Google Pixel Watch 2 GPS data missing

[DrWatson]

Just took my Pixel Watch 2 LTE for its first parkrun today and recorded on it on Fitbit exercise. I don't have data on the watch but it was connected to my phone by Bluetooth. It only tracked just over the first KM of the run before the GPS cuts out. Final distance is correct (estimating from stride length?) but there is no map tracking beyond that point. Any solutions?

Moderator edit: Subject for clarity.

[RodrigoMFitbit]

Hello everyone. Thanks for your posts about the GPS data of your training sessions. 

I really appreciate the detailed explanations and the current workaround for this situation. Have you tried checking the activity on the website? I am just curious if it is a situation with the activity in general or the app. Thanks in advance. 

Please note that usually manually started activities have priority over the trainings detected automatically. However, please do try turning off the automatic training detection to see if that resolves this situation. I guess it will only work for new activities. Please be so kind to report back. We will keep on monitoring this situation and will get back at you once I have more information. Thanks again!

[Chris_uk35]

Turned off automatic training detection and still dropped GPS after 0.75 miles.

[DrWatson]

I haven't had a chance to check whether turning off automatic tracking on my phone and watch has helped yet, but will as soon as possible!

I have checked the activities impacted by it on the website. For my most recent run, where no GPS data was recorded, my dashboard shows two activities recorded at the same time, neither of which have any GPS data associated (see screenshot). 

If I download the tcx file from the activities page on the website, they look to be empty other than basic metadata. Unlike the previous poster, none of the GPS data is stored. 

For the manually recoded run (started at 17:54) it reads as follows (I had to edit hyphens to slashes in the dates for some reason because they weren't permitted?)

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes"?>
<TrainingCenterDatabase xmlns="http://www.garmin.com/xmlschemas/TrainingCenterDatabase/v2">
<Activities>
<Activity Sport="Running">
<Id>2023/10/24T17:54:54.000+01:00</Id>
<Creator xsi:type="Device_t" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance">
<UnitId>0</UnitId>
<ProductID>0</ProductID>
</Creator>
</Activity>
</Activities>
</TrainingCenterDatabase>

For the automatically recorded run, it looks like this:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes"?>
<TrainingCenterDatabase xmlns="http://www.garmin.com/xmlschemas/TrainingCenterDatabase/v2">
<Activities>
<Activity Sport="Running">
<Id>2023/10/24T18:00:00.000+01:00</Id>
</Activity>
</Activities>
</TrainingCenterDatabase>

When I look at another run where GPS data is missing (~5km total distance), only one activity is listed on my dashboard.

The activity itself only shows the first short section of the run on the GPS. This is the Town Moor parkrun route in Newcastle, so the run continued past this point to loop around the moor. The distance shown on the map in pink is correct to the final distance, even though the section of GPS shown is only ~1km in to the run.

When I look at the tcx file, data is present throughout the run but my GPS position (latitude and longitude fields) are frozen after a certain point and do not update at all for the rest of the run.

[NickMW]

Similar issues with missing data. The overall run is recorded in Fitbit, but part of my run is missing. This happens on other runs as well, and not always the same portion of the run, but as an example:-

Within the Google Fit app journal, all kilometer splits show up.

[DeCarteret]

My first run yesterday had the same issue reported here.

In Fitbit, my run started correctly, then ~3.5 minutes into the run it stopped recording, then ~23 minutes into the run it started recording again and shows a random line directly from one side of my route to the other side. The rest of the run recorded correctly.

I found this thread and the recommendation to turn off all automatic activity tracking. I turned everything off and did another run today. Same issue.

Today it correctly recorded the first 17.5 minutes of the run and then stopped recording any further. The final 13 minutes of my run were not recorded.

On both days heart rate was recorded correctly for the entire duration. The elevation difference seems correct and the total distance is very close to correct.

I'll try with a 3rd party GPS app tomorrow.

Next day follow up:
I found a Reddit thread that addressed this issue and an app written to rectify it! I installed it and eagerly tried it today. Unfortunately I still had the same issue. 😞 Three days in a row.

Tomorrow I will try with a 3rd party app! Probably Ghostracer.

[WolfV]

I had a call with the Google pixel support team. They asked me to completely reset the watch and reconnect everything. After doing that I recorded one activity and that went fine.

I also turned off all the automatic activity tracking. However, that doesn't work because it still asks me if I want to start tracking when I cycle to work.

To make matters worse, now my sync with Strava doesn't work anymore. I've reconnected Fitbit to Strava a couple of times but my activities do not show up in Strava.

