Charge 5 battery draining too fast

[SharleneH]

I have had the new Charge 5 for 2 days. The battery discharges within a day. GPS is off, the phone is not set to always on. In looking over the troubleshooting instructions from Fitbit, it seems that you essentially have to disable all of the features that were selling points of this device in order to get decent battery life. Even my ancient Charge 3 got 6 days on one charge! Has anyone with this battery problem found a solution other than disabling everything?

[tcat007]

Well, I did the charge/restart thing on Saturday and still have 76%, so it does work for me. Definitely software related, something to do with gps not turning itself off completely after using it.  That's my guess.

[Sled483]

tcat007 I think you'll find you have to restart it every time you charge it to 100%. That fix has worked for me. But I have to do it every time I charge my fitbit. If I don't it goes back to draining completely in 1 day. I don't use the GPS feature and I have an Iphone. I know there have been a few comments about the phone being an issue. I don't think that's it either. I also find when I'm charging my 5 it stays on 99% for a LONG time. Right now I think it's been on 99% for 20 minutes. Another thought, they have now come out with a Charge 5+. Any thoughts they are going to ignore us until these all are out of warranty and offer the Charge 5+ at a discount? How about they send all of us new Charge 5+ for free? That would work. I'm stunned there has been ZERO communication from Fitbit. Not a good look. 

[tharp]

Best Answer! Working on a solution! Thank you so much that is so helpful!  I am very happy to have my tracker sitting on the charger while I work out. 

 The best answer is to keep your charge 5 on the charger because none of the above recommendations work!

I have read this has been going on a while. Like another user I don't understand that if it is a software issue; why some have issues and some don't. I don't know why mine worked fine a few months then one day it went blank. It would not restart for hours. Yesterday a month later around 2 in the afternoon it was blank. It took 3 tries to get it to restart with a soft reboot; at 8 p.m. the battery was completely down again. I turned in a case; was told we are working on it. I left it on charge on my computer all night. It is still not charged. I have had this device several months; I wish I could just get the 150.00 so I could buy a non-fitbit product.

[Bunchadogs]

I am so jealous of y'all!!!  

I want this to work SOOOO badly...I'm going to retry this more and see if I can make it work.

The good news is my battery drain is so fast I can usually see 20% battery drain in 10-15 minutes, so it doesn't take too long to test and re-test. 

If anyone has any tips that caused the 100% / restart trick to FAIL I'd love to hear them.  This thread has gotten so big it wouldn't hurt to bring the process / pitfalls back up to the top!

[Bwmcliz]

I did learn that if you charge it up to 100% and not wear it but instead leave it in your car, the charge lasts for several days! LOL!

Please Fitbit, get on this. It is beyond ridiculous now. 

[Bunchadogs]

I do still support Fitbit and I really do want to continue using their products. My entire family is tied into the Fitbit ecosystem, I have referred numerous friends and coworkers...

I've said numerous times, we're here to help Fitbit! We're trying to troubleshoot this! We're trying to provide input! We would just like some feedback!

I felt the need to make this statement publicly - that's all I can say!

[JKOFFOTH]

>From what I have read it seems to be there is a number of C5’s with batteries that wear out prematurely. All these restart after charge “fixes” and disabling t various settings are a smoke screen to hide the defective watches. I believe that the supposed software fix probably makes all the disable battery draining options the default. No software fix is going to sole what happened to my wife’s Charge 5, which just completely died. I will say cudos to Fitbit for replacing hers under the warranty,

John kofroth

[Bunchadogs]

A wise person once said: 

This is supposed to be a community ..... it is right there in the domain COMMUNITY.fitbit.com ..... so why is there no community support from Fitbit? where is the outreach to your loyal customers?

Can we possibly get some type of answer to this question?  

It really is a good question - yes this topic is getting long - but it's because we have not received any updates or answers.

[Bike-man]

In line with your message, I will continue to prod Fitbit for a straightforward answer.  
Come on Fitbit, give your community the support you promise.  These are good people here who really want their devices to work as designed.  Be honest and transparent.  Give us something we can believe in. 

thanks,

[GDSchulz]

tcal007. Glad it worked for you. No, I don't think it has to do with
settings. I have never had GPS switched on. Always used my phone for
GPS. All I know is the problem started suddenly in late April after many
months of never having the issue. I had not changed any settings for a
long time when it started.

I am also happy to report that I just now charged my Charge 5 for the first
time in a week and was only down to 41%. So the battery's fine. It's
something software related that changed in late April. Can't even rule out
that it might be something related to the phone app (Android).

[tharp]

Well said!

Moderator edit: personal info removed

[rasse3]

I’m iOS, still same problem, 2-4days charge. I changed my Fitbit 4 to five, which seem to be bad decision. After that I have replaced my Fitbit twice. Still same problem. 
If I want to charge my watch everyday I would get apple smartwatch. 

[Bunchadogs]

I'm also using iOS - you might try some of the "change to Phone GPS" and disable auto exercise tracking and removing / changing the ECG / SpO2 apps.  I did see changes in my battery drain, but for me it was 12 hours per charge vs. 24 hours per charge so it really wasn't a great solution!

If you are getting 2-4 days you might at least get back to 4- days!  

Also - curious, did you try the charge to 100% and then reset?  I'm still pretty mad that I can't that particular trick to work well, but maybe it's Android specific? 

I'm glad we can work so hard to provide Fitbit some testing data!

[tharp]

Good to know it isn't an android problem.

Moderator edit: personal info removed

[tharp]

Yes I tried resetting. I don't feel I should have to limit the usability of the device to keep the battery on.

Moderator edit: personal info removed

[rasse3]

4 days was with the old firmware. Should have been more specific.
Max 2 days with new firmware (old Fitbit which I replaced). Now I updated to latest and after 10h, is already below 75%.  I haven’t done 100% & restart, which I will try today.

[Bunchadogs]

---

@tharp wrote:
Yes I tried resetting. I don't feel I should have to limit the usability of the device to keep the battery on.
*Tammy Harpin*

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100% agree - limiting features is not a solution, but it might be a temporary work-around until they get the firmware / updates delivered.

[Bunchadogs]

I wonder what happens if you reply to a post "like this"....

😁

[Emper9]

I have done all of these things and I'm lucky if my battery lasts 5 hours. I've gone back to my charge 3 that's being held together by crazy glue. Fix this. Now.

[GDSchulz]

Emper9: Your problem sounds different than the one I've been describing.
Even when I was having the battery drain problem I was still getting 3 full
days on a charge, just not the full week+ I was used to. Yours sounds more
like a bad battery or hardware. Just a guess.