Best in the Industry - Software Engineer II Garmin Employee Review

5.0
Jul 10, 2023
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

For the embedded industry there really isn't much better than Garmin. Benefits (401k, healthcare, ESPP, product discounts) are at the top of the industry and incredibly generous. There is a brand new on-site gym which is also nice. You can tell the company really cares about its employee's well being. In terms of a work environment, Garmin is an engineering company first and foremost. Lots of internal tools that are very high quality (I can only speak from aviation software but the internal testing tooling really made our life so much easier). Also the codebase was one of the cleanest i've ever worked with. It's a great place to start your career and a great place to stick to long term. They have a good mentoring program for new hires and there are many people here who have spent their entire career at Garmin. The work life balance here really cannot be beat. I left Garmin to be closer to family (see cons), but if not for that I would have absolutely stayed here long term, it really is that good. I cannot recommend Garmin enough

Cons

There is little flexibility for remote work. They do offer a hybrid system (3 days in person, 2 at home), but no fully remote option. This wouldn't be a huge issue, however the HQ is based in Kansas City. If you are an outdoor person KC does not offer much + that midwest summer can be brutal.

Explore other reviews about Garmin

5.0
Jul 5, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Nice headquarters, good people, fun atmosphere.

Cons

Questionable C-Suite directives/policies. A lot of bureaucracy, and it's difficult to move new ideas forward.

3.0
Jul 1, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Great, and I mean great benefits.

Cons

Poor local culture, everybody is in their own clicks and don't deviate from them. Not a huge amount of office friendliness. Not many team building exercises, and qa gets left out of alot. If you're not a developer, you will have a yard time socially. Coffee is the worst I've had at a company ever. Return to office was not handled right, and the wfh policies were written very vague by a local manager, but what they actually wanted was very specific and was not communicated at all(avg of 1 per month over the course of a year). This lead to a problem where I was denied a wfh request to grieve a dead pet because I used wfh 2 weeks earlier to register a new car ( that I got solely for work commute)

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