How to Use Your Suunto Watch With Runna

By pairing your Runna plan with your Suunto watch, you’ll be coached through your workouts as you run. For example if you’re doing an intervals session, you no longer need to remember and track the specific distances, paces and rests.

Instead, your watch will automatically tell you how much further is left to run, what your current pace is and how that compares to your target. It’ll even count down your rests so you know when to start running again. Once you've completed your session, you can then compare your runs against what your Runna plan set you!

Runna currently supports specific Suunto models such as the 3, 5, 9, 9 Baro, Peak, 5 Peak, 9 Peak, 9 Peak Pro, Race, and Vertical. Unfortunately, the Suunto Run (despite its name!) is one of the models that isn’t currently compatible with Runna.

If you have one of these supported models, you'll be able to sync your Runna workouts and enjoy features like real-time coaching and audio cues (audio cues only available on the 9 Peak Pro and Vertical).

To pair your Suunto watch with your Runna plan:

Once connected, your Runna workouts will now sync automatically to your Suunto watch and your Suunto app. They’ll appear as scheduled SuuntoPlus Guides and you’ll be able to view them in the Suunto app.

You can also choose to sync in either outdoor mode or treadmill mode. In outdoor mode, pace targets are visible on the guide screen on your watch. In treadmill mode, pace targets will not appear on the watch.

What to expect after connecting:

Note: Your Suunto workout will appear in the same unit of measurement as your Runna plan so we recommend making sure your Suunto account is configured to use that same unit of measurement.

You can find out more information about the workouts which have synced from Runna to your Suunto app, with the following steps.

Upon selecting a guide, you can find out more details about what the workout entails. By selecting Learn More, the Runna app will open and take you to the workout for that day.

In Suunto, structured workouts are called Guides. They're Suunto's version of step-by-step workout guidance — the same sessions from your Runna plan, delivered directly to your watch. Once your Suunto is connected, your Runna workouts sync to the Suunto app as Guides with a scheduled date attached.

Note: Changes made to the Suunto Training Calendar will not reflect in Runna; you need to reschedule your runs within Runna and re-sync your watch!

What the Suunto connection can do with Runna:

What the Suunto connection can’t do with Runna:

There are a number of settings that we recommend configuring in order to make the most out of your Runna workouts when downloaded to your Suunto watch.

By default, your Suunto watch will automatically create a new ‘lap’ every 1km or 1mi. For the longer splits that we set you (e.g., 2km repeats) this means that the splits will automatically be lapped (split into a new step in your run) mid-way through which makes analysing your average pace afterwards difficult.

We recommend turning off auto-lap when following your Runna workouts, but also recommend to turn it back on again if you’re going for a casual run, time-trial or race so that your watch will keep you updated on your pace.

To toggle Auto-Lap in Suunto Watch:

Auto-pause will automatically pause your workout when it detects that you’ve stopped moving (e.g., at traffic lights). However, this can be a problem when running interval workouts since while you’re resting, even if walking around, it can detect that you’ve stopped running and pause the workout including the timer to start running again.

We recommend turning off auto-pause and getting into the habit of manually pausing and resuming the workout when you are forced to stop running temporarily (e.g., at traffic lights).

To toggle Auto-Pause in your Suunto:

For shorter runs, where battery life is not so important we recommend ensuring you're battery mode is on Performance to ensure you have the most accurate metrics.

However, if you are doing a much longer run and don't have much battery left, you may wish to use the Endurance mode instead.

To change your Battery mode in your Suunto:

If you use both Runna and Strava, we recommend to sync Suunto with Strava so your Suunto-recorded activities show up in Strava.

To connect Suunto with Strava, go to Suunto app → Settings → Connected Apps → Strava.

It’s better to sync directly from Suunto to Strava rather than routing through Runna. We can sync activities from Strava back to Runna, but we're unable to sync activities through the chain Suunto → Runna → Strava due to data-handling limitations.

Once Suunto is connected to Runna, your Runna workouts in your Suunto app will automatically sync to your Suunto watch as Suunto Guides.

To start a Runna workout and follow a guide on your watch:

If you do not have a guide scheduled for that day, you can either choose to do a free run or you can follow a guide for another day by:

Note: Completing a Runna-synced SuuntoGuide on a different day than it is scheduled will still cause the recording to “link” to the original Runna session once it syncs. If you do a free run instead, you'll have to manually link it to the planned session and you won't receive Pace Insights for that run.

After you’ve completed your run, your completed workout will then be stored in your Runna app and Suunto app. You can then analyse your post-workout stats and compare them to the pace targets that you were set.

If you’re consistently beating, or not making, your pace targets then we suggest editing them to make your targets challenging yet achievable.

To remove the Suunto connection:

This will remove your Runna workouts from your Suunto Watch and stop completed workouts from syncing automatically — reconnect at any time to resume.

To get Runna’s audio guidance, you'll have to start the workout from the Runna phone app and from your watch, as Runna's audio cues aren't available on Suunto watches. You may get conflicting pace/distance information with the two separate devices and GPS hardware used in each.

Yes, you can leave your phone behind if you start your Runna workout from the Suunto Watch. Your completed workout will then sync back to Runna.

This is usually caused by auto lap being turned on. Auto lap creates laps at fixed distances (e.g. every 1 km or 1 mile), which can cut across your structured workout steps (warm-up, recoveries, intervals). As a result, the laps no longer match your planned segments in Runna, and your splits may look inaccurate or misaligned.

For structured Runna workouts, we recommend turning off auto lap on your device. This ensures your splits align with your planned workout steps.

This usually happens when Runna can't match your completed activity to the planned workout in your training plan. The most common reason is that the run was recorded as a free run, instead of starting the Runna workout that was sent to your watch.

If this happens, the activity may still sync into Runna, but it won't automatically attach to the planned session. You can manually link it:

If you have any questions about using your Suunto watch with your Runna plan then please don’t hesitate to contact us. If it’s a problem using your watch, including technical issues, we’ll try and help as much as we can, but you may be required to contact Suunto directly to get support.