Battery short life - Charge 5

[tsl14]

I am nearly ready to give up on the battery on this Charge 5.  I ordered a new one for my wife, and if hers has better battery performance, I will return this one and get a replacement.  But I'm tired of all the problems.

1. Restart Device helped initially, but the brief battery life improvement could have been from forgetting to switch off Water Lock and Do Not Disturb. When I turned those off, the battery life went back to being terrible.
2. Even turning off email, text and phone notifications, and using Dim screen mode and Dynamic GPS, the battery drops to 50% in the span of 16 hours.
3. I wear a long-sleeve top to bed, and I wonder if the sleeve touching the screen activates it, and causes battery drain.  I tried sleeping in a short sleeve top to test it, but that didn't help much, although maybe I moved my arm and touched the sheets and covers.
4. I just turned off GPS, Fitbit Pay, real time data sharing with the app, and eliminated auto detect for most exercises. I don't know what else to do.

This totally sucks.  If I wanted a device that doesn't last longer than a day or two, I'd have gotten an Apple Watch.

Moderator edit:  updated subject for clarity

[Heather-S]

@tsl14 That is not normal.  I would contact customer support to see if you can get a replacement.  You shouldn't have to disable all those options to get good battery life.  I wouldn't wait, just contact Fitbit.  Sounds like you may have a faulty battery.

[JuanFitbit]

@Heather-S Nice to see you around. Thank you for sharing your insights. 

@tsl14 A warm welcome to the Community! Thank you for sharing all what you've tried to solve this.

As advised by our fried Heather-M please give us a call or chat with us. Click here  to get connected. 

See you around. 

[Aaymedh]

Same issues facing with the battery.. absolutely worst device I have ever bought. I have contacted customer service several times, horrible service now waiting ages for some kind of email to receive from something called Higher team as lower team is not capable 

[Knuty]

Had the device for 2.5 weeks now and I've only changed it twice (came with 45% when i bought it). It seems to last about 6 to 6 and half days of just being on the wrist. Every option is turned in except always on display. So there has to be something faulty with your device. Right now I'm at 56% and it's been 3 days since last charge. I don't do fitness with it but i wear it 24/7

[JuanFitbit]

@Aaymedh , A warm welcome to the Community! Thank you for your feedback and taking the time to contact Support. If you case was escalated, this means that a specialist or specialist team is investigating it. 

I appreciate your patience and thank you for keeping us updated. 

@Knuty ,Nice to see you back. Thank you for your message and for trying to solve the situation by yourself.

As the recommended steps did not provide any improvement, please give us a call or chat with us.  Click here  to get connected. 

See you around. 

[Xterm8]

Try restarting device every time after you end tracking an exercise. Keep all other settings as default. Restarting takes a few seconds only. Until charge 5 get an updated software upgrade that fixes this, you got no choice. 

[markp88]

I am stuck at the exact same point! Contacted fitbit numerous times with updates that it’s still dying far too quickly. 

i just like 25% from the time I went to bed at 10pm and woke up at 5am and it was dead. 

fitbit on night mode, so no screen turning on, no gps no fitbit pay nothing. 

if I have to turn off heart rate tracking and everything else then this device truly is a waste. The whole purpose is that’s it’s supposed to last a week. Maybe real world usage it’s 4/5 day. But not 1 day!

[Wibby]

There is something very wrong with yours and they should give you a replacement! 

I top mine up every morning when I have a shower, but I only lose about 10 to 15% per day with normal usage.  I don't use notifications though as I don't want a smartwatch, I want it to purely be a fitness tracker.

You shouldn't have to turn everything off to be able to keep it alive.  Please insist on a replacement or refund and then get your next one from a local shop or Amazon, who are more experienced and capable of dealing with faulty products and returns.

Good luck!  Be insistent!

[markp88]

I have notifications turned off too! It’s very frustrating!

i purchased from a local shop who won’t return it once it’s opened? Sport check in Canada. Absolutely ridiculous!

they tell me to contact fitbit and fitbit can’t return it since I didn’t buy it from them. So at the very best all I can hope for is a replacement?  Horrible product support. 

[tsl14]

This is so bizarre.  I took the steps I described and charged it once more.  And I haven't had to charge it in 4 days.

I even turned Notifications back on for phone calls and on for text messages before turning them off after I got annoyed by them.  I even turned GPS back to Dynamic.  And as of today, I still have 40% battery life left.

I have a new Charge 5 arriving today from Costco, and I will return the one I am currently using to my local Costco warehouse.  I am confident that the new Charge 5 will not have these issues (which have resolved in the past only to become problems again) because I got another one for my wife last week and she hasn't had any problems at all.