Does the Fitbit app have the ability to auto recognize exercises on its own?

[phatbitzr]

I did 2 bike rides on the same day, the first one was auto-recognized by the Sense 2, but the second one did not (it was still in watch mode when I ended the ride).  Later on, when viewing my exercises in the app, I see an activity labeled "Mountain Bike" (or "Outdoor Bike", as in the web dashboard or latest exercise of the Activity tile in the app.)  It had no GPS data, and it indicates it was recorded by "Fitbit for Android".

I am wondering why the Sense 2 did start recording the bike ride, but somehow handled the responsibility to the app.  Plus, why did the app not utilize GPS to track my route and distance, if it was being recorded on the phone where GPS data is easily accessible.

Here are screenshot of the 2 examples:

Auto recognized exercise by the tracker, with GPS:

Auto recognized exercise by Sense 2

Tracker didn't auto recognize and start an exercise, but the app did:

Auto recognized exercise by App

Moderator edit: Subject for clarity.

[Guy_]

HI @phatbitzr - you need to start a watch exercise in order to choose GPS or not.

The Fitbit app will take the synced data if you didn't manually start it and try and associate it with an activity without GPS.

You can turn on/off watch auto recognition [where the watch will notify you of the auto started exercise] independently.

[phatbitzr]

@Guy_- My bicycle exercise has been set to use GPS, so all my auto-recognized bike ride already has GPS on it.

How does the fitbit app associate the bike ride I just did with an activity if the tracker didn't know I was on a bike ride.  The only data that would have synced to the app would be my elevated heart rate, and maybe some arm movements it interpret as steps.

[LZeeW · Accepted solution]

@phatbitzr   The Sense 2 has two different auto recognition features.  One is called Bike Detect.  It activates the Exercise app on the Sense 2.  It will give you all the details and it will give you a GPS map from the time the GPS connects.  There is also a Walk Detect and an Run Detect in those shortcuts.  The Sense 2 also has SmartTrack, the auto-recognition feature most users are familiar with.  It is the one that detects among the seven activities on its list.  It doesn't and can't give a GPS map.  These activities are detected by your Fitbit as it analyzes the accelerometer data.

It looks like one ride got detected with Bike Detect and the other got detected by SmartTrack.  I can't explain why one was detected by Bile Detect and the other wasn't.

[phatbitzr]

@LZeeW- I though Bike Detect is just the old SmartTrack, but starting the app instead of just collecting data in the background.  I remember that feature when I had the Blaze, where sometimes 2 of the same activities shows up on the app after a bike ride.  The Blaze didn't have "Bike Detect", so this doubling up only happens if I start to record the activity a few minutes into the ride (where SmartTrack is already recording in the background).

[RodrigoMFitbit]

@Guy_ @LZeeW Thank you very much for the explanation. 

@phatbitzr Nice to see you again in the forums. Thanks for reaching out about automatic detected activities, the explanation and the screenshots. 

From what I can see, as you concluded, the second activity was detected by "SmartTrack". No GPS was taken into account, since the device was still in exercise mode when the second ride was detected by your device. Hence it could not start the activity on your device and only proceeded with the "SmartTrack" log. I am glad to read that everything is clear now. 

The app does not have the ability to recognize activities manually, only Fitbit devices will log activities automatically. Whenever the app shows "Fitbit for Android" as the source, this actually means "SmartTrack" detected the activity. I understand it can give you another idea, but the app does not have that feature. Thanks for your understanding.