Daily Readiness / Past sleep always good

[Hoppy1976]

My sleep is always fair (not once had it been good) but my past sleep within the readiness score is always good.  I've had an average sleep between 4 & 5 hours since June 2024 but this is not reflected in my readiness score.

[RiekoC]

Hello & welcome, @Hoppy1976 

I'm a little confused and am not sure what issue you're experiencing. 

Would you please provide a bit more information? What do you mean when you say that your average sleep between 4 & 5 hours isn't reflected in your readiness score?

The Daily Readiness score algorithm was changed in a Fitbit app update last year (2024). This help page explains how the updated Daily Readiness score is calculated (<-- click link). As you can see, your recent sleep is used to calculate your Daily Readiness score.

[Hoppy1976]

Hi,

I understand but given how bad my sleep is generally (sleep duration is at
best 'fair') this is not reflected in my readiness score (as the past week
of sleep is always good).

Therefore, I can have a period of sleep which is just a few hours but my
daily Readiness is moderate or even high which is ridiculous.

The 'past week of sleep' is stuck on ''good' when I have never had a good
night sleep. That tells me something is wrong.

I have health issues so take an interest in the data and scores. It is
clear that the app is geared up for fitness and not someone like myself.

As an example, my heart rate drops as low as 42 and my RHR is 55. The app
cardio score thinks I'm super fit when in fact I have a heart condition!!!

I would like to help improve your app.

Regards
Lee

[RiekoC]

Hello @Hoppy1976 

Thank you so much for taking the time to explain the issue you're experiencing. I agree that it doesn't make sense to get a Good rating for your sleep when you are not getting sufficient sleep.

As you stated, the Fitbit app algorithms don't take into consideration health issues, like a heart condition. That said, I personally have not seen that other fitness trackers have a way to accommodate current health conditions in their algorithms. They might exist. But I haven't seen any articles or reviews that they do.

What you can do is look through the Product Feedback forum (<-- click link) to see if there's a feature request that would address your needs. If you don't find one, please submit one. I understand that the developers monitor this forum to see what features are being requested for potential future implementation.

The other option you have is using the Feedback option in the Fitbit app

• Tap on your picture in the upper right of the Today page in the Fitbit app
• Select Feedback in the menu that opens
• Complete the prompts and submit

Although it's likely that you won't receive a reply, the team receives & reviews the feedback reports.

These are currently the options we have to improve the app's functionality.

[RaeChi]

I have exactly the same problem, but no diagnosed health issues.  

 

 

[RaeChi]

Can you please also see my post above with screenshots?  I have same problem with terrible sleep being rated good, but don’t have a heart condition.

[Hoppy1976]

As I'm getting no help or meaningful responses (to this or other issues
I've raised) from the moderators I have decided to clear all the data and
start again. Just to see what happens.

I'm beginning to think that the charge 6 is only fit to wear as a watch!

[RiekoC]

Hello @RaeChi 

The Daily Readiness score looks at your past week of sleep, not just the previous night.

The screenshot that you provided shows your sleep for the past 3 days. It looks like you got about 6 hours on Monday & about 7 hours on Tuesday. You'd have to look at your sleep for Thursday, Friday, Saturday, & Sunday of the previous week. How many hours did you get on those nights? If those were more in line with what your sleep was on Monday & Tuesday, that would explain why you got a Good rating for your past week of sleep.

[RaeChi]

 

 

 

 

Thank you for looking at this ReikoC.  Here are the details of those nights:

 

 

 

[RaeChi]

Also @RiekoC  as well as above, please see screenshots for Mon & Tues below - totals may have been respectable but they were each split over 2/3 sleeps with insomnia gaps in between.

 

 

[RaeChi]

So all fair except one “good” night.

[RiekoC]

Hello @RaeChi 

Thank you for providing the additional information about your sleep sessions and that your sleep is frequently divided due to insomnia.

It does appear to me that your sleep should be considered Fair, rather than Good, based on the screenshots. 

According to the help page on Daily Readiness (<-- click link),

Your daily readiness score is based on data collected by your Fitbit device, broken down into the following categories:

• Sleep: How much you slept in the past week compared to your calculated sleep need. Your sleep quality and quantity play a significant role in your readiness score. Sleep debt is the accumulated difference between the amount of sleep you've gotten and the amount of sleep you need. Essentially, it's the "sleep you owe" to your body. If you've been experiencing poor sleep, your body's ability to recover and perform may be negatively impacted. Reducing your sleep debt typically increases your readiness to exercise.

