For Serious Junior Golfers, the Garmin Approach J1 May Be the Smartest Watch

Paul Liberatore is the founder of Golfers Authority, which reviews the world's best golf products and gear.

You know what’s been missing from the golf tech world?

A legitimate golf GPS watch that’s actually designed for kids.

I mean, think about it. More kids are playing competitively than ever before. Parents and grandparents are investing serious money into lessons, clubs, travel and tournament fees.

But when it comes to golf technology, there really hasn’t been much beyond golf clubs that’s specific to kids. I’m not talking about gimmicky stuff like Spongebob golf balls. I mean actual gear made to help a talented kid play better golf.

Until now.

Garmin just dropped the Approach J1, and it’s their first-ever golf GPS watch built specifically for junior golfers.

And just to be clear, we’re not talking about a scaled-down adult watch. This isn’t a “junior version” with fewer features. It’s a legitimately thoughtful product designed from the ground up for younger players.

And I must say, after seeing it in person at the 2026 PGA Show, I think Garmin’s got something very interesting here.

If you’re a parent looking to help your kid take their game more seriously, or a grandparent looking for a perfect golf gift, or if you’re a serious junior golfer yourself who wants real tech that actually fits, this is well worth checking out.

Here are five reasons why the Garmin Approach J1 might be the smartest junior golf purchase you can make.

It actually fits, which matters a lot

Let’s start with the most obvious reason why, until now, golf watches for junior golfers just didn’t work: the fit.

Essentially, you could give a junior an awesome golf watch but that would be too big for their wrists and likely interfere with their swings.

Or you could give them an appropriately sized watch that wasn’t very sophisticated. It probably had few, if any, actual golf features.

I know I’m over-simplifying this a bit, but not by much. The bottom line is that there just wasn’t an option for an actual purpose-built junior golf watch. Now there is.

The Garmin J1 weighs only 1 ounce, so it’s significantly lighter than even smallish adult models like the Garmin S44. It’s even lighter than Garmin’s fairly bare bones older S12. Also, the 43mm case on the J1 is slim and low profile. And the wrist size range starts at 115mm, compared to 125mm on something like the S44.

This is a watch that’s actually designed for young people. It’s also packed with junior-golf-specific features, which I’ll get to in just a minute.

Another nice touch regarding fit with the J1 is that it comes with Garmin’s ComfortFit fabric band, rather than the traditional silicone band. This is nice because it uses a velcro system that means kids can adjust it themselves easily. And it’s going to stay secure during play. It’s also comfortable enough to wear all day long, not just on the course.

I’ve got kids. And if you do, you know how if any kind of gear doesn’t fit right, it’s just going to become a distraction for them. I think this J1 design is really smart if for no other reason that it actually fits a kid’s wrist properly.

It gets better. We haven’t even gotten to the golf stuff.

It makes the game less intimidating

Look, golf is so hard. We all know that. And for kids, strength and skill levels vary wildly. For a lot of kids, a normal golf course is just far too big to have any realistic chance of making a par or a bogey.

The J1 addresses that with two brilliant features: Tee-Off Guidance and Personal Par.

Tee-Off Guidance provides forward tee locations down the fairway on all of Garmin’s 43,000 preloaded courses. So it essentially scales every hole to match the junior golfer’s actual ability by suggesting realistic spots to start the hole from. Instead of looking at a 450-yard monster and feeling defeated, with the J1 your kid sees a forward suggested spot that makes the hole feel achievable.

I love this. I makes it so that a kid doesn’t have to feel like they’re terrible at golf. They’ve got their whole life for that. Why not let them start out with some confidence?

The other feature I love is Personal Par. This allows you to adjust par based on the junior’s skill level. So that 450-yard par 4 can play as a par 6, or whatever you want.

This feature helps set realistic goals and builds confidence. Instead of walking off every green feeling like they failed because they made a 7, they can celebrate shooting even par or better relative to their actual ability level.

When you think about it, this starts to teach a kid about course management and strategy. If they have a realistic place to start the hole from and a realistic goal for being successful on the hole, they’re more likely to start to figure out how to work their way through the hole to achieve their objective.

It teaches good pace-of-play habits

We all hate slow play. It’s one of the things that most golfers agree on. So this is another reason I think the Garmin J1 is brilliant: it actually teaches kids to keep pace.

Kids learn early on to keep up, stay ready and move efficiently around the course. That’s so huge when you think about what that does to prepare your junior golfer for a life in this great game. If they can keep up, they’ll be invited anywhere. This is the perfect lesson to learn early on.

The J1 has a Pace-of-Play Timer. It’s a simple visual indicator that shows juniors how much time they should be taking on each hole. It keeps the game moving at the recommended pace without being intrusive or stressful.

I think this also takes some of the pressure off the parent who’s trying to teach their kids golf etiquette. You’re not having to constantly nag your kid to hurry up and potentially ruin the vibe or good time you’re trying to establish. The watch does the gentle reminding for you.

Beyond pace of play, the J1 also makes scorekeeping easy with on-watch scoring after every hole.

Another really cool touch is that the watch includes little animations that recognize improvement and encourage kids as they play. Little celebrations when they make par or beat their personal best. Also, if your kid is too old for that kind of feature or doesn’t like it, you can turn it off.

Club suggestions and distance mapping

A lot of kids don’t know which club to play. And how could they if they’re just learning or figuring out how far each one goes? This watch helps them figure that out and it learns their game right along with them.

The way it works is you input which clubs your junior carries. Then the watch tracks their distances with each club over time. So then when they’re facing a shot, the J1 suggests which club to use based on the yardage and their actual performance data.

I mean, this is the kind of feature that only a few years ago we were excited about for adults! And now the kids get it too? I wish they had this thing when I was a kid.

I think Club Suggestions accomplishes a couple of things for a junior golfer: it can help them play faster, and it will definitely help them play with more confidence. But it also teaches them a general understanding of how far different clubs fly.

The J1 also provides all the essential GPS data that any golfer needs. Meaning, your kid gets front, middle, and back yardages to every green. They also get hazard distances and shot distance tracking.

And like all Garmin GPS golf products, the J1 comes preloaded with more than 43,000 golf courses worldwide. So basically, your kid can use this thing on every golf course anywhere.

It’s a great golf gift

This could be the best reason of all to buy the J1. If you’ve got a young golfer who either loves the game or who maybe you’re hoping will learn to love the game, this is probably the next-best thing you could get them after their golf clubs.

What golfing kid wouldn’t love this thing?

If you’re like me and you struggle to come up with gift ideas, the Garmin Approach J1 might be perfect. At $299.99, it’s not cheap. But if you’re looking for a nice gift that may land well, this could be your move.

It’s fun to have some cool golf tech for the kids

I gotta say, it’s kind of cool to see something different in golf gear.

Don’t get me wrong: I love all of the options we’ve got for launch monitors and rangefinders and adult golf watches and handhelds, and all the other cool tech.

But the Garmin Approach J1 is the first golf GPS watch that genuinely puts kids first. It fits their wrist properly, includes features that help them learn and build confidence, it teaches them good habits and course management, and it grows with their game.

I think all that adds up to one of the most interesting golf products of 2026.