There was an undeniable cuteness when runners referred to Strava and Garmin as “Mom and Dad” last week. But the endearing monickers belied strong tensions as the two brands find themselves engaged in a legal battle that threatens to end the pair’s longtime partnership. It’s a clash that has left runners, cyclists, and athletes hoping for a quick and peaceful resolution.
“Have you seen the news that Mom and Dad are fighting?” California ultrarunner Andy Glaze said in a now-viral TikTok video. “I’m sitting here with my thousand-dollar watch and my $80 app and thinking, can we just get a family meeting and start getting along again?”
For the uninitiated: Garmin smartwatches have become as ubiquitous as iPhones among marathoners and other serious athletes, offering an easy way to track distances and racing times. Strava, similarly, is the go-to platform for athletes’ outdoor resumes, showcasing their best times for all to see. In other words, runners and cyclists typically track their activity on Garmin and then upload it to Strava.
But now, a quarrel between the brands threatens this longstanding status quo.
On Sept. 30, Strava filed a lawsuit against Garmin in a Colorado court, alleging that two of Garmin’s features had infringed on Strava’s own patents, violating an agreement between the companies. The lawsuit has surprised many in the running and cycling communities. After all, Garmin has been Strava’s most important business partner for a decade. And Strava’s lawsuit makes some major demands.
The brand is seeking damages, but also wants to stop Garmin from selling watches that include the claimed patent infringements.
Representatives for both Garmin and Strava declined to answer GearJunkie’s questions about the legal battle.
Strava–Garmin Lawsuit: The Details
The first feature at issue in Strava’s lawsuit is “segments,” or stretches of trail that allow users to compare performances on the same route. Strava is also suing over Garmin’s use of heatmaps, which are visual representations of the most popular places to run or ride.
In its lawsuit, Strava demands that Garmin stop selling devices that use these features, which would likely include most of Garmin’s smartwatches. However, many running influencers and other observers don’t think it’s likely that Strava will convince a court to prohibit sales of Garmin products.
A close examination of Strava’s legal claims has puzzled even many of its longtime defenders. Ray Maker, better known by his YouTube moniker DC Rainmaker, pieced together a thorough chronology of the patent history for both of the features at issue in Strava’s lawsuit. His conclusion? The brand’s claims don’t make a lot of sense.
“Heatmaps and the generation of routes across them were simply not a Strava invention, nor were they new,” Maker wrote. He made a similar argument about the “segments” feature. “This just seems like an incredibly bizarre move that’s almost certain to backfire.”
That’s certainly the reaction of many online comments as well. Matt Salazar, Strava’s Chief Product Officer, made a Reddit post stating he would be “setting the record straight on Garmin.”
However, Salazar then criticized Garmin for a completely different issue than those mentioned in the lawsuit: “On July 1st, Garmin announced new developer guidelines for all of its API partners, including Strava, that required the Garmin logo to be present on every single activity post, screen, graph, image, sharing card etc…We consider this to be blatant advertising.”
Most of the comments on the Strava subreddit post, however, were not supportive of Salazar’s argument — or Strava’s lawsuit. The post received 0 upvotes, but more than 1,400 comments.
Signs of Peace Ahead?
While Strava declined to answer GearJunkie’s questions, the brand did respond to TechRadar this week. The brand seemed to suggest it will capitulate to Garmin’s new demands about including the Garmin logo on activities and other functions.
“While we don’t agree with the extensive branding Garmin is forcing, uninterrupted connectivity for the subset of our community that uses Garmin remains our top priority, and we have also decided that we will give similar attribution to all of our device partners going forward to be fair,” a Strava representative told the publication.
In other words, the brand is wary of alienating too much of its customer base by interrupting the Garmin connectivity that so many users rely on. But it’s still unclear if Strava will withdraw its lawsuit and avoid further actions against its longtime partner.
For many observers and longtime Strava users, the battle is reminiscent of rule changes that Strava initiated last year. In 2024, Strava also changed the rules for many brands that partnered with it. That meant that some of its longtime partners, like TrailForks, could no longer import Strava activities onto their platforms.
According to DC Rainmaker, TrailForks was forced to remove millions of activities from Strava as a result of the platform’s rule changes, which Maker called “ridiculous” and designed to “kill off apps.”
Regardless, runners remain unhappy with Strava and Garmin’s spat, and just want them to make up so they can get back to recording each and every run for posterity.
“Mom and Dad (Strava and Garmin) are fighting and they need to figure it out,” TikTok user Becki.Runs said.
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