I walked 7,000 steps with the Garmin Cirqa vs Fitbit Air — and there's a clear winner

(Image credit: Dan Bracaglia/Tom's Guide)

Which new screen-free fitness tracker is more accurate, the Fitbit Air or the Garmin Cirqa? I decided to find out by popping one on either wrist and logging a long walk.Even though the Garmin Cirqa is twice the cost of the Fitbit Air — $199 vs $99 — these two trackers have a lot in common. Screen-free, your primary method for interacting with either is through the companion app. That said, the Cirqa also has one physical button to start and stop workouts.More importantly, neither has onboard GPS, so both require you to bring your paired phone along when logging an outdoor workout so that they can piggyback off its location and elevation data.Now, on to the test!Fitbit Air vs Garmin Cirqa: Walk test rules

(Image credit: Dan Bracaglia/Tom's Guide)I manually counted 7,000 steps — using my trusty $6 tally counter to log every hundred — with the Fitbit Air on my left wrist and the Garmin Cirqa on my right wrist to determine which is the more accurate fitness tracker.I also ran Strava on my iPhone 16 Plus for additional step count, distance, elevation, and pace data. For the Fitbit Air, I manually began a walking workout from the Google Health app. For the Garmin Cirqa, I started the workout by pressing the single button. This proved to be a mistake.Fitbit Air vs Garmin Cirqa: Walk test results