Garmin Drive™ 53 GPS Navigator, High-Resolution Touchscreen, Simple On-Screen Menus and Easy-to-See Maps, Driver Alerts

4.2 4.2 out of 5 stars | 747 ratings

Price: 99.99

Last update: 12-16-2024


About this item

Bright, high-resolution 5” glass capacitive touchscreen display lets you easily view your route
Get more situational awareness with alerts for school zones, speed changes, sharp curves and more
View food, fuel and rest areas along your active route, and see upcoming cities and milestones
View Tripadvisor traveler ratings for top-rated restaurants, hotels and attractions to help you make the most of road trips
Directory of U.S. national parks simplifies navigation to entrances, visitor centers and landmarks within the parks
Includes detailed map updates of the North America
Provides spoken turn-by-turn directions with Garmin Real Directions landmark guidance feature

Product information


Top reviews from the United States

Gary L. Rezeau
5.0 out of 5 stars Easy to use and works great!
Reviewed in the United States on October 14, 2024
This is a really great tool! Simple to install, simple to set up, and easy to use. Plus this device picks up satellite signals better than both my vehicles’ systems. The software works reliable and I like the user friendly features available on the main screen. Very glad I bought it. Great value for a good price.
Customer image
Gary L. Rezeau
5.0 out of 5 stars Easy to use and works great!
Reviewed in the United States on October 14, 2024
This is a really great tool! Simple to install, simple to set up, and easy to use. Plus this device picks up satellite signals better than both my vehicles’ systems. The software works reliable and I like the user friendly features available on the main screen. Very glad I bought it. Great value for a good price.
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Charles Bagwell
5.0 out of 5 stars Easy to load
Reviewed in the United States on December 10, 2024
It was easy to load and set up. I like that on multi lane roads it shows which lane I should be in. Here we have several left lane exits .
Grounded Dragon
4.0 out of 5 stars Works great, except voice command
Reviewed in the United States on November 3, 2024
The Garmin Drive 53 is simple to use, easy to view, reliable and gets most destinations on target. However...like previous Garmin units of this type, "voice command" stumbles, trips and fails. It's better to safely park and input information via the touchscreen.
J. L. Milton
5.0 out of 5 stars Good value
Reviewed in the United States on November 20, 2024
So far it has been impeccable. The audio is very clear and route graphics clear.
J. Newhouse
5.0 out of 5 stars Nice GPS unit
Reviewed in the United States on October 4, 2024
I bought this Garmin GPS unit to take on trip in a vehicle that didn't have built in navigation. Great pickup for the drive. Worked well and took some of the guess work out of the trip. Also I didn't need use my data plan to get us around.
Good Guy
1.0 out of 5 stars Worse than my old TomTom
Reviewed in the United States on February 19, 2024
I had some grumbles with my old TomTom, so when it finally bit the dust, I was open to a new brand. Well, since TomTom and Magellan no longer make car GPSs, Garmin is our only choice now, anyway.
The most important function for any GPS is to navigate. This one very frequently loses its satellite connection. The map freezes, and a banner says Lost Satellite Reception or Acquiring Satellites. I've gotten to driving locally with it turned on just so I can monitor this, and it occurs randomly and stays this way for many minutes at a time. Meanwhile, I've passed 50+ potential turnoffs. Because of this problem, this device is worthless.
Even while this GPS is working, while driving on an interstate, it will frequently direct me to take an exit, then re-enter the interstate at the same exit. Maybe it was two feet shorter? A Garmin GPS I used in a rental car 20 years ago did this, but I thought that Garmin would have corrected that by now--wrong.
Also, this thing occasionally loses its view settings, so the perspective changes drastically, and good luck figuring out how to get it back. Even switching places with my passenger the last time this happened, it took me at least ten frustrating minutes to figure it out. Very unintuitive.
So bottom line, I do not recommend this device. However, all the competition is gone. The world wants us to rely on our phones for road navigation. I could live with that if I had a cell signal in all the wilderness areas I frequent, but that doesn't work either. Our technology has gone backwards.
Brian D.
5.0 out of 5 stars Great Garmin
Reviewed in the United States on November 17, 2024
Works as it should
John D. Trimble
3.0 out of 5 stars A Mixed Bag - Trust, But Verify
Reviewed in the United States on July 29, 2024
This product has been a mixed experience. The visual and audio directions are clear, and it will get you to where you are going, but there are some quirks. We use it, but also check the route on Google or Apple Maps before starting.

The traffic function is nearly useless. We used this on a cross-country trip so that I could avoid using cell phone data, so I specifically looked for a model that had traffic updates via satellite instead of a cell phone BlueTooth connection. Most of the time it said there was no traffic detected on our route as we sat in bumper-to-bumper traffic.

The driver alerts are helpful, but spotty. Sometimes it would alert us to a 40 mph speed limit while on the interstate when passing an exit - it was pulling the 40 mph ramp speed. There were several small towns where it helped me catch speed zones in advance when the actual signs were hard to spot. It doesn't catch all of them, though, so you need to use it as an aid - not depend on it.

Most routings (with no traffic) match what I pull up on my phone. There have been some occasions where it directed me to get off at an exit, go through the intersection and immediately get back on the highway for no apparent reason.

The ETAs have been hit or miss. There does not appear to be enough time allotted for traffic lights, so if you have several lights on your way you can expect to add 5-10 minutes to your ETA.

Overall, this provided generally reliable instructions and I was able to keep my cell phone data usage to a minimum. It's a good backup - especially in spotty cell phone coverage areas - but I wouldn't use it without checking your route with another map service first. I wish it had a feature to provide instant feedback on things like incorrect driver alerts. I expected a higher quality from the Garmin name and have been disappointed. I don't know if this is just this model or representative of stand-alone GPS's in general.

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