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I have the same thoughts.
Explore could navigate you to address/POI, and it has a bigger screen with touch.
However, 530 is smaller, it has a better battery life and the same maps IIRC. Also, it could recalculate route on the fly using their own heatmaps, and it has tonnes and tonnes features which probably I won't use but hey maybe I will, and not all of them require a power meter. It's black also.
Cloak/Dagger-
Ended up going for the Explore as it is currently down to £176 on Cycle Republic. Annoyingly the Edge 530 was down to about that previously on the Garmin site as discussed in this thread a few weeks ago, but wasn't really ready to make a purchase then. I'm so used to having my current unit on charge whilst riding that I think the battery life will be ok for me, any longer stuff I can plug it in when it starts to get low. I think the sheer amount of features on the 530 was what turned me away most. I hate having things that I don't use cluttering menus up haha.
ric_a5
Looking to get a Garmin Edge Explore. Is there any reasons why it should be avoided? Had thought about a 530 but the additional stuff looks like stuff I’ll never be planning to use. Don’t care about power meter connecting, training or on device strava segments or any of that. I’m after guidance and mapping and also on the fly routing and obviously tracking. Touchscreen makes me a bit apprehensive but it doesn’t look to be a problem in most circumstances. The lower battery life is also a worry but states 12 hours (as a max) still which will be ok a majority of the time and my current ancient 605 that I’m using has basically no battery retention so is plugged into my battery pack the whole time on any ride I use it on.