Field notes 4 MIN READ
Getting a route out of Garmin Connect
Garmin gives you the file your watch actually wrote, which makes it the better source on a hilly day. Here is where the export lives, on web and in the app.
Garmin Connect holds the file your watch actually wrote. That is a meaningful difference from a copy that has been through somebody else's processing.
On the web
Open the activity at connect.garmin.com. In the top right of the activity there is a gear or three-dot menu, and inside it two options that both do what you want:
- Export to GPX — converted to the universal format. Choose this if you want a file that nothing will argue with. - Export Original — the untouched FIT file the device recorded, often gzipped.
Either works. Original carries slightly more.
In the app
Open the activity, then the menu in the top corner. Depending on the version this is three dots or a share icon. The export sits in that menu and saves through the normal share sheet, so you can drop it straight into a file app or mail it to yourself.
Why bother, when Strava already has it
Because of elevation.
A Garmin with a barometric altimeter measures air pressure and derives altitude from it. That is the number in the FIT file. Strava re-processes elevation on its side, sometimes using its own terrain database instead, and applies its own smoothing before it reports a total.
Neither is wrong. They are answers to slightly different questions. But if you are printing a profile under the line, the file that has been touched least is the better one to draw from.
On a flat ride it makes no difference worth the extra clicks.
What we do with it
Where the file states an elevation gain in its metadata, we print that number rather than one we computed. A recomputed total depends on a threshold — how much continuous climbing counts as climbing — and moving that threshold moves the answer by hundreds of metres. The number on your watch is the number you remember, so it is the one that goes on the paper.
Questions people actually ask
- Should I export from Garmin or from Strava?
- Garmin, if the ride had real climbing. Garmin gives you the file the watch wrote, including its barometric altitude. Strava's copy has been through Strava's own elevation processing.
- What is the difference between Export to GPX and Export Original?
- Export to GPX converts to the universal format. Export Original gives the untouched FIT file the device recorded. Original is the better source; GPX is the safer one if something downstream is fussy.
- Can I export from the Garmin Connect phone app?
- Yes. Open the activity, use the menu in the top corner and choose the export option. On some versions it is under a share icon rather than a three-dot menu.
- Does a Garmin file work if the watch has no barometer?
- Yes, it just means the elevation came from GPS rather than pressure, which is noisier. Positions are unaffected, so the drawing is identical.
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