In conclusion: nothing works as expected. Really surprising that software + hardware from Google is failing so hard. This thread is getting so much traction. Google + Fitbit you really need to get your **ahem** together and fix this.

[Moggy66]

Could be a coincidence but my last 3 runs worked when I didn't bring the phone with me and it uploaded when I returned. It also synced with Strava fine too. 

Be interesting to see if others that get regular GPS failures are carrying their phone on the run. 

[Chris_uk35]

No the 2 runs i have done, i havent carried phone, and both have cut off half way round the run

[NickMW]

Update from this morning's run. As below, the first couple of kilometres or so seem to be a pretty straight line, with absolute consistent pace. This is not the route I took though; the upper line is the route back, and I took the same route out, so tracking is way off. As for the Km times, these are also random:-

For a dedicated fitness tracking app, this is appalling.

[JulienDev]

Activity on the website is also broken:

[RodrigoMFitbit]

Hello everyone. I really appreciate the detailed explanations and screenshots about this. Thanks for letting me know. 

I recommend you take a look at the "best practices" and "troubleshooting tips" in the following article: How do I get my Fitbit device to connect to GPS?. Tap on "Built in GPS" and there you will see both sections. Thanks in advance!

[DrWatson]

I hate to be negative... But the best practices and trouble shooting add nothing to the things already suggested on here that have been tried and shown not to work by multiple people. I've used 4 or 5 different GPS watches over the years and I don't think I've ever had to read a manual on making sure I get GPS connection for them to work.. 

[ShawnPHX]

I've read over all of that if there is anything there that actually addresses the problems we are all describing with GPS cutting out you should have directly linked to it or copied it here otherwise it's just making it sound like there isn't a real problem that needs to be addressed by Google/Fitbit. It's a frustrating response.

I have also tried all the recommendations on this page including resetting they watch, the pixel 8 pro, location permissions on both, disabling automatic exercises, etc. My charge 5 was working flawlessly before "upgrading" to the new pixel watch 2/pixel 8 pro.

[Moggy66]

Right! The responses we're all still waiting for from Fitbit / Google is: 

We acknowledge there is a major flaw with Pixel Watch 2 and we're working on a fix to push to devices. Everything else is a distraction. 

[chromium]

Same issue here. I went for a run earlier. I actually ran 2.94 km, the app says I ran 2.82 km, but the map shows my run ending 2.02 km into the route.

A similar thing happened the first time I took it on a run. Pretty poor that such an expensive device can't get basic stuff like this right. My sleep tracking is terrible as well. I fell asleep just after 1:30 am and the app reported that I didn't fall asleep until 5:10 am!

If this is how it is I'll have to return it. My 3 year old Fitbit Versa 2 was better than this, it even played music offline from internal storage until they inexplicably removed the feature.

[ShawnPHX]

I don't know if this is useful on determining cause or if anyone else has the same problem but I've also noticed battery life on the watch is great until I use the watch for an exercise (where GPS always gets cut off) at which point the battery drain is very high. I will have to charge to full 3-4 times a day until I restart the watch and it does well until the next exercise is started. Perhaps there is a stuck process/thread.

[katja_pixie]

I have similiar problem. I've already written on GooglePixel watch help, maybe I will get help here sooner. I'm using Google Pixel 8 and Google Pixel watch 2 and I'm tracking activities with Fitbit. Reading the forums I assume the problem could be Fitbit.

My Google Pixel Watch 2 was working properly for first few days, then the battery drained too quickly. I charched the watch before going to bed and after 6 or 7 hours of sleep the battery was on 50% or less. 

When I have problems with the battery, two more issues appeared. When tracking activity using Fitbit, GPS didn't want to turn on in the app. The second issue connected to battery drain is that Fitbit is not monitoring sleep properly. When I have problems with the battery I only get basic sleep details.

I completly reset my watch and after a day and restarting a watch again everything was working fine, even the watch battery was draining normally. This lasted for 2 days.

Yesterday in the afternoon the second activity I was tracking with Fitbit didn't want to turn GSP on, the battery is draning for 10% in an hour, and I only got basic sleep details in the morning again.

[Changgo]

Run into the same issue. Tried the various different suggestions without success.

[kow]

Exactly same problem. Issue is it doesn't happen all the time but sporadically which is frustrating. No response of course from Help/ Support

Tried checking it on Fitbit web dashboard, attempted to export exercise as tcx file but it came up empty clearly indicating no GPS data

[Changgo]

I exported the .tcx file as well for one of the failed trackings. Looking at the data, it starts recording GPS coordinates fine, but after ~ 4 mins the coordinates repeat for the rest of the run.