Garmin Descent dives in a logbook: export the .fit files
A Garmin Descent keeps every dive as a .fit file in Garmin Connect. Here is how to get those files out and into a logbook you can export again.
· 2 min read
Where the dives live
Garmin's manual says the Garmin Dive app syncs with your Garmin Connect account, so the dives you see in the app are the same dives you find in Garmin Connect on a computer. That makes Garmin Connect the one place to export from.
Checked 23 October 2026 · Source: Garmin, Descent Mk3 Owner's Manual: Garmin Dive App · Garmin Connect
Exporting the .fit files
- On a computer, sign in to Garmin Connect in a web browser.
- Open one of your dives from the list of activities.
- Open that activity's settings menu (the gear icon) and choose to export the original file. Garmin downloads that one dive.
- If the download is a .zip archive, unzip it: the dive is the .fit file inside.
- Repeat for each dive you want, and keep the .fit files together in one folder.
These menu names come from how Garmin users describe the website and may differ slightly in your version of Garmin Connect. The file you are after is always the original .fit.
What a .fit file holds
Each file is one dive: the date and time, the depth, the length and the full depth profile. It has no dive site name, because a watch does not know where you are diving, only the position it recorded.
Bringing them into a logbook
Loggerfish reads .fit files directly, and you can pick several at once in the file picker. Importing needs no account: the files are read on your own device. The preview counts the dives that are new, the ones already in your log and the ones that differ, and nothing is saved until you press import.
Two things happen with sites. A dive that is already in your log and is clearly the same dive (same day, and the same start time or the same depth and length) keeps the site you typed and gains the watch's profile. Any other dive is named from its GPS position, or comes in without a site when the watch had no fix, so you can fill it in afterwards.
What it does not do
Loggerfish does not download from a Garmin watch by Bluetooth or cable (its Bluetooth download is for the Mares Sirius and the Shearwater Peregrine TX only): it reads the files you export. If you want the dives to arrive on their own, Garmin's own app and Garmin Connect do that part, and Loggerfish takes it from there. The Garmin step-by-step guide has screenshots of the import.
Import your Garmin .fit files into Loggerfish
Free to start, no card. Your logbook, and every export of it, stays yours on every plan.
Names such as PADI, SSI, MySSI, Subsurface, Shearwater and Garmin belong to their owners and are used only to say which product we mean. Loggerfish is not affiliated with any of them. What a guide says about them comes from their own public pages, listed beside the statement with the day it was checked. If something is out of date, write to support@loggerfish.com and we will correct it.