Blaze GPS Accuracy and 1 day review of the Blaze from a Surge owner

[JohnRi]

I have had the Fitbit Surge since November 8, 2015.  I love my Surge.  But like a lot of Surge owners I had issues with the band coming apart.  I did get a replacement, but I lost so much weight, and my Surge no longer fits me.  So I had to get a new Fitbit no matter what.

So I decided I was getting a Blaze with it's new design for replaceable bands.  But my concern was the GPS tracking.  I used that almost every day with my Surge, and it works flawless on my Surge most of the time.  And it was very accurate.  A 3 mile course my Surge would show 3.01 miles.  I had used mapmywalk with my iphone, and found it to be inaccurate.  A 3 mile course, it would show 2.9 miles. 

So I got my Blaze yesterday, and after tinkering with it for a day, I have to say I like the interface better.  The color makes it more readable, but how the changes to the menus and how to do things with the watch are nice upgrades from the Surge.  Screen size was a little smaller, but the watch is bigger.  ODD... 

I do like that the watch seems lighter and more comfortable than my Surge.

Heart rate monitor seems a little more accurate, but that could be just because it fits properly, where my Surge was loose.

I did a walk this morning with my wife.  We BOTH have the new blaze.  She has a Samsung Note 4, and I have a iPhone 6S.

The course we were on, has 1/4 mile marker posts.  So we have an accurate idea of how far we walked.

My wife walked to the 2 mile marker, and turned around.  Her fitbit app showed she had walked 3.86 miles.

I noticed right away the tracking was wrong.  At the 3/4 mile marker, the Blaze showed .7 miles.  My surge would have shown .78 miles at this point. 

At the 2.75 mile marker, where I turned around, the fitbit app showed 2.56 miles.   My surge would have shown 2.80 at this point. 

When I got back to the starting point, my app showed 5.29 miles.  But based on the mile markers, I should have walked 5.50.  My Surge would have showned around 5.6 miles.

Tomorrow I'm going to walk a 3 mile loop and see what the Blaze says there.  It's mostly flat, and the trail I was on today is very hilly.

So I'm not impressed with the GPS passthrough so far.  Both of our Blazes with different phones, both inaccurate.

My surge was always almost accurate, so the Blaze being so inaccurate is kind of a bummer.  The distance being wrong is also a bummer, because the pacing the app shows is now wrong too. 

I'm not sure what Fitbit can do, but this is a bummer for me.  I like having accurate distances and rates.

On the plus side, I found the heart rate monitor on the Blaze worked very well during exercise.  A problem I've been having with my surge with the heart rate monitor not working.

So I'm torn...  Accurate GPS, or Accurate Heart Rate Monitor.  I guess I'll stick with the Blaze.

I was able to get call notifications working, but text notifications, I'm still trying to get those to work.  Works flawless on my Surge.

Maybe Fitbit will come out with an update to the Fitbit app to make the GPS data more accurate...

[matt9013]

The GPS doesn't seem to work the best yet on the Blaze. Maybe a future update will help solve the problem. I've also heard that the more you use the GPS the more accurate it becomes as it's being calibrated each time.

Another suggestion would be to use the Blaze for walks and keeping track of it but just keep the GPS off and use another app like MyRunKeeper or something. Until the GPS can get sorted out.

[Iguana]

Same thing for me. It is adding anywhere up to 100 metres per kilometre run!! 

Ran with a friend today and it said I ran 7.8 kilometers for a 7.1 kilometre distance. Friend had a Garmin that tracked it accurately. I know the run - do it often. I even cross-checked the distance using Google Maps the measure distance in meticulous detail. Off by at least 100m per kilometres. WOW! What a glaring problem!

Will certainly be returning unless an update can correct this. Quite embarrassing, really, for what is otherwise a premium product.

[ChaneRZ]

Yup it is not accurate at all.

[Rich_Laue]

Of their indeed is an accuracy problem, it would have to be determined of it is hardware or firmware related, is the cause on the Blaze, or phone, is it only occurring with certain phones, or perticular hardware in the phone. Since few have mentioned their phone model, i very big oart of connected GPS, it makes it hard to see a oattern.
A fix will need to be found and tested. I don't believe the update will come overnight, but with patience you will find that an update will be released. I base this observation on past updates, and bugs that only affected a relatively few trackers. Now if you happen to be one that is affected then i realize it would be a big thing.

For me im still at the testing stage and have not determined the accuracy of the connected GPS yet.

[JohnRi]

Yesterday I walked at Memorial Park in Houston.  200 miles further south from where I walked on Saturday.  The Memorial Park trail is a oval trail, that is very flat.  Both of my fitbit's show only 10 feet climbed when walking the trail.

The trail is marked 1/4 markers, and is exactly 3 miles long.  My Surge would show it at as 2.99 to 3.01 a loop.  Which to me is dead on accurate.

Yesterday I walked this course with my Blaze...

Marker          Blaze

1/4 mile         .25

1/2 mile         .5

3/4 mile         .74

1 1/2 mile      1.48

2 1/2 mile      2.50

3 mile            2.90

3.5 mile         3.4

4.0 mile         3.9

That's all I can recall from memory.  But you can see that it actually caught up a 2 1/2 miles, then lost .1 of a mile.  Only thing I can think of, during the first mile, my phone on my back faced north.  Second mile it faced West.  Third mile mostly east.  The course is basically a large triangle.

Very inconsistent....

[runninrocket]

I wore a blaze on one wrist and surge on the other. I ran on a trail with mile markers. I ran 8.5 miles based on trail markers. Surge was spot on, marking me at 8.5. Blaze put me at 9 miles. That's a huge difference when you're training for a race. The pace was way off on the Blaze too. I run 11-12 minute mile pace and the blaze got me at 8:55 early on in my run. No way I was running that fast. I have an iPhone 6s.