As you may know, if you read my blog here, I already have a Garmin Edge 520 Plus but I thoroughly enjoyed trying and reviewing this CooSpo CS300 GPS bike computer for a fun change and I am always curious about new tech and new bike equipment companies. Plus it was a nice little bike computer to try out as it seems to be their second generation of bike computers. I also previously reviewed and still use (on my mountain bike) a CooSpo Cadence/Speed Sensor.
The box the CS300 and its accessories come in is a straightforward white box with a topographic pattern background and a photo of the bike computer, the company logo, and the model of the computer on the front. On the back is a brief description in various languages, and quick specs.
Inside, everything is packed nicely and securely in a fitted cardboard container with depressions holding the computer and the accessories, and even a bit of foam on the sides where the computer sits to hold it safely and securely.
The bike computer itself has a plastic cover on it with text that explains to charge it before the first use and a little about searching for GPS signals in an open area, shown in various languages.
Peeling that cover off and examining the CS300 – it looks very very similar to the 500 and 800 series of Garmin Edge series (see photo). A quick glance by your friends and they might not even notice right off the bat. It feels like a substantial little computer but very light.
The physical dimensions are 82.95×51.45×19.43 mm or 3.27x2x.8 inches with a 66 mm or 2.6 inch display and it weighs a very light 60 grams. It is ip67 waterproof of course. Control is via physical buttons, there is no touchscreen – this can be a good thing sometimes if you ride in the rain and muck.
The specs show the battery life at 40 hours and indeed it lasts a LONG time, the battery is a 1300 mAh lithium, which is a pretty good sized battery for a small device. So far for this review, I have not run it down! It takes a few hours to fully charge via opening a small rubber waterproof flap on the back and plugging in the USB-C cable, you also should be able to use any USB-C cable to charge it.
It can store a hundred hours of ride history or so, that’s a lot.
The CS300 can connect to any compatible Bluetooth or ANT+ sensor, including power meters. Everything I tried it with connected just fine to it. And of course, CooSpo has a full line of their own accessory sensors of all types.
The front has the CooSpo text shown. There is a power button on the upper left, the start/stop/pause/save button is in the lower left and there is an arrow button in the lower right for paging through the screens and accessing options.
Also in the box you get all of the stuff that you need to start using the computer including the computer itself, the mount and rubber pad to make it stay securely where you put it and the rubber bands to hold the mount on. These are long ones so it should fit on any place you want to mount it, these bands are the standard type that you will see on many biking devices.
A note here – the mount seems to be Garmin-standard, which is nice. The devices fit each other’s mounts interchangeably. So this means that any Garmin-standard mount that you buy can be used with this computer, though you can also buy a number of mounts from CooSpo also, including various colored ones.
In addition to the computer and the mount, there is a lanyard, the USB charging cable, and the manual.
The lanyard is nice as a safety feature as you can loop this around something on your bike as a backup, even though the mount itself is very secure. Also makes carrying it easier.
The USB cable is a medium-length cable and standard USB-C. A quick test shows that the CS300 can be charged and powered while it is running.
The manual comes in various languages and has some reference info, like for setting tire size if using a bike speed sensor, how to install it on the bike, an explanation of the screen icons and buttons, and a brief overview of instructions to get you started.
I skimmed it and once I installed the app I didn’t really need any further instructions.
The app can be found on the Google Play Store and the Apple Store under “CooSpoRide”. From what I have seen it works similarly on each device. A few reviews I have read mention the app is hard to figure out, I have not noticed this at all if you use some common sense and logic.
You can configure the CS300 via the device itself or the app. Really, the app is the way to go as you get easier access and many more options, and you’re going to want to use it anyway. Just make sure you have Bluetooth and Location turned on on your phone or other device you are using to connect to the CS300.
But if you do want to set it up and program each page screen via the device itself then you can do so via a long press on the bottom right arrow button. This starts to take you through the various options for setting up and adding sensors, setting the time zone, power calibration, etc as well as setting up each screen.
As I said – you’ll likely want to do this in the app itself. If you are patent and famialrize yourself with the app and if you use logic and common sense you can navigate through the setup effortlessly enough. And set your profile and add sensors and other options, as well as customize each page screen of data.
There are five screens of data that you can use, by default the last one is turned off but which can be enabled at any time.
Bootup of the device is fast, and it’s ready to go in no time. GPS lock from a new location takes a short time but also is fairly fast. For satellite reception, it connects to regular US GPS, BDS, and QZSS.
You can see this on the display in the upper left. Beside that is time, a symbol representing the ride in progress or paused, and on the right the battery power.
Below this to the left is the lap indicator and around that is a circular display of the HR zone that you are in, the zones of which can be customized in the app settings. You can customize both heart rate zones and power zones in the app.
To the right of that and below are more data fields that can be tailored to your own preferences, within certain parameters. What I mean by that is each data field on each screen has a certain range of data types that can be shown there.
You can display (depending on the page screen) – speed (speed, average, or max), HR (HR, average, max, %max), cadence (cadence, average, max), power (power, average, max, 3s average), distance (distance, odometer), altitude (altitude, ascent), altitude (grade, average up, max up), time temperature, energy (calories). So you get all of your basics and then a few more.
