With so many color screens doing the rounds you could argue the 22 x 25mm grayscale (144 x 168 pixel) display looks a bit dated, but, while slightly boring, we’d rather have practical features than bling any day of the week.

The good news is that you can still pull your data into third party apps including Strava, Runkeeper and MapMyRun so that's TomTom's saving grace. But we were hoping for more on the app front in the future. The square watch face is slightly rounded at the edges, and the whole unit is controlled by a rectangular four-way button that protrudes through the strap from underneath the screen. The whole watch face pops out of the strap for charging, but don’t imagine that means you can get a more fashionable strap for it. There are a number of third-party straps available, but I wouldn’t call any of them stylish. They still need to house its heft, after all. The screen is quite dark, but it uses power-saving reflective LCD tech, so it’s always on. The Spark 3 is also an excellent ally in the pool. Once you’ve set the length of the pool, the Spark 3 will tally lengths, strokes, strokes per minute, total distance and calories. So with my favourite truly wireless buds, the only option is to have the volume at maximum, ruling them out. In fairness, it’s not a problem if you use the bundled headphones that come with the TomTom Spark 3 Cardio + Music bundle, but it’s worth keeping in mind if you already have your own favourite running headphones. The Spark 3 beats Garmin, Polar and Suunto for offering the ability to stream music from your watch. You just need to get yourself a pair of headphones to get up and running. It should play nice with most Bluetooth headphones, but if you're in doubt, TomTom has a list of supported devices here that work depending on which wrist you wear the watch on.

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The key takeaway is that running with music without carrying your smartphone along for the ride is awesome. We relish the freedom every time we hit the roads for our training runs, and along with the top heart rate performance, is why we recommend the TomTom Spark again and again. But there's still definitely some work to be done to make music support more seamless – and our dream of a Spotify enabled running watch is yet to be realised. For a sports watch, the Spark’s design is pleasingly unobtrusive, especially compared with the slightly more outlandish offerings you see from its main rivals, Garmin and Polar. As such, you can pretty much wear it anywhere without looking like you’re about to shed your suit and sprint off. Should I consider buying something else? That said, on looking at the data when synced afterwards, it appeared to have recorded accurately. In fact, since most people are likely to train in zones, rather than looking at tiny heart rate detail variations, this shouldn’t be an issue; zone movements appeared to keep up.

It's not 100% perfect. You will see the odd outage, perhaps twice in a two hour run, but this is absolutely a problem with chest straps as well. What you get with Spark 3 is a responsive and relatively lag-free experience that means you can effectively and reliably manipulate your heart rate to the right zone during your training – and that's what it's there for. This will appeal to anyone with a terrible sense of direction, or those of us who just like to run free and explore new areas without the fear of getting lost. The Spark 3 has enough storage for about 500 songs, but getting them onto your wrist isn’t as simple as we’d like. The 2km discrepancy with Apple's GPS-less model is just unacceptable if you’re serious about training (or even just want to know how far you've gone), so praise the running gods for the Apple Watch 3 if you're desperate to be part of the Cupertino brand with your wrists. Menu Then there are the many different modes you can use to guide your run. You can plan interval sessions, or set the Spark 3 to buzz every time you stop running at a certain pace or exit a given heart rate zone.

That feature is cool, but if you’re after more structured training programmes, Garmin or Polar watches offer more than the TomTom Spark 3.

It’s a running watch that I’ve found has largely stood the test of time. Its feature set for the money still makes it great value, with reliable GPS, heart rate monitor and extensive battery life. While its design is probably beginning to look more dated than ever, the four-way controls do work a treat when you’re out running and simultaneously trying to interact with the watch whilst dodging pedestrians. I can see why TomTom has been so averse to giving it a proper design overhaul. TomTom says you should be able to get a good five hours of GPS, HR and music on the go. Alternatively, using GPS, the watch should last for around 11 hours on a charge. If you don't entirely trust the heart rate data that's being dished out by the on-board heart rate monitor, you do have the option to connect a range of Bluetooth Smart heart rate sensor chest straps including the Polar H7 and Mio Alpha wearable.If you’re upgrading from the original TomTom Spark the menu system is exactly the same, but anyone used to a traditional smartwatch-style menu system should probably get practicing before pulling on the trainers. It’s also simple to set goals, and you’ll be rewarded with a buzz and a badge when you hit your activity targets. In reality, TomTom’s figures are pretty accurate. In fact, I was impressed by how long the music player worked and found myself using the watch and Bluetooth headphones as my go-to music player when out and about since it’s so easy to use. As well as just not getting lost, the TomTom Spark 3 lets you save routes you've run and follow them at a later date, or more interestingly, you can upload GPX files and follow someone else’s favorite 10km route.

The TomTom Spark 3 is, as the name suggests, the third-generation GPS running watch from maps and satnav specialist, TomTom. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it – right? That appears to be TomTom’s thinking with the Spark 3, which hasn’t changed significantly in the looks department since the first version.Once home,you can review all the details in the TomTom Sports App or export the data to your favourite apps like Strava or Runkeeper, which you’ll probably want to, because the TomTom app isn’t quite up to those standards just yet. The trails support is also fantastic. I moved house and so didn’t really know the running routes around here, which always makes you a little apprehensive about going out for a longer run. Thanks to the .GPX route support, I just jumped online and used PlotARoute to generate a predetermined distance based on my starting point, which can also be a circuit. You can also use MapsToGPS in conjunction with Google Maps to easily generate a .GPX route to load onto the watch.