Step counting WAY off

[vstinnett]

I just got the new Blaze after using  the Zip for over a year and i am wondering if I am doing something wrong. I just went for my usual 3 mile walk (milage verified many times) and it recorded only 1.7 miles. It was a 50 minute walk and I got only just over 4,000 steps. I can handle a few hundred steps off, but not thousands. Is there something I can do to fix this? My Zip did not have this problem at all. I swing my arms normally, not overexaggerated, but enough it should count. 

[FerdinandFitbit]

Hi there @vstinnett. Good to see you in the Fitbit Community! 🙂

I'm sorry to hear that your tracker is not counting your information as accurate as it should. I would recommend trying to restart your tracker by pressing and holding the left and lower right buttons together for 10-15 seconds until your tracker reboots.

Then, try it out and see if this makes any difference. Let me know if you need more help with this!

[vstinnett]

I tried your suggestion, but it did the same thing this morning. Undercounted my steps by over 2,000 on my walk. Anything else? Did i get a faulty Fitbit?

[GingersBlaze]

Mine does this quite often too, and it's a little frustrating. I've had mine for 3 months and hardly ever get the same miles on the same walk. Still trying to learn though

[FerdinandFitbit]

Huh, that's strange @vstinnett. Thanks for getting back.

Please get in touch with the Support Team. They will be able to take a deeper look into this and get you back on track.

Let me know if you need anything else! 🙂

[Bonnieboy]

I am having the same problem and more. I upgraded from the Surge to the Blaze, mainly because I couldn't get the Surge to fit under the cuff of my shirts - what a mistake!

My Blaze now undercounts steps and mileage, randomly on walks: not every time, just enough times to make it completely unreliable; it also counts steps when I'm cooking food, cleaning my teeth, etc. I now have the problem that it's counting steps when I ride my motorcycle and won't let me remove them by adding 'Driving' as an activity; so I've got between 1,000 and 2,000 steps logged, even though I've logged the time as driving.

I'm really disappointed! I loved my Surge and told everyone what good products Fitbits are...it turns out that the Blaze is useless. If Fitbit can't sort it out, I'm taking mine back to the retailer for a refund.

[fudge22]

There are a few questions that you can ask yourself. Were you holding something in your hand during the walk, like a phone or a dog leash? Did you have your hands in your pockets? Were you pushing a stroller? All of these things potentially could cause the blaze to undercount your steps. 

Since it is a wrist-based step counter, wrist movement is key to being able to track steps.

If you were walking normally with average arm movement, try contacting support as suggested to see what they say. Their first suggestion will be to restart the tracker and see if that fixes the issue. 

[fudge22]

@Bonnieboy Check your settings. If you wear your blaze on your dominant hand, yet the blaze is set to the non dominant hand, it will count steps more frequently. As for the motorcycle, naturally since your arm will be bouncing up and down as you hit bumps, the blaze will most likely pick up additional steps. If it is a big issue for you, I suggest turning it off before riding and turning it back on after. Otherwise, just ignore the extra steps as there really is no way of telling the tracker to stop counting steps. You can however go to the feature request board and upvote the request to add the driving feature in a future update (most likely months from now if it even happens).

[vstinnett]

I do wear it on my non-dominent had and I've reset it twice. As for holding things, it was a standard walk without my dog or a stroller and my phone is in an arm pack. I do carry a water bottle (July in Florida, it's kind of essential) but if i have to avoid all of the above things to get my steps counted then it's not worth it to me. I'm not a step "nitpicker", i don't get upset if it is a little off, but 2,000-3,000 is crazy. I'm going to send it back and stick with my Polar A300. Very accurate and it is also a wrist based device. I just love the FitBit because of its app,  and  the challenges with my friends, and that it syncs with Weight Watchers. Thanks for all your advise thought 🙂

[Cefnohio]

I had the same issue with my fitbit charge hr. I did 8 miles and it tracked 6 miles.

[MikeS1971]

This has been an ongoing issue since the last firmware update in April. It worked fine previous to the update. After three months with no fix in sight, I stopped using my Blaze. Luckily I didn't have to pay for it, so I'm not out any money.

[Cefnohio]

I'm almost ready to give up on my charge hr. This is my third one. I hate to accept challenges because I have to work harder to get steps to show up. It seems that if this is an ongoing problem it should be fixed . This is so frustrating.

[AlejandraFitbit]

Hello all, I hope you are doing fine.  I would like to know if you keep having problem with your Blaze accuracy? If you do and have followed @FerdinandFitbit's suggestions without success, as recommended, please get in touch with our support team, for a faster response you can contact them via phone or chat.

Let me know the outcome. 

[vstinnett]

No I returned it.

Sent from my iPhone

[yhussein]

Yep mine is the same- I think it is because it doesnt have GPS- My friend has a garmin and his steps are counted off his GPS not movements on the arm. This makes it really inaccurate because I could just move my arm while standing still and it could still count steps.