Aria body fat percentage questions

[CarrieV]

Hi, I have a question on whether it is really possible I'm made up of 33% body fat (according to the aria scale).  Here are my stats:

51 year old woman

5' 6"

132 lbs.

currently wearing a size 6

33% body fat according to the charts means I'm obese.  I don't feel obese.  I know I need to lose 8 more lbs. to be at my ideal weight that I feel best at, but this 33% body fat has been pretty consistent the whole time I've been dieting.  Even after I lose 8 more lbs., I do not think it will be much less than 33% body fat on the aria scale.  I'm definitely not lean, so I know selecting the "lean" category in the settings would not apply to me.

I'm fine with just ignoring this and feeling good about the lbs. I've already lost, but every morning it's still a little depressing to weigh yourself and think how is it possible that 33% of my body is pure fat.

I weigh myself bare foot, dry feet every morning before I shower.  I do not move the scale.  It is sitting on the floor in my bedroom, same spot as always.

Moderator edit: updated subject for clarity

[SadH]

I assume you didn't read the original post of this thread. The problem is
the body fat % doubled after changing the baterries and resetting the wifi.
It is a problem with the **ahem** scale.
--
Doug

[Humblezandra]

Every scale I have used gets a different number if you step back on it lol.

Our bodies change every minute.

Men and women are completely different. Lol. At your weight we would never be that fat percentage 

Moderator edit: merged reply

[warreng2104]

This is seriously the accepted solution.  I am 39 years old.  I finished an enhanced clean bulk about 45 days ago and I am 217lb with a caliper measured 20% body fat.  The scale tells me I am at 33%.  I have NEVER been at a BF % over 25% in my entire life.  33% BF can be easily measured by looking in the mirror.  I pulled the batteries 3 times, re-synced 3 times and have now weighed myself 15 times and the calculation is out to lunch. 

Should the accepted solution be take what Aria tells us and deduct 10%?  Between this bullcrap and the lack of a smart alarm on the tracker itself I'm feeling really stupid buying Fitbit products. Here is a photographic representation of what BF levels look like in the mirror.  Honestly this is more useful than the Aria calculation.  Save yourself $130CAD and look in the mirror. 

[MatthewFitbit]

@warreng2104 I understand that this can be frustrating - hopefully I can offer some insight. 

Body fat measurements are meant to estimate the percentage of your body that is fat, as opposed to muscle, bone, and other tissue. No matter the method, this measurement is always an estimate - and different methods will always provide differing results.

The Aria's method involves sending a small electrical current through your body to measure how much resistance it encounters (fat resists electricity more than other body substances), while calipers pinch a small portion of your body to measure that area's volume - again, these are completely different methods of estimation, and we would not expect their results to match.

There are no methods of body fat measurement which will be perfectly accurate. Calipers are a fairly archaic method, and generally considered to be less accurate because different people carry fat in different parts of their bodies. We believe that the Aria presents customers with a relatively narrow range of accuracy, and should be more than sufficient to help set and achieve weight-loss goals.

Rather than focusing on the percentage itself, pay attention to value's the change over time. This is the best approach to setting and achieving those goals. Hopefully that helps!

[warreng2104]

Thanks. 

Looking in the mirror is sufficient of an estimate for me to determine that Aria's initial caluclation is not accurate.  But to support your change over time theory I stole this from Wiki:

^ Buchholz AC, Bartok C, Schoeller DA (October 2004). "The validity of bioelectrical impedance models in clinical populations". Nutr Clin Pract. 19 (5): 433–46. PMID 16215137. doi:10.1177/0115426504019005433. In general, bioelectrical impedance technology may be acceptable for determining body composition of groups and for monitoring changes in body composition within individuals over time. Use of the technology to make single measurements in individual patients, however, is not recommended.

Even more problematic though is this study:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2543039/

Which basically indicates that the one size fits all calculation that Aria does is not really the best for on the spot measurements. 

Why not just say that on the box? 

[Joe_NC]

I had a dexascan done by dexafit and they were able to measure my fat mass, bone mass and muscle mass to 0.1 lbs. The Aria results fat percentage differed by 100%. Almost exactly double the scan.

Sent from my iPhone

[NanFC]

Me too! The customer support suggested I update the dashboard to Lean mode. I am not a marathon runner nor body builder. Seems strange that I would need to purposefully game the scale to get an accurate reading. Seems like a firmware update is needed. 

[jdc115]

After the last time I moved, it took a few weeks to get the Scale to show a
reasonably accurate body fat. Now that I moved again and connected to a
new Wifi, it has gone back to high weird results. I tried lean mode again
but it didn't change the results. I hope it corrects again like it did last
time

[Splatter246]

Body Fat Scale Reliability

A "Consumer Reports" study of body fat scales supports what many health and fitness experts say: that these scales are not as accurate as other body fat measurement methods. One issue is that the current runs from foot to foot and therefore is only measuring fat content in the lower body. The Consumer Report study found that the best scales were accurate up to 80 percent of the time. Further, there was no consistency as to whether or not scales reported a higher or lower body fat content. Because of these widespread inaccuracies, "Consumer Reports" no longer tests body-fat scales. Although the scales aren't always accurate, they can still be a tool to measure progress if you test your fat percentage under the same conditions each time.

from livestrong website article "how do body fat scales work & are they accurate?"

