Coros Dura Solar GPS Review: An Unpolished Gem – Travis Engel | The Radavist | A group of individuals who share a love of cycling and the outdoors.

The Coros Dura GPS unit grabbed headlines this summer with its claims of a 120-hour battery life. In theory, that could even be extended indefinitely thanks to the integrated solar panel. But Travis dove deep into the drop-down menus and found the stuff below those headlines to be just as interesting.

You can’t talk about the Coros Dura GPS unit without mentioning battery life. It’s like trying to talk about Mad Max: Fury Road without mentioning practical special effects. And something about that kinda bugs me. Not because there’s actually a fair amount of CGI behind Fury Road’s spectacle. But because there’s also a whole dang movie behind it. All the flame-throwing guitars in the world won’t save a film if it isn’t well structured and well acted. Fury Road‘s set pieces were not the only reason it was successful. Those set pieces supported a larger vision. It’s the same with the Coros Dura. That battery life feels like an organic component of a larger package. Aspects like the minimalist interface and mid-sized display all point to a product that’s designed to do its job and then fade into the background. Easing range anxiety with a long-lasting battery is just one part of that. But it’s a part I definitely have to cover, so I’ll get it out of the way first.

Coros Dura Quick Hits

960 mAh battery
Up to 120 hours (claimed) on a single charge
Solar panel offers 2 hours of ride time for every 1 hour of direct sunlight (claimed)
2.7” (diagonal) screen, 240×400 pixels
3.92″ x 2.39″ x 0.62″ device dimensions
Touchscreen controls with physical indexed knob/button, and one separate button
Garmin quarter-turn mount (Out-Front-style bracket included for 25.4 or 31.8 bars)
Included global Open Street Map background maps downloadable to device by region
Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and ANT+ connectivity
$250

Battery Life and Solar Charging

Although the Coros Dura’s battery-life claim is rightfully its most attractive feature, it’s also the feature I think about the least. I’ve had it for almost two months, and I already take for granted the fact that I haven’t yet fully drained the battery. It’s like when I went tubeless on my mountain bike. Flat tires were once a weekly occurrence. But now, I need to mark my calendar to remember when it’s time to add sealant.

Everyone’s probably seen the numbers … especially if you just read the Quick Hits listed above. Coros says the Dura will last up to 120 hours on a single charge, or 70 hours when set to the higher-accuracy “dual-frequency” mode. I can’t precisely check that claim like I’m weighing a handlebar or measuring a tire. And I can’t quantify how much work the solar charger was doing. The unit was in my shadow more often than not, but solar panels do still get some juice from indirect sunlight. I can only say that, regardless of whether I was navigating, measuring heart-rate, or simply tracking a ride, the battery seemed to drop less than 1% per hour. Or, a more impressive testimonial comes from Radavist pal, Mel Webb, who only charged hers once in 13 days at Silk Road Mountain Race in Kyrgyzstan in August.

I’m not an engineer, but I’m gonna guess that the memory-in-pixel (MIP) display is partly to thank. MIP displays don’t require as powerful a backlight to be readable in sunny conditions. But more interestingly, each pixel is controlled by its own RAM. A traditional LCD or OLED or AMOLED display gets refreshed top to bottom every time anything on the screen changes. But if an individual MIP pixel doesn’t change color or brightness when a map or menu moves, that pixel doesn’t ask for any processing power. Think of it like old cell-animated cartoons. Elmer Fudd got redrawn every time he moved, but the forest behind him was always the same static matte painting.

Charging Time

Even on two- or three-day trips riding from sunrise to well past sunset, you’re not likely to need to charge the Coros Dura until you get home. But if you do need to charge it mid-journey, it’s fast. I clocked that it took just 10 minutes for every 8% recharge, whether it was plugged into the wall or into my battery bank. One reason is that we’re living in the era of USB-C, but the other is that the battery on the Coros Dura isn’t actually that big. It’s 960 mAh. Compare that to the Wahoo Elemnt Roam, which also has a 2.7” color screen, but has a 2,000 mAh battery. Not sure if there’s more to thank than the MIP display for the Dura’s longevity, but either way, the proof is in the pudding.

Value

I couldn’t think of a good Mad Max analogy for value. Otherwise, I might have opened this review with that instead. $250 for what the Coros Dura offers is pretty unreal. A Garmin Edge 130 Plus mapping GPS is $200 for a black and white 2” display with only a fraction of the features offered by the Coros Dura. The Wahoo Element Roam is a little closer, with a full color 2.7” display, but that goes for $400. Then there’s the Garmin Edge 1040 Solar, which has a significantly bigger 3.5” touchscreen display. It’s $750. The Coros Dura is a remarkable value.