On each page, in the bottom right it shows you which page you are on with an indicator bar.
When you finish a ride you can hold down the right bottom button to save it and review your ride on the device as needed,
I think a good portion of the real power of this device is the app, which I’ll go into in a bit.
To start a ride it’s a simple matter to press the Start button (bottom left), though the autostart is turned on automatically so if you tend to forget to start a ride it will do it for you, this is an option that you can turn off. More about the auto functions later.
When using the device there is a beep tone when pressing buttons and also when it pauses, unpauses, autostarts, etc.
The display is nice and bright and very easy to see, even at a quick glance. In fact, it is easier to see than my Garmin Edge and much brighter (though admittedly my Edge is a bit long in the tooth).
I really can’t say enough about the clean, crisp, bright display. It’s in black and white of course and isn’t as fancy as other bike computers but when you are out riding sometimes you really just want to be able to get the data quickly as you ride.
For the most important test – the ride test – I compared the CS300 side by side with the Garmin Edge 520 Plus, which is a known quantity when it comes to data accuracy. So far I have done over a hundred miles with the CS300 with the Edge as a comparison, and will tweak and add any other thoughts I have to this blog post as I ride more.
Both showed the same data very closely or exactly, depending on the data. Timing for changes in the data was within a few seconds of each other, again depending on the data and sensor. All within reasonable timing.
Changing screens for looking at data was easy on the go too, and as I said before the display is so easy to read especially while riding. The backlight briefly comes on as pages are changed or any button is pressed and will come on as needed during evening or night.
So I’m not sure what else to add to this, it was very favorably accurate compared to the Edge it seemed.
When finished it’s a simple matter to hold down the bottom left button to save.
The data is saved in the CS300 but can be uploaded/synced within the app as well as to Strava and Training Peaks as an option. I found that because of the power-saving settings I have turned on on my phone that the app needs to be running and connected to sync data internally to the app as well as to Strava and Training Peaks. Syncing is quick,
Once it does sync your ride is available immediately on Strava and Training Peaks as well as in the app for further analysis.
As you can see in the screenshots you also get standard charts and data in detail, as well as your route and info.
In addition to the data on the device and in the app, and uploaded to Strava and Training Peaks (the latter of two which are optional of course); you can also share your data to others or send it to yourself (perhaps by email) to upload to other services or to analyze more with other programs, via a .fit file. You can even create a course, share the ride as a picture, or delete a ride.
Because of Garmin‘s policies on not allowing automatic syncing of data from other services and devices (except for starred routes and segments from Strava) there’s no way to automatically sync data from the CS300 to Garmin. This is not a limitation in the CS300 but inherent to ANY device not Garmin.
An easy workaround is just to email yourself the .fit file via the sharing on the app and then import it into Garmin Connect, which works just fine. There are other variations that you can use, like downloading a .gpx file from Stava and uploading it to Garmin Connect, etc. It’s a small extra step but not very complicated or time-consuming. There does not seem to be a way to directly access the data stored on the CS300 via plugging it into a computer as this only charges it, so use the options above to export the data if needed.
The only slight downside I want to mention is the altitude has no automatic altitude compensation but you can easily set the base altitude in the app, using the GPS or manually.
The app also has a map screen and recording function, and it looks like the CS500 can display maps and courses from this section of the app, but not the CS300.
A few more things to cover –
There are seventy-plus options that you can set on the CS300!
In the app there is a bike trainer mode – an indoor mode.
There are several auto functions that can be turned off or on in the app like auto backlight, auto-sleep, auto lap (you can also set lap length or by time or location even), autopause (you can set the stop speed) and autostart. You can also set the CS300 to scroll through each data page automatically instead of fixed on the last page you selected, and the timing is customizable.
There are also a number of other options in the app, including the ability to set up multiple bikes with customized settings for each.
You can also set up alerts which will cause the CS300 to beep and switch to a screen showing that alert and it’s data. You can set any and all alerts for time, distance, calories, heart rate, speed, cadence, and power. Each one of course can be personalized to your specs.
And for the above options you can access them all at once in the app in addition to specific sections, which is a nice feature for those who like to personalize their device.
And the app also lets you do a firmware update easily and quickly.
One thing of note here – if you are heavily exploring and changing options in the app keep in mind that the CS300 may eventually go to sleep, which will disconnect you if you don’t press any buttons on the CS300 for a length of time.
For those who want the built-in mapping and/or smart notifications as well as electronics shifting and smart trainer capability then perhaps consider the CS500, I don’t have an Amazon CooSpo store link but you can get it directly from CooSpo’s website at this link. You can compare them at this link.
In conclusion here, I don’t see any particular downsides or cons to the CS300, outside of wanting or needing the above options that the CS500 has. Everything worked and seemed to work well and it compared favorably with the data refresh and accuracy of the Garmin Edge that I compared it against.
I found both the device and the app to be very functional, pretty simple to use, and did their jobs just fine. And for a much much lower price than something like the Edge series – though of course you don’t get the smart features and Connect IQ nor direct sync to Garmin.
But for the price of the CS300 you get the same basic data and many additional features above and beyond the basics, I would consider this a mid-range bike computer suitable for a beginner or intermediate cyclist but also very usable for even an advanced bicyclist who doesn’t want to spend a lot of money.
