Charge 5 - Known Built-In GPS Issue

[RikParr]

Hi

My Charge 5 is 9 months old. Until about 6 weeks ago the built-in GPS worked perfectly for all my weekly runs. Now it only works with my mobile connected. Contacted support and went through all the troubleshooting etc with no fix. They asked me to reset the 5 and monitor for a few days, which I have done. Just contacted them again and have been told it's a 'known issue' and they are working on it and to ensure my 5 is kept up to date. To be frank that's a poor response, with no timescales and no offer to replace the device, surely they are breaching consumer rights in the UK? There are no details of this 'known issue' on the website nor have there been any announcements, what's going on?!?!?

[C00b]

For me it works the first, say, 20 minutes of my walk or run, then gives notification gps is not working anymore. This never happened before the last couple of weeks (not sure it's 6 weeks as well).

[sharper100]

For me, it’ll not track the first mile or more starting from my house and then pick up. I also have to take my phone, because without it, it doesn’t track hardly at all. I upgraded to Charge 5 FOR THE NEW GPS FEATURE and have given up. Paid all this money and could’ve kept the Charge 4. Works just the same. I use MapMyFitness now to track my bike rides and hikes. Really unhappy about the Charge 5 right now. Haven’t even had it a year. 

[SunsetRunner]

Hello @RikParr,

So this may be redundant:  On your charge 5 device

1. Swipe up to "settings" and select.
2. Scroll down to "GPS" and select.
3. Under GPS settings It will say either:
   • GPS: Dynamic
   • GPS: Built-In
   • GPS: Phone
4. You will want it set to Dynamic which use either the Charge 5 GPS chip or the smartphone's GPS chip (depending on signal strength and accuracy). 
5. OR set to Built-In which only uses the Charge 5 GPS chip.

Note: The Phone setting uses only the GPS chip on the smartphone.  

Feel free to share any additional info and make sure your Charge 5 is using the current firmware: 1.171.50

https://help.fitbit.com/articles/en_US/Help_article/1372.htm

If the above was redundant then perform a factory reset by:

• unpairing the device from your smartphone (smartphone settings forget or delete the charge 5).
• Then on the Charge 5 itself Go to "settings" then "device info" and scroll to "clear user data". Clear user data will not wipe out data stored on the fitbit servers just the Charge 5 itself.  This action performs a factory reset. 
• While it is resetting make sure the Charge 5 is also removed from the fitbit app. 
• When the device is ready just connect the Charge 5 like a new device and reconfigure any of your preferences. 

Why might this work? Sometimes when hardware has installed an update... a clean install is needed for the updated software to run properly on the hardware.

Let me know how it works out for you.

[CareyS]

10 months later I do a DuckDuckGo search and find this article. It worked for me after over a week of not getting GPS on my Charge 5.

Thank you Splatt Matt!

  -Carey

[dz1234]

Mine stopped working entirely. For the past week, it hasn't connected when I try it in the dynamic setting. This morning I tried the phone setting and it didn't work either. My phone itself had no problem tracking my run.

[dz1234]

Factory reset worked