Dial and Buttons

Although you can perform most actions via the touchscreen, there are also mechanical inputs that roughly follow the design language in Coros’s line of watches. There’s a rotating knob that doubles as a button when compressed, and one other button below it. Rolling the knob to scroll through options is sort of a love-or-hate thing. It’s fine when at a stop, but it was a challenge when riding. The knob is indexed, but those indexes are very gentle, quiet, and close together.

In contrast, the knobs on the Bookman lights I recently reviewed are about twice the size, the clicks are further apart, and they actually make a positive audible “snap.” Also, the relationship between clicking the Dura’s knob and scrolling its menu items wasn’t always one-to-one. It tended to vary by speed and context. Slow, methodical clicks would (usually) move the menu up or down by one item. And extended turns would (usually) set the menu in motion until I stopped turning. So, I found the trick was to “swipe” the knob, instead of twisting it. This is actually how Coros suggests interacting with the knob (which they call a “crown”). A short, quick pass with the thumb may be three clicks in reality, but it would register as one menu item on-screen. It was all a little inconsistent, but I got used to it like I do most new electronic gadgets. I always have to meet them halfway. Like, the Coros Dura buttons have no “Play” or “Menu” or “Back” icons. Their function is contextual, but usually intuitive. Bonus points that the process of ending a ride requires some clicking and holding, and it’d be hard to end a ride accidentally. For the most part, compressing the knob was “Select,” and compressing the button below it was “Back.” Or, there was always the touchscreen.

Touchscreen

GPS touchscreens have come a long way. My Garmin 1030 was once the standard for luxury. But by today’s standards, swiping between its data fields feels slow and clunky. Navigating the Coros Dura menu is a bit more pleasant. The reactions are quick and consistent, though there isn’t that satisfying sensation that you’re pushing around a physical object beneath a thin sheet of glass. It’s more like the gestures are registering as button prompts or knob turns. I could occasionally sweep my thumb and scroll past multiple menu items at once, but it seemed to work best if I swiped once for each tick up or down a list. Kinda like how I treated the physical dial. And that actually had its perks, especially when I was moving. It offers consistency that can be hard to get in a freeform touchpad.

The only scenario the touchscreen functionality really fell short was when 2D-scrolling and zooming around the map. There’s a distracting delay that had me reaching for my phone if I ever had any big complicated decisions to make. To be fair, though, this is a 2.7” display. Even if I could pinch and zoom on the Dura like it were running Google Earth, map exploration would be something I’d rarely do on this kind of device.

As for the screen itself, it’s of course a “capacitive,” not “resistive” type. Meaning it reads input like your phone, not like a credit-card terminal. Resistive displays are technically better in gloves or in rain, but they take a lot of pressure and are only on low-tech devices these days. The Dura usually works fine with gloves if they’re touchscreen compatible, but it wasn’t 100%. Sometimes, I had to give my finger a gentle hawk-tuah for it to register.

Speaking of moisture, the screen was reasonably tolerant of water. Late summer in southern California isn’t the time or the place to evaluate rain functionality, but even with a healthy test dribble from the water bottle, I rarely got it to misread an input. Worst case, there’s a “map only” touch screen setting that limits all non-map inputs to the physical controls, allowing you to zoom or scroll the map if you really need to.

Screen Size, Color and Brightness

Until now, I’d usually use a 3.5” Garmin 1030 on long rides in unfamiliar areas where I relied on navigation. But I’ve done some semi-local races where I only needed breadcrumbs. My 2” Lezyne Macro Plus screen did just fine in that setting. Where my bare-bones GPS unit fell short was oblique intersections, especially when singletrack mixed with fire road mixed with paved road. I guess I would learn soon enough if I’d made the wrong decision, but it was annoying.

I enjoyed learning and making decisions on rides, I would use a map and compass. The Garmin 1030’s robust background map removes a lot of that guesswork, which is why it was my go-to when I was out of my comfort zone. But after testing the Coros Dura, I think I’m gonna retire both my Lezyne and my Garmin. The Dura’s battery life is far better than my minimalist devices, and its high-contrast color palette and adequate resolution do more to point the way than simply a bigger screen.

