Blaze Heart Rate Only Accurate at Rest

[D_E]

The heart rate shown on my Blaze seems pretty accurate when I am at rest (for me around 60), but is nowhere close when exercising - typically brisk walk and intermittent running on a treadmill.  I have tried all the suggestion I can find regarding position on the wrist, tightness, restarting, etc.  Most of the time when my heart rate gets above 70 or so, it just displays 2 lines instead of numbers.  If numbers are displayed, I might get a reading of about 73 when my actual rate is around 175.  Heart rate was one of the reasons I went with this fitbit, but it is completely useless at the time I am most interested in it.  I was going to e-mail this question directly to fitbit, but they don't have an e-mail address on their Contact Us page.  Excuse me for not being interested in having a twitter account.

[SilviaFitbit]

Welcome to the Community @D_E! First of all thank you for following the steps on the help site before sharing what is going on with your heart rate. I would like to ask you how many times have you seen the two lines instead of the numbers on your tracker's display? Is this more common when you're  walking or on the treadmill?

You can check what should you know about your heart rate data to make sure which are the heart rate zones you have to be in, while doing different kind of exercises. 

About the e-mail that you needed to contacted us, here is the page Get Support, or you can always keep contacting us this way. 

I hope this helps, let me know how it goes! 

[D_E]

I see the 2 lines instead of numbers virtually every time I walk or jog on the treadmill. Once in a great while it will display a rate of up to about 130, but that is rare and intermittent. I've had this Fitbit since Christmas and never had success with heart rate other than at rest. I'm just starting to accept it as an expensive pedometer that has a watch, nothing more.

[phatbitzr]

I get very frustrated with the Blaze tracking my heart rate, and out of the blue, drops off, and if I don't constantly look at it and compare with my chest strap's heart rate output, I might think I am not pushing that heart.

I started wearing some lycra wrist wallet to hold keys or credit cards so that the Blaze would sit higher on my wrist.  It still fails read my HR once in a while and I still have to adjust it.  Then I noticed the watch doesn't sit flat on my wrist nearer to the hand because its made for a constant radius cylinder while my arm is a decreasing radius one.  Then I put a rubber band over the side of the fitbit closer to the hand, and on the one time I tried it, it did not lose tracking of my HR (albeit it was on a stationary bike), but I think it proves my theory.

They should have a bungee version of the wrist strap, which would hold tight both sides and constantly pull the Blaze close to the wrist.  I know in the scuba world, we frequently replace anything on wrist straps with a bungee corded housing.  It could be ugly on a activity tracker watch, but sometimes form has to follow function.