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?

[berkeleycoffee]

Can you comment on what Fitbit will be doing to actually fix this issue? The restart does not seem to fix this for a large portion of the users. I've ordered a second Charge 5 which is also affected by this issue. How many should I expect to have to get before I get one that works?

[shimsim]

I can't speak for fitbit but from my experience and from what others have commented, if you do have this specific issue, you need to contact support, they will diagnose it and if they confirm it's the same battery issue, they will arrange a replacement.

It's probably better to let fitbit handle the replacement otherwise there is no way to know if you will get another faulty one from the same batch. So far all the ones that people reported on were made in China. My replacement unit was made in Malaysia, but I'm sure not all units made in China are faulty, just the ones we have been unlucky enough to buy.

[Garico74]

My charge 5 is connected to an android phone. The battery life is terrible. I'm really disappointed with it. Had a charge 2 that had no issues. And a versa, no problem too. This one is crap. Fit bit have dropped the ball on this one.

[DavideFitbit]

Hey everyone!

Glad to see many customers have been able to resolve this issue with customer support. Please check out the steps in this post if you are still having issues. We will continue to update this thread as we hear more. As a reminder please keep your firmware up to date. 

Have a good day.

[podmania]

Hi, so you mean I don’t have to return it and wait for an update? Is that what you’re saying? 

[Bike-man]

I think what it means is to try troubleshooting and resetting your device.  If all fails, apply for replacement device through customer support.   I believe a number of users have already done so successfully.   Best of luck.  

[berkeleycoffee]

Good luck with the replacement process. I mailed my watch on February 2nd and it is yet to even be received at the warehouse. They won't even receive the watch till February 21st for some reason. No it wasn't lost during shipment either. My guess is there's so many of these defective watches out there that can't even get replacements fast enough so they artificially slow down the shipping

[dponzio]

Hang in there.  My battery was definitely bad on my new Charge 5.  I went through Fitbit support and got a replacement in about a week.  New one is fine.

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In my opinion, I think certain ones had batteries from the manufacturer that were bad.  I told Fitbit support this was the 2nd time; first was a Versa 2 so I sent it back and bought a Charge 5.  Same thing on the Charge 5, drained really fast.   I actually said do not send me another bad battery.  My Charge 5 replacement is fine.  I think they know which ones have bad batteries from their origin.

[DavideFitbit]

Hi, welcome to the Community forums, @podmania. 

Thank you for your inquiry about this inconvenience with the Charge 5. 

Keep in mind that not all battery draining problems are related to the issue with the GPS chip, but some users are experiencing this specific problem as well. Let me know if you've been using the GPS feature and make sure to follow all the suggested troubleshooting steps mentioned here earlier. 

@Bike-man @berkeleycoffee @dponzio Thank you for taking the time to share your experienced with this inconvenience and with the Customer Support team. Every case is evaluated individually and all your comments and feedback are appreciated. 

See you around. 

[dponzio]

I think you’re right about the quantity of bad batteries. I did get my replacement in about a week and the new one is fine.

Sent from Mail for Windows

[Garico74]

Thanks 👍
I've messed around in the settings and don't really know what I've done, but the battery is lasting days now.

Get Outlook for Android

[VtWood]

I bought charge 5 for my daughter's birthday in November,. it stopped holding a charge, she reset it,. now it's dead,. how do we get her a replacement!????

[Bike-man]

You can start here.

https://myhelp.fitbit.com/s/support?language=en_US&co=US

Hope this helps.  

[VtWood]

chatted, they checked the battery's activity (problem with batteries?), determined she was eligible for replacement, thanks.

[SpiffyMagpie]

I'm so glad I found this thread, I thought I was going crazy! Same issue is happening with mine, tried a bunch of troubleshooting steps with no luck. At least it's super easy for Support to see the issue as they can see how long your battery is lasting in their diagnostic tools.

[Nittybit]

I took mine back to the store twice. The 3 rd one keeps a charge longer BUT takes HOURS  to charge I don't get that. . Certainly not totally  happy with this product. Fitbit do something you are better than this.

[DavideFitbit]

Hi everyone, I appreciate all the updates that you've shared about this. 

@dponzio @Garico74 @VtWood @SpiffyMagpie It's good to know that you already contacted the Support team or that you've received a replacement device. Thanks again for all your feedback and comments; I'm sure this will be useful for other users as well. 

@Nittybit I'm sorry to see that you continue to experience a problem with the battery. It's good to know your device it's keeping battery life for longer, but if you're still having trouble to recharge it, please make sure to follow the recommendations listed here as well. 

I'll be around. 

[LiJaHi]

HI Juan, which problem is the team working to fix?

Using the Phone GPS setting is only a helpful solution if you take your phone with you, which is inconvenient to carry while running. I chose the Fitbit Charge 5 in part because it has built in GPS. So far, using the GPS for exercise sessions has caused the battery to discharge by 40%, meaning a full charge will only last two days when exercising daily.

[mhernan240]

ONLY ONE LOUSY DAY!!!👎

[RealGandy]

Charge 5, same issue battery only lasts a day max.

Online chat with fitbit yesterday and taoday, and their response is:

"We are working to fix this battery drain issue in a new firmware version, please keep your fitbit up to date" but no indication of how long this may take.