The Dura’s screen is nothing crazy. 400 x 240 pixels with 64 colors. But it’s not like I’m editing photos with this thing. I just want to know at a glance if the line approaching my little blue arrow is a trail, a road, or a river. And I always could, even on the “normal” backlight brightness. Maybe it’s becauseI’ve been conditioned to accept dim screens, but I was rarely even tempted to switch to the brighter setting. Again, the MIP display doesn’t drown in sunlight, and it’s plenty vibrant in the shade. With just a quick glance downward, I could quickly see and interpret all the info I needed within the 2.7” screen. Even when I shrank it to 2” during customization.

Screen Customization

Of course, you get the option to create multiple activity profiles and stack them with however many data screens, each with however much or little info that you want. It’s kind of frustrating that the activity-profile names are more like bike-profile names. Things like “MTB,” “Gravel,” or “E-Bike,” instead of “Touring,” “Training,” or “Commuting.” But there are plenty to choose from, so I had no problem making all the profiles I needed. And within those profiles, the choices are almost overwhelming. Beyond all the normal stuff like ride time or elevation gain, there’s a glut of training metrics and extensive integration with other accessories or components. I’ll get to that later.

I think the standout feature is the “split-screen” setting, which allows you to put three data fields in the lower quarter of the screen, leaving the rest for the map. And you can have multiple split-screen pages, all with the map up top, but different metrics at the bottom. On my Lezyne or my Garmin, I’m frequently swiping back and forth if I’m curious about my accumulated elevation gain, remaining battery life, or even just the time of day. I should mention that, if it’s just a clock and battery gauge you want, a quick tap of the Dura’s screen in any mode during a ride will bring that up for a couple seconds.

My only issue with split-screen mode was that it’s always split-screen. There’s no option to add one full-screen map page if you only want the bottom data fields to be visible of the time. Not a deal-breaker, though. Especially because it should be easy for Coros to fix with a firmware update in the future if enough people ask for it. I did.

Mounting

Kudos to Coros for sticking with the Garmin mount. Garmin mounts are everywhere. I’m a bit of an outlier, but I counted seven of them in my cluttered technology drawer. Somehow, though, I appreciate that I now have one more after the Coros Dura arrived. It integrates nicely with the profile on the back of the device. And it only sticks out barely far enough to clear the stem. It’s just a bummer that the clamp doesn’t fit up to 35 mm bar, so I had to dip into my own supply of mounts to use the Dura on the mountain bike I’m currently reviewing. It’s also a bummer that the device doesn’t come with a security lanyard, but I had plenty of those too. And quick post-publish edit: future Coros Dura units will come with a lanyard.

Third-Party App Integration

You can tell by looking at the app integration list that Coros is a wearables brand first, a bike accessory brand second. There’s a lot of running and training apps in their roster of partners. But I recognized a few of them. Strava and Kmoot are there, of course. There’s also Ride With GPS, which is my route-maker of choice. I ran into a glitch sharing routes directly from RWGPS to Coros, but they’re working on it. Anyway, it’s easy enough to download a GPX file and send it to the device, which I talk about below. Strava route planning works fine, though. The routes I made there showed up in the Coros app immediately. And sharing in the other direction, the rides I recorded on the Dura showed up in Strava as soon as I was finished and back in cell service. I do miss my Lezyne, whose manual upload process gave me a minute to crop, add photos, and think of a clever ride name. But I guess automatic sync is the way these days.

It’s fair to say that Coros is still actively expanding into more cycling-specific app integration. They’re working on offering Strava Live Segments, as well as direct route sharing with Trailforks. Keeping in mind that the Dura is their first bike device, and that it launched less than four months ago, I think they’re doing pretty good.

Notifications

Like many GPS units, the Coros Dura will alert you if you get a call, text, or email, as well as other apps that display notifications on your phone. There’s no “notifications” data field in the screen customization, so if you want to read more than what’s displayed when the notification comes through, you have to exit out onto the main menu to scroll through those notifications. Or you can just pull out your phone.

Route Downloading

It’s funny how old-school I am about putting GPX files on my devices. I like plugging in my Garmin via a (data-compatible) USB cable as if it’s a thumb drive, and dragging and dropping the GPX file into it. That requires a laptop, but if I’m planning a ride that involves navigation, there’s always a laptop involved at some point. That’s not an option with the Coros Dura. Everything happens through (or from) the mobile app. But at least the Dura’s “manual” method is still reasonably intuitive. I’ve only had the iPhone (not Android) experience. I start by getting the GPX file on my phone, whether via email, or download. And when I find the file and “share” it, I scroll past traditional sharing methods like “Messages” or “Gmail,” and choose the Coros app icon. That takes me to the app, where I can edit and save it to my routes. But my favorite method was AirDrop. Partially because it reminded me of the drag-and-drop days, but also because it immediately brought up a dialogue box where I could tap Coros, and there it was. Either method takes you to a screen where there’s a big blue button at the bottom to sync it with the device, and it’ll be there for your next ride.

