Garmin CIRQA now vibrates for incoming calls and messages

So much for keeping phone notifications off your wrist. Garmin has added vibration alerts for incoming calls and messages to CIRQA, despite previously saying its screenless fitness tracker wouldn’t support them. The change comes with firmware version 4.20.

Garmin has changed its mind

When CIRQA first arrived, Garmin was pretty clear about what it wanted the $199.99 tracker to be. You got health monitoring, activity tracking, recovery metrics and a vibration motor for alarms, but none of the usual smartwatch distractions.

In fact, when we covered Garmin’s explanation of CIRQA’s design choices, the company had confirmed that phone calls and notifications would not trigger vibrations. It wasn’t a hardware limitation, either, since the vibration motor was already there.

Now Garmin has reversed that decision. The official firmware 4.20 changelog specifically mentions support for vibration alerts from smart notifications and incoming calls.

There’s a slightly amusing detail here. Garmin’s own CIRQA support FAQ still says the band cannot vibrate for phone calls, text messages or other smartphone notifications. Clearly, someone hasn’t got around to updating that page.

Of course, CIRQA still doesn’t have a display. So you won’t be reading messages or checking who’s calling directly on your wrist. The band simply gives you a physical nudge when something arrives, leaving you to check your phone for the details.

A few workout improvements too

There’s more to version 4.20 than notifications. Garmin has added automatic Run/Walk detection for Trail Run activities.

Indoor workouts get some attention as well. Users can now calibrate recorded distance for treadmill running, indoor rowing and indoor cycling before saving an activity, while the Live Activity screen in Garmin Connect can show heart rate before recording begins.

Version 4.20 follows the substantial 3.20 update released in September, which introduced additional button controls and several Bluetooth-related changes.