Looking At A Garmin DriveSmart 86

https://www.garmin.com/en-US/p/720310/pn/010-02471-00#specs

Under "Specs" it shows "Map Updates" - Yes. But it doesn't say Lifetime.

This link indicates Lifetime Traffic & Maps

https://www.crutchfield.com/S-aRfxnZl12Ey/p_150DS86/Garmin-D....

"Garmin also includes free lifetime traffic and map updates for the life of your navigator, which drives the value and utility of this travel companion home."

It's not directly a Garmin site, but the spec seems totally valid.

and the answer is yes, lifetime maps. Now short of any negative comments from other 86 owners, I am seriously considering it.

has it for $319.00. Not bad.

See: https://www.garmin.com/en-US/legal/lmdisclaimer/
and https://www8.garmin.com/manuals/webhelp/nuvi57-58-67-68/EN-U...

If you do a Google search for "Garmin Lifetime Maps", there are "Sponsored" ads showing plenty of Garmin units "With lifetime maps".

There are also postings from other sites complaining that they can't load the latest maps. Most of them are about older units that have memory that won't handle the new larger maps and the users don't understand that they will have to upgrade or use "MapInstall".

I just bought a replacement DS76, and nowhere could I find "Lifetime Maps" on the box or in the paperwork that it came with. Although, updating the map was in the setup.

Perhaps, Garmin is moving away from using the term "lifetime". As maps continue to get larger and with more features, older models are just no longer able to handle them.

Providing special maps to honour "lifetime" for old units has to be expensive.

You’ll enjoy it.

Best Buy has it for $299.00. I'm sold.

https://a.co/d/e9XDTrS

That's a sale price so tough to beat except for a refurb some of which are down around $220. https://www.gpscity.com/garmin-drivesmart-86-(certified-refurbished)

I don't own a smartphone so I wonder what is lost in using that device as a standalone?

You need the app to get reasonable traffic, weather reports.

regarding lifetime, as many posts before, such as old devices with cripple data stores (hard drive in Garmin) then lifetime is just a trick of time until it's out of space. If you're lucky enough to insert new microsd but still be very slow speed comparing the one on device.

wt 86 is the same, when updating to new maps and stuffs, it will automatically remove many things to save places. Just don't know why we spend a lot of money but Garmin still have only limited of hard drive space in 2024 and so. Is it their purpose to push us to buy new device when old one cannot have more space?

86 still have bugs such slow in density city, lost signal alot during vacation, bring us to the place never existing before, many POI of restaurants and other hotel don't have it yet, maps very obsolete in New York or Viriginia, too much annoying spam messages don't need it, plus divided screen in half is not practically with head up POI. Remember my 86 did update with latest map 2025.10

despite all of that, 86 is nice big screen with dual direction, more information displaying.

if you're in hot zone such as Virginia or Texas, Houston, device easy to shut down due to too hot to touch it, mine over 100 degrees last time and 86 seems cannot handle it right under the hot sun directly, even it's under air conditioner blowing up from car air duct.

In general, likely it or not but it's not for me when there's many bugs and errors.

Enjoy yours!

I don't see the 86 model.

This model is interesting
https://www.garmin.com/en-US/p/818681

@ https://www.garmin.com/en-US/p/720310

The old units were in fact hamstrung by their internal storage. For all devices that could read maps from the SD / MicroSD card, the slower read speeds had no impact on usability. Write speeds however were dramatically impacted, as I routinely would have to use my laptop's card slot to install a map to a card due to the slow speed of the USB connection.

The DriveSmart series are NOT the same. 16GB of storage is rather plentiful, and is expected to be plentiful for years to come. By the time we get to the point that a MicroSD would be required the device will be at least a decade old if not more. Although by that point Garmin may well be out of the consumer navigation device market.

Garmin's purpose has been, and always will be, to persuade people to buy their devices. That is how they keep the doors open and the lights on. The fact their older devices are hampered by their smaller amounts of internal storage I feel isn't Garmin being shady or underhanded. Especially as they have provided a means by which you can continue to use your older devices. To this day I keep a nuvi 65 and nuvi 3550 - devices from 2014 and 2012 respectively - fully updated and ready to go just in case my DriveSmart 65 fails.

As for the units shutting down due to being too hot to touch, they really are not intended to be constantly mounted. If they were, bean bag mounts wouldn't be as popular as they are. But I will say that the software is more buggy than I would prefer. I do think however my issues with the software spontaneously rebooting are due to using the device's bluetooth passthrough feature for calls. If I shut that off, I think I'd eliminate most of my software issues.