Route Planning

I usually avoid planning a route on my phone at all costs. It’s small, clumsy, and I just don’t trust my phone not to let an app crash or get interrupted. But in a pinch, the Coros routemaking function actually isn’t that bad. It’s responsive and fast, and I have yet to come across a missing trail or road that I know exists in real life. I’ve been using the Coros app’s OSM Outdoors map layer, but there’s also a satellite option if I need to double-check something. I do have to fight it sometimes, though. Seems like it’s programmed to route around especially steep hills, so I have to brute-force certain sections of a route if I know it’s where I want to go.

Also, it’d be really nice if route planning could happen offline. Sometimes I need to call an audible on a backcountry trip, and I’d like to be able to create a detour and just send it to the device. But there’s no way to do that without cell service or wifi. That said–and this will be a recurring theme in this review–this could potentially be a feature they would add in the future if enough people ask.

Navigation Experience

Once your route is built and synced, you can select it on the device and start your ride. You follow the ubiquitous blue line, dotted with white arrows. And occasionally, there’s the turn-by-turn cue that pops up at the bottom of the screen. Cues are always an overlay on the map, and aren’t an optional split-screen data field. And for me, these cues were relatively reliable. There were some early reviews of the Dura saying that cues were inaccurate. They’d predict U-turns when it was clearly a left, or ignore turns altogether. But I had no such issue. In fact, there were noticeably few distracting “U-TURN, 200FT” notifications when there happened to just be a switchback in the singletrack. It did happen sometimes, especially when the base map clocked an offshoot that actually had nothing to do with my route, but it was rare. You can also turn off turn-by-turn notifications entirely. That’s how I ran it most of the time. And if I was ever confused, the device’s gyroscope is extremely quick and accurate. It was easy to scan the device around like a video-game mini-map to make sure I was pointing where I wanted to.

There’s also refreshingly few unwarranted “off-course” notifications. My Garmin and Lezyne units would often get a little back-seat-driver-y the moment I made a sharper than 45° turn to check out a view. The Coros Dura is a bit more relaxed. Maybe a little too relaxed for some tastes. Although notifications would pop up very quickly (which I’ve heard is an improvement over the state it was in at launch) there’s currently no way to have an audible off-course alert. Because the screen is bright and high-contrast, it only took a quick look to make sure I was on track. But I found myself looking more often than I liked because I knew it was my job to make sure I was handling the intersections, so I’m hoping they’ll add audible off-course notifications in the future.

More difficult to add is an offline rerouting function. Like route-making, it can only happen when you’re in cell service. So, you’d better be sure the shortcut you’re tempted by will indeed get you back to your blue line, because the device isn’t currently able to draw a new one for you. I’ve also heard complaints about the device base map not including street names. I’m usually reading the map and the road, though. Not the words, so I didn’t miss it. And like the online map in the phone, the base map in the device seemed to be very thorough, featuring every little obscure spur I knew of in my mountains. And best of all, everything is free (and fast) to download directly to the device over wifi.

Climbing Breakdowns

Every time you encounter a long enough climb while navigating a saved route on the Coros Dura, it can show you a breakdown of its various grades and your progress on it. It’s a useful way to see when there’s a steep section and when you’ll get a short respite. And it’s a great use of the split-screen mode because it can be one of the optional data fields below the map. But if you’re using full-screen mode, it’s a mandatory data field below the map. This didn’t pose a problem during navigation because it takes up only a small bit of screen space, but I still wish there were a way to turn it off and stay full-screen full-time. Sometimes, I don’t want to know how far I am from the top of a climb, but I did want the cleanliness of a full-screen map. It’s a small nitpick, though. When in split-screen mode, I can simply have another screen configuration active if I don’t want to see the climb breakdown. Plus, unlike the similar (but optional) feature on Garmin, every climb doesn’t take over the whole screen the moment I reach it, so I’d call it a step forward.

