The Suunto Race 2 has received quite a few updates over the original Suunto Race, including a bigger display, new and faster processor, longer battery life, and more. Well I have been testing this watch for a while now and today I’m going to give you my full thoughts on if the Race 2 is a worthwhile upgrade you should consider.  Let’s get to it. 

First lets get right to the pricing of the Suunto Race 2.  It did increase over the Race, and the stainless steel Race 2 like I have here retails for $499 USD, and the titanium version retails for $599.  Now that is an increase of about $50 over the prior watches.  

In the box you get the watch, the 22mm quick release silicone watch band that has the little push pin style clasp.  These types of watch bands have been around for quite a while on Suunto watches, and they work really well.  In the box you’ll also receive a new charging cable, as the charging ports on the Suunto Race 2 have changed.  Yep, another new charger from Suunto.  It would be really nice if we could get some consistency amongst the Suunto chargers.  

Right out of the box I did have to update to the latest firmware, and that took quite a while!  So don’t get too excited opening it, as you will likely have to spend 30-45 minutes getting it updated and the maps downloaded.  I only downloaded the Colorado maps, and it took a very long time!  Not sure why as many other brands it only took a minute or two to download, and those maps have more details on them, but just plan on the entire setup process taking about an hour.  

The first upgrade I want to talk about is the AMOLED display!  It is vivid, crisp, and easy to read in any lighting, just like on the original Race watch.  However, on the Race 2 the display is a high definition LTPO (Low-Temperature Polycrystalline Oxide) amoled that is now 1.5”!  This display is huge! It’s one of the largest displays I have tested.  The glass is sapphire crystal, which is incredibly durable and tough to damage. When running or cycling, or just sitting on the couch, a quick raise of the wrist and the display lights up.  Even in the bright Colorado sun, it is very easy to read and see the data on screen.  The display is up to 2000 nits of brightness, and you can change the brightness setting on the watch.  Even on the default medium setting, the AMOLED display is so easy to see.   

The new watch face is also really nice and easy to see!  Plus you can change two of the complications on the watch face, and you can see your exercise level over the last 4 weeks.  

Another cool feature of the bright 1.5” amoled display is the flashlight.  For me I customized the lower button to long press to turn on the flashlight.  The flashlight is actually very bright! Plenty of light to walk around at night, unlock your door, or maybe get clothes in the morning for a run without turning the main light on and waking up your significant other.  

As for the specifications on the Suunto Race 2, it’s nearly identical to the original Race, measuring at 49 x 49 x 12.5 mm, so it is actually a bit thinner than the original Race.  It is definitely a larger watch on the heavier side, but it does not feel overly large on my 16cm circumference wrist.  For reference you can see the size difference when compared to the Race, Race S, and now the Race 2.  The watch with the silicon band weighs in at 76 grams, which is a bit heavier than the original race.  

The button layout is the same, with the digital crown on the side, however it is now just a bit smaller than the crown on the original Race, and the same size as the crown on the Race S.  

Another huge upgrade to the Race 2 is with the processor.  The Race 2 uses the Ambiq Apollo 510 processor, which is the same processor COROS has been using in their PACE Pro, NOMAD, and APEX 4 watches.  This processor is very fast, and you can see the difference when comparing the Race vs the Race 2.  When navigating the menus on the Race 2, there is no lag and everything is very smooth and responsive.  One Race, it was not near as smooth.  This is really apparent when using the maps, which we will talk more about in a minute, but you can see the maps load very quickly on the Race 2 now.  

The Race 2 is available in either the stainless steel version like I have here, which has the stainless bezel and a The case is made of a glass reinforced polyamide (plastic), and like I said earlier the glass is sapphire crystal.  There is also a titanium version available, which has a grade 5 titanium bezel.  Interestingly, The case on the titanium version still has a case made of the same hardened plastic.  Either version should be very durable!  

The Race 2 is tested to the highest military standard for ruggedness (MIL-STD-810H) / from -20° C to +55° C, -5° F to +130° F, and it is water resistant down to 100m.  Plus, the watch looks really clean and nice! I kind of like the coral orange band color too.  

