Does Coros track strength training?

It has a gym mode that recognises some movements and counts reps, and the Training Hub records the session as an activity. It does not track load per set or proximity to failure, and strength contributes almost nothing to its Training Load or recovery estimates.

Is Coros EvoLab accurate?

Its running fitness and load estimates are reasonable and comparable to Garmin's. Like Garmin's, the arithmetic is proprietary, so when Base Fitness or recovery time disagrees with how you feel there is nothing to inspect. It is also derived from aerobic activity, so a heavy lifting week reads as light.

Does Coros have a nutrition feature?

No. There is no intake tracking and no calorie target, only an estimated burn per activity. For a hybrid athlete that is a meaningful gap, because the energy cost of running plus lifting is what determines whether you can add muscle at all.

Can I use Coros with something else for lifting?

Yes, and it is the usual approach. Coros exports to Strava and Intervals.icu, and a separate lifting log handles the strength side. The seam is that no system then holds both, so the cross-discipline decisions stay manual.

Base vs Coros for Hybrid Athletes

Q: Coros or Garmin for someone who lifts?

Coros wins on battery life, price and simplicity. Garmin wins on ecosystem breadth, third-party integrations and slightly deeper analytics. Neither models resistance training in any way that affects its training or recovery guidance, so on that specific question they are equivalent.

What Coros does well

Battery life, decisively. Multi-week watch battery and multi-day GPS. For ultra distances this is not a convenience, it is the product.

Price for the hardware. You get more sensor and more battery per unit of money than anywhere else.

EvoLab. Base Fitness, Load, Fatigue and recovery time, derived from your aerobic training. Reasonable modelling, roughly comparable to Garmin's, presented more simply.

Running form metrics on the wrist, and structured workout execution that works.

It exports cleanly. Strava, Intervals.icu, TrainingPeaks all ingest from Coros without fighting it, which matters because Intervals.icu will model your load better than any watch hub does, for free.

Where it stops

Strength is a recording. Gym mode recognises some movements and counts reps. It does not hold load per set, and it has no concept of proximity to failure — which is the variable that determines whether a set drove adaptation. Why RIR is the input that matters.

Strength does not enter the model. Base Fitness, Load and recovery time are computed from aerobic work. Five heavy sets of squats produce a low heart rate and therefore almost no load. The result is systematic: Coros will tell you that you are recovered on the days after your hardest lifting. Why heart-rate-derived load misreads resistance training.

Nothing shows its arithmetic. EvoLab's figures are proprietary. When recovery time says 18 hours and your legs disagree, there is no input to check. Why that matters over years.

No nutrition at all. An estimated burn per activity, no intake, no target. For anyone trying to add muscle while running, that is the number that decides whether it is possible. How much a hybrid week costs.

Coros or Garmin, for someone who lifts

On the specific question of resistance training, they are equivalent — both record it and neither models it. So the choice comes down to everything else:

	Coros	Garmin
Battery life	Far better	Good
Price per capability	Better	Higher
Analytics depth	Good	Slightly deeper
Third-party ecosystem	Adequate	Broadest
Sleep and HRV	Present	Slightly better
Simplicity	Better	Cluttered
Strength modelling	None	None

If battery and price matter, Coros. If integrations and breadth matter, Garmin. What Garmin Connect models in detail.

The comparison against one ledger

	Coros	Base
GPS, pacing, live workouts	Yes, excellent	No, the watch does this better
Battery life	Best in class	N/A
Endurance load model	EvoLab, proprietary	Ramp rate on minutes, visible
Shows its arithmetic	No	Every derived number
Load per set	No	Yes
RIR / autoregulation	No	Yes
Weekly hard sets per muscle	No	Yes, fractional
Lifting affects recovery estimate	No	Yes
Endurance affects lifting volume	No	Yes
Nutrition	No	Measured, adaptive
Baseline compared against	Proprietary	Your own 30 days

When Coros is the right call

You need the battery. Ultras, multi-day events, or simply not charging things.
You want the hardware value. It is the best price-per-capability in the category.
Endurance is the priority and lifting is durability work.
You want live pacing and structured sessions on the wrist. Base deliberately does not do this — the watch is better at it and always will be.

When the gap becomes the problem

When your lifting is a goal with its own progression. At that point you need three numbers Coros structurally does not produce: load and RIR per set, weekly hard sets per muscle group against your endurance load, and a recovery signal that reads both.

The standard workaround is Coros plus a lifting log plus Intervals.icu, which is a good free-ish stack for three separate records and no shared view. Every cross-discipline decision — deload, session order, calorie target — stays with you. What that reconciliation actually costs.

Two things worth doing today whichever watch you own: derive your own threshold pace zones rather than trusting the watch's, and check your ramp rate on total endurance minutes. Easy runs drifting too fast is the most common way concurrent training quietly fails, and no watch hub flags it.