From what you & @Hoppy1976 shared, I agree that you both should see Fair or something else for your sleep category. I just checked my husband's Fitbit sleep data & his Readiness score breakdown. He also suffers from insomnia and his sleep scores have been Fair to Poor. Yet, his Readiness score breakdown shows sleep as Good.

I'm at a loss in understanding why people who have Fair to Poor sleep scores still get Good in their Readiness score breakdown. It doesn't make sense.

[Hoppy1976]

I deleted all my data and ensured my scores were all null. I have today
started to wear my charge 6 again after nearly a week without.

I will report back in a week with the output.

[RaeChi]

Thanks RiekoC , it’s good to hear it’s not me losing my mind, which is always a risk on this much sleep!

Certainly for me when my sleep has been really bad it becomes impossible to do cardio exercise- all I can do is limp through work and responsibilities and probably fall asleep in my clothes after work if not at lunchtime.  So I would expect it to impact readiness.

i guess it’s possible it could just be the word displayed is hardcoded but the numbers behind it could be right, but I doubt it.

The other thing that is weird is the sleep score never seems to go below 60s.  One day my total sleep hours was 18 minutes (because I’d slept in the evening, woken before midnight, so it added those four hours to the previous night then only got back for half a restless hour after midnight).  And then it gave me a zero sleep score and refused to calculate anything from it so no readiness etc.  I don’t have screenshots of that now because either I fell asleep the next evening for a bit and it added it on, or edited the sleep hours to cross midnight to try and sort my graphs out, I can’t remember which now.

They say not to nap when you have insomnia but I literally fall asleep in my clothes so it’s really hard not to sleep in the evening.

im sad I can’t access sleep labs being in UK and on iPhone.  I’d love some more useful feedback than “you’re a dolphin” if there’s anything I can do to solve this insomnia.

[RiekoC]

Hello @RaeChi 

Thanks again for the additional info.

My husband also often naps during the day, often for about an hour or so. Sometimes, he'll fall asleep in the living room during the day while he's watching television. He uses a head wrap that has speakers so he can listen to podcasts & relaxing music. It helps some, but he still has plenty of nights with short hours of sleep.

We're fortunate to live in California and have access to cannabis products. We both use cannabis to help us sleep.

[RaeChi]

Cheers Rieko.  Yes I’ve been trying headbands speakers in the night recently too with meditations or classical music but it can still be hours for me to get back to sleep.

Today I started the day with a good or medium readiness score even though my last night sleep score wouldn’t even load, I had slept evening, woken and then slept 1h 46 after midnight so it only counted the second part as being that day.  it targeted me something like 80 to 120 cardio load but I did not have the opportunity to do cardio exercise so just walked a lot through the day and did cardio load about 30. Then tonight I fell asleep by accident till just before midnight and on waking it now says I’ve slept 5h total (3 was this evening and the rest 3am this morning) with sleep score 67, and to target 1-19 today so is telling me I’ve overdone it!  The whole interpretation goes to pieces if you wake over midnight.

[RiekoC]

Hi @RaeChi 

Your sleep is about the same as my husband's. He got 4+ hours of sleep last night, but that was over 2 sessions with a 2 hour gap between the sessions. Like you, it can be hours for him to go back to sleep when he wakes up. I also suspect he is sleeping in short bursts, less than an hour at a time, which wouldn't get tracked as sleep since it's such a short time span.

As for Cardio Load & target Load, I'm still trying to wrap my head around how this works. There have been plenty of days where I don't make the suggested range, especially when it's on the higher side. Personally, I look at where my dot is on the line graph and focus on keeping it in the Maintain section.

[RaeChi]

Hi @RiekoC , Your husband has my sympathies.  It sounds like we are on the same wavelength!  I had 3.5 hours last night, but that was 7.30 to 11pm so I don’t have a score today as it added the sleep hours to the night before instead.  I wish I could configure it to cut off at midday not midnight.  But anyway now we know we have a problem with poor sleep not being reflected in readiness score, how do we get them to fix that?  I feel a sense of urgency to get this fixed before the lack of sleep sees me off!

 

 

 

[Hoppy1976]

>From our findings it would appear that our needs are not met. I guess the
main goal is fitness related so when you have issues such as insomnia the
scores seem to misbehave.

For example; My cardio fitness score is excellent because my resting heart
rate is so low (RHR is typically 53 BPM but as low as 41!) but this is
because I have bradycardia not that I'm super fit.

I have CFS/ME plus insomnia so I don't think that these types of devices
are designed for me.

[RaeChi]

Well I can’t comment on the bradycardia but re insomnia, this watch is sold as being good for sleep tracking, and it does do it more accurately than three others I’ve tried.  It just needs its logic fixing in a couple of places I think.