who want the longest battery life, and it will continue to receive feature updates like the Edge 1050. We hope that remains the case for some time to come. tall.
With that – thanks for reading!
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