Now what really surprised me about the original Suunto Race was the battery life with the bright AMOLED display.  Well somehow Suunto figured out how to get the battery to last even longer!  With the Race 2, you can get up to 55 hours of battery life during an activity with the highest GPS settings in the Performance mode! There are 4 levels to choose from, which all increase the battery life, but reduce the GPS accuracy and turn other features off.  There is Endurance mode which will give you up to 65 hours, Ultra mode will give you up to 90 hours, and Tour mode will give you up to 200 hours but has the lowest GPS accuracy.  It is really simple to change too, when you are in an activity just scroll to Exercise Options, and then battery mode and select the mode you want.  So even with the Performance mode enabled, you will have more than enough to run any 100 mile ultra marathon out there.  And as you saw, mine straight off the charger actually had higher estimates of battery life too.

In daily use as a smartwatch mode you will get up to 18 days of use. The watch only takes about 2 hours to fully charge.  

Another upgrade on the Race 2 is to the optical heart rate sensor.  If you remember my review on the original Race, that was one of the weaker points in that watch was heart rate accuracy; and honestly in the Race S as well.  Well Suunto completely redesigned the optical heart rate sensor for the Race 2.  Just by looking at the three Race models, you clearly see it is much different.  Now on the Race 2, instead of 2 LED’s and 2 photo detectors, we have 6 LED’s and 4 large photo detectors.  My testing did yield some better, but not consistent results.  When I ran on the treadmill indoors, we can see the Race 2 and the COROS APEX 4 appeared to be very similar.  Over these two treadmill runs it does look like the Suunto takes slightly longer to read, but then both are very similar.  However, when I did a trail run on the New Sante Fe Trail, we can see the Race 2 was wildly different!  The Race 2 just seemed to steadily claim and at one point at the end it said my HR was 187bpm, while the COROS said 134bpm.  I definitely felt like 134bpm.  So not sure if this was just an oddity or what but not what I had hoped from the Suunto Race 2. 

Another result of the updated heart rate sensor is the charger has changed as now the contact points have shifted over the side.  

Next let's talk about GPS accuracy.  Both the Suunto Race 2 and the COROS watch were in their highest dual band settings.  Here we can see both appear to be very accurate with clean and consistent gps tracks.  So very accurate in my opinion. 

The Suunto Race 2 does have 32GBs of on board storage for maps, which like I said before you can download in the app, but that download did take quite a long time! The maps on Suunto devices have always been really nice, but now in late 2025 we have had so many improvements from other brands that it sort of feels like the Suunto is stuck in the past.  Don’t get me wrong, the Suunto Race 2 is great for navigating and the maps have a good amount of detail and there are different contrast levels you can choose.  However, the maps do not have any labels, trail or street names, and no Points of Interest.  It would be really nice to have labels and POI’s!  One great feature that Suunto has on their maps is the bearing navigation. You can select a bearing and lock it, so that when you are on the map you will see a red arrow for the bearing you locked.  This is very helpful when dead reckoning!  I actually really like this feature!

Plus when you create a route inside the Suunto app, you can turn on turn by turn navigation, which is really helpful too!

The Suunto Race 2 also tracks your sleep, has a built-in coach in the app, and you can control the music on your phone through the watch, but as far as a smart watch goes it also feels like it is stuck in the past a bit.  There is no ability to respond to text messages (unless you are on android and set some predetermined messages) or answer phone calls; there is also no contactless payment, no speaker or microphone either.  So many other brands have come out with some awesome features this year, and I would love to see Suunto do the same.  I like the weather widget as it is nice to see that on the watch.  

Now with that said, Suunto has been primarily known for their GPS accuracy, so if you only want a watch for tracking your runs or hikes, then the Suunto Race 2 is phenomenal at that!   

Well overall I think the Suunto Race 2 is a great watch when it comes to trail and ultra running, or hiking in the mountains.  The GPS accuracy is some of the best out there, and the battery life with that beautiful LTPO AMOLED display is nuts.  However, I am not sure the HR sensor upgrade is really an upgrade yet. I need to do some more testing on that.  

Well hopefully this review has been helpful to you if you are researching the Race 2.  If so, please consider using my affiliate link to purchase the watch as it will help support the channel but won't cost you a penny extra.  

Affiliate Link: https://suunto.pxf.io/N9jE2O 

Video Review: https://youtu.be/zkWH2dFSuKE