[jboyle1115]

 My concern over the body fat is there a more accurate ways to do it i.e. body scan and you can't readjust your scale to your known body fat.   It also does not let you do that on your App or data.   Even when I plug in 11.7% I still go back to 20%.   It would be nice to from that point will use your more accurate data 

[PeperG]

@MatthewFitbit I have read through this and a number of other threads and I can not find an answer to what I have been seeing. Its not a minor fluctuation that is explained by water weight or any other weight loss causes. My Aria is approx 2x off when it comes to BF. I am 6'5", 282.6 and according to my Aria I am 44.7% BF. I have done a tape measurement (22.4%), a caliper measurement (22.8%) and used an InBody measurement at my Dr (22.1%). I have looked all over to see if there was an update or something that caused it to change, it used to be correct. I have also tried to reset the thing to factory defaults and then reconfigure and I have the same issues. 

[warreng2104]

---

@PeperG wrote:

@MatthewFitbit I have read through this and a number of other threads and I can not find an answer to what I have been seeing. Its not a minor fluctuation that is explained by water weight or any other weight loss causes. My Aria is approx 2x off when it comes to BF. I am 6'5", 282.6 and according to my Aria I am 44.7% BF. I have done a tape measurement (22.4%), a caliper measurement (22.8%) and used an InBody measurement at my Dr (22.1%). I have looked all over to see if there was an update or something that caused it to change, it used to be correct. I have also tried to reset the thing to factory defaults and then reconfigure and I have the same issues. 

---

For me, the scale is exactly, or very near exactly, 10% points actual body fat higher what my actual body fat is.  Aria says 28% I'm actually closer to 18%.  It does not seem to matter what time of day I measure.  Wearing sock seems to change the measurement.  Overall the product will work for me now that I know it's out to lunch.  I wish I had read threads like this before I purchased it because honestly I would of saved the $150.  It's not any more useful than the mirror, to me. 

If I'm being honest I feel bad for someone in the 25-35% BF range stepping onto their brand new Aria and it telling them they are in the the 35-45% range.  It's bull**ahem** and Fitbit should be more open about how out to lunch the scale is. 

[Joe_NC]

Fitbit probably knows exactly what the fault is. Letting the cat out of the bag may generate excessive warranty exchanges. Won't buy another Fitbit product.

Sent from my iPhone

[jboyle1115]

I guess that would be a good gauge then because mines at 21% and that is double what I am. Thanks for the comparison detail

Sent from my iPhone

[LoriBee]

I agree! Thanks.

[Kstim]

Ok, I'm having the same issue it says 

124 lbs

5'6"

30 years old

26.8% body fat..... has not changed at all??? Gain or lose wait stays the same?

[JamesDoulton]

My aria used to measure my body fat as 32%, which matched other devices. Then I changed my unit from stones to pounds because I was fed up with the way that the display truncated the fraction of a pound on the scale so I had to look in the app to get the full reading.

Having changed to pounds, then my body fat jumped to 46% on the next weighing. I have checked my account settings and my height and that is all correct. I changed the height units from cm to feet and it had no effect. I changed my location etc to UK, which seemed to have been messed up by installing the Windows app. I have tried the reset and 5 weighings but it is still saying 46%.

The only reason that I bought these scales was because they log this data, which saves me doing it, but these scales are beginning to look like being an embarrassment to have in the house.

I think that the issue was in installing the new Windows app. Before, I don't remember there being any 'lean mode' but now there is - I have had my Aria since 2015 so maybe it was added. Changing myself to 'lean mode' makes the scale return my BF to about 33%.

I think that 'lean mode' is rather inappropriate - I am not lean, I'm 230lb. My legs are pretty lean and muscly but I don't workout, I never get to 10K steps a day. I can run up 3 floor of stairs, two steps at a time, but I don't very often. 'lean mode', really?

Moderator edit: merged reply

[Girlyray]

For anyone that looks this up in the future. I would disregard the bodyfat reading. Maybe I need to reset my scale like stated above but even when I was stage lean, abs and veins, it said I was 30% body fat. And now after gaining 15lbs it says ive only increased to 33%. Or... i would use the handheld bodyfat calculator and average out the number with the aria scales bf number. 

[johneric8]

I'm not trying to discourage anyone,  but I don't think the scale is as off as some of you think it is.   My wife does readings both at home with the aria and once a month at Camp Gladiator camp.   She is 5"6 at about 130 pounds and the readings she gets are within a couple of percentage points between the aria and the camp gladiator dunk method,   as well as the pulse method at CG.

Also,  mine is within a couple of percentage points as well.  I'm a 6 foot male at 170 pounds and I always typically get between 7 and 9 percent body fat,  which totally lines up with what I get from other methods such as caliper and gym scale. 

Average body fat for a women depending on age is anywhere between 25 to 38%.  Women typically carry quite a bit more far than men and that is just genetics.   Lets be realistic here for a second,  even 30% body fat is healthy in women of age,  so honestly age has a huge deal to do with it.   Some of the photos I see of women claiming there are 20% body fat don't look nowhere near that,  and quite honestly that is getting near super lean athlete territory for a women.

I seriously believe that some of us just have cloudy views of what our true fat percentages are.   All I'm saying is the scale works VERY accurately for both my wife and I whom are religious with comparing results with other methods.  However,  I will say that we use LEAN mode on the scale since we don't carry much fat.   Maybe there is something to the Aria working better when you carry very little fat?

Again,  I'm not going to suggest lean mode as a viable option unless you're truly lean.   But,  if you feel it works more accurately to what you perceive to be then go for it..

[johneric8]

unless your an athlete and have plenty of muscle and very low fat I would venture to say that 18% was the incorrect reading.   I have a friend I workout with at the gym as she is 27 year old weight lifting female whom is VERY fit and she is at 20% bf.