Accessory Integration

At the moment, you can pair a heart rate monitor, power meter, or certain electronic drivetrain components with the Coros Dura. But a more feature-rich integration ecosystem is currently active in an open beta of an updated Coros app. That includes lights so you can keep tabs on their battery life, or radar units so you can keep tabs on approaching vehicles. And there’s talk of more additions in the future. One coming improvement I hope to see involves SRAM AXS. I was able to pair my drivetrain (but not yet my seatpost) with the device, and there will be data fields for remaining battery life. That could cut out the need to check derailleur and shifter battery through the AXS app, but it’s not designed for people like me with multiple AXS bikes. There’s no way to tell which component you’re paring without lengthy trial and error. But they’re working on a solution for this. It may even be nice to have a reminder on my bar of which rear cog I’m in. Point is, AXS integration isn’t polished, but it’s promising.

The power meter and heart-rate monitor integration is clean and simple. I don’t have the vocabulary to critique how Coros does it better or worse than anyone else, since I’m not very hands-on with my fitness. But I do have a power meter that I play with once in a while, and it wakes up and pairs without fuss. Same goes for the Coros heart-rate monitor, which I also plan to play with once in a while. It’s got Fitbit-level polish, and is more comfortable and convenient than a chest-mount monitor. And I’ve never liked riding with a watch on my wrist. The Coros monitor is $80, which is more than you have to pay for a heart-rate monitor, but it’s on par with other brand-name, sometimes less-sleek options. It’s a worthy addition if you’re looking for a training companion you don’t already have a monitor. Coros is very much into training.

Training Features

My apologies, dear reader, if you made it this far into the review expecting an in-depth analysis of the Coros Dura’s training features. I have a basic understanding of how that world works, but I’ve barely ever set foot in it. All I can say is that the amount of metrics on offer is pretty impressive. If you want to know something, chances are it can tell you. And then there’s what it asks you. There’s the standard height and weight stuff, as well as the slightly off-putting question, “sex assigned at birth.” But Coros tells me an update is coming with a more modern approach to the profile page, including one that doesn’t default to a gendered caucasian avatar.

That’s just the start, though. All the zones and peaks and percentages for heart rate and power and pace made my head spin. One thing I do know a bit about is functional threshold power, or “FTP.” It’s a way to find out how much power you can sustainably put out, and it’s a bit of a faff to calculate on your own. But there’s an FTP test that’s integrated into the device that makes it pretty easy and foolproof. I wish I could go into this more, but given how thorough Coros is about training, I’d say you are in good hands.

App Usability

Like any piece of technology, using the Coros app is a learning experience. It’s not always obvious what path to follow to tweak what feature or access what function. But I’ve got fewer complaints about Coros than I do about Apple and Google. It’s become second nature to find which routes are saved on the device and which are just on the phone. Or to get under the hood and start shuffling data pages around. Nothing is broken or obtuse. But if something is ever missing, there’s a tab right there to make suggestions for improvements or additions. All the times I’ve mentioned that a feature is coming or an issue will be fixed is proof that Coros isn’t afraid to treat this like a work in progress. I know I’ll be making suggestions in the coming months. And syncing with the device is impressively fast. I find that speed varies widely among brands, but for some reason, Garmin seems to be the worst. I’ll sit for several minutes waiting for a route or an activity to sync. Everything was almost instant with the Coros Dura.

And when it comes to cycling electronics, usability perks like these are not just a quality-of-life thing. They’re a quality-of-ride thing. One of the many overused criticisms of modern bike technology is that it’s complicated. That bikes used to be simple, and that it was better that way. I’m not here to argue one way or another when it comes to things like suspension or drivetrains or droppers. But when it comes to tiny computers that fit in the palm of our hands, that ship has sailed.

Smartphones are part of daily life for most of us. And if used in moderation, they can make daily life better. Especially the parts of daily life when smartphones are the furthest thing from our minds. When I know I can hail a ride or check a showtime or book a table at any moment, I find I can be more present during the rest of my day. A well designed GPS unit is the same thing. It plays a supportive, not central, role on a ride. And the Coros Dura does exactly that. It’s not so sleek and feature-rich that you’re tempted to interact with it any more than you have to, and it’s not so small and simple that you need to frequently supplement it with a smartphone.

But I’ve got to come back to the battery life as what really has me sold on this thing. I can leave it on and the brightness up for days at a time, and I don’t worry about running out of power. It’s just there, making my experience better when I need it to, and disappearing from my mind when I don’t. Not unlike one of Immortan Joe’s War Boys, teetering on an inverted pendulum in the back of an El Camino.