Garmin Quick Workout: Let Your Watch Decide How to Run Today
Most runners head out at the same pace every time. Quick Workout builds a guided run in seconds: pick how hard you want to train and how much time you have, and your Garmin does the rest.
Don't know how to run today? Let your Garmin decide
Most runners just head out the door and run the same pace every single time. It's comfortable, but it's also why so many of us stop getting faster. Your Garmin can fix that in seconds, with a feature called Quick Workout.
You only answer two questions
- How hard do you want to train? Choose from easy up to very hard
- How much time do you have? 30, 45 or 60 minutes
Your watch then builds a guided run to match:
- Easy: a base run at a relaxed, conversational pace
- Moderate: a tempo run, around your marathon pace
- Hard: a run that pushes you towards your threshold pace
- Very hard: short sprint intervals
What you see during the run
Once you start, a dedicated workout screen shows which step you're in, the pace you should hit, and how you're doing against it. You don't need to remember a plan or do maths mid-run: the watch tells you when to speed up, when to recover and when you're done.
How to find it
- Start a Run, but don't start the timer yet
- Open the activity's menu and scroll down to Training
- Select Quick Workout
- Pick your intensity and duration, and start running
Which watches have Quick Workout
It launched on the Forerunner 70 and 170, and Garmin has since rolled it out to most of its current running and outdoor watches:
- Forerunner 70, 170, 570 and 970
- Venu 4 and Venu X1
- vívoactive 6, added with software update 18.29 in September 2026
- fēnix 8 and fēnix 8 Pro, fēnix E, Enduro 3, tactix 8 and quatix 8
Got one of these but can't find it under Training? Update your watch's software first: on several models it arrived in an update rather than out of the box.
Garmin doesn't list it yet for the Forerunner 165, 265 and 965, the Venu 3 and vívoactive 5, or the newest fēnix 9, MARQ (Gen 3) and Enduro 4.
Two things to keep in mind
- The pace targets assume a good day. On a hilly route, in heat or on tired legs, run by feel and treat the target as a guide, not an order
- Don't make every run a hard one. Keep the hard and very hard options for one or two runs a week, and let the easy runs actually be easy
Perfect when you don't want a full plan
Quick Workout is ideal if you don't want to follow a structured training plan but still want some variety in your week. Pick hard on the days you feel good, easy when you don't, and you'll be training smarter without planning anything.
Want more structure? You can also build your own interval workouts, or let PacePro pace your next race.
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