Square Omni Review: A $1,600 Launch Monitor Worth Buying

This review is long overdue. After spending time with an early demo unit from PlayBetter and reviewing it on their channel, I've now had the production Square Golf Omni in my garage for a while — and a few things have changed.

Bottom line up front: it's a great deal. Performance has made me really happy, and at $1,600 with no subscription fees, I can't complain too much. There are some small nits and things I wish were different, but this is a unit I'd recommend in a heartbeat as long as you're okay with a couple of caveats.

The Omni really represents two ways people will interact with it. There's the crowd who'll connect straight to GSPro on a gaming PC — and then there's a whole other group who don't want to deal with a PC and just want the native Square app on an iPad. We'll cover a bit of both.

Square Omni Launch Monitor

What's Changed From the Pre-Production Demo

If you've watched other reviews using the demo unit, there are a handful of differences worth noting on the production hardware:

• The pre-production unit had two exposed USB-C ports on the bottom under the tripod mount. On the production unit they're hidden under a piece of reflective tape.
• There was a typo on the power adapter label — that got fixed in the production run.
• The side tape tabs that wrap around to the back had popped up on my box. I think the adhesive is just stiff and wants to lift, so if you see this, your unit almost certainly wasn't opened.

One thing I don't love: the tripod setup leaves the Omni a little top-heavy. I've knocked it over a couple of times. On turf it's no big deal, but on concrete that top edge takes the fall. I 3D printed a little alignment stick holder that doubles as a top-cap protector, and I've got ideas for a phone/tablet stand that clips onto the top mount too.

Course Play on GSPro — Rants and Raves

I ran Kapalua Plantation course on GSPro, connected to the Omni via Bluetooth. The connection has been solid, and when it does drop it reconnects automatically and quickly — far less disruptive than some other devices. Still, I really wish there was a Wi-Fi or hardwired option instead of relying on Bluetooth alone.

The things I love come down to flexibility. At this price point, getting to play any ball you want is huge — I've got a whole pile of mismatched balls and the Omni reads them fine. The LED status indicator on top is genuinely useful: solid green means locked on, blinking green means it's looking for a ball. Putting and short chips read great with very few misreads, handling short putts as well as my Launch Pro or Garmin R10.

The frustrations are mostly about hitting area feedback. Unlike the R10 or Launch Pro, GSPro with the Square doesn't show where you are in the hitting area, so you just have to know where it is and hope you're centered. Drift toward the edge and you'll get no-reads a bit more often. On elevation, GSPro lets you dial in your altitude (a mile high here in Denver), but the native Square app only offers a plus/minus carry percentage — I'd much rather just set my elevation.

The Native Square App vs GSPro

I still open the Square app when I want something quick. The course play is actually pretty nice, but a few limits keep me from using it much:

• Only three mulligans per round, one per hole — sometimes I just want to hit a shot over and over.
• No on-course practice mode. Practice is limited to the driving range, closest-to-the-pin, or putting.

GSPro obviously has on-course practice, so you can hammer whatever hole you want as long as you want. That flexibility is why GSPro gets most of my course time, even if the Square app is the faster grab-and-go option.

Impact Location: Square Omni vs Mevo Gen 2

The Omni gives us face impact location for under $2,000, and the only other device in that category that does is the FlightScope Mevo Gen 2, which offers it as a standalone unlock. With that unlock, the Mevo runs around $1,650 — a very close price point.

Using an impact sticker on the club to compare against reality, I found the Square seemed a little more accurate on face impact location, and it didn't require calibration as a first step. It was just easier to get going and a bit more reliable. Interestingly, the Mevo lets you calibrate impact location if it's reading consistently high or low, while the Square Omni doesn't offer that — but it may simply be more accurate by default thanks to its optical nature. On a toe strike both units agreed with reality, with the Square reading just slightly lower.

Bushnell Launch Pro