Charge 5 battery has to be charged every 3 - 4 hours

[Wojodaisy]

My Charge 5 has to be charged every 3 - 4 hours.  I only bought it 2 weeks ago.  This is my third fitbit and the first one with problems.  I'm so discouraged can I return it?

Moderator edit: subject updated for clarity

[DavideFitbit]

Hi, welcome to the Fitbit Community forums, @Wojodaisy.

I appreciate all this information that you've shared about the inconvenience that you've been having with your Charge 5. 

Could you please confirm if you've been using the built-in GPS feature on your device? Before considering other options, please make sure that you've followed the steps provided in this article. In addition, try to perform a restart following the steps listed here below, this has been useful for other users experiencing something similar: 

1. Connect your device to the charging cable. For instructions, see How do I charge my Fitbit device?
2. Press the button located on the flat end of the charger 3 times (end if the USB cable), pausing for 1 second between presses. Then wait 10 seconds or until the Fitbit logo appears.

The battery can last up to 7 days; because battery life is affected by use and other settings, actual results may vary, but the battery shouldn't be draining only after one or two days. Keep in mind that some of the feature that can drain the battery more rapidly are: 

• Built-in GPS (Charge 5 can have a battery life of up to 4 day when using this feature regularly, or up to 5 hours if you use it continuously).
• Always-on display (Charge 5 can have a battery life of up to 3 days when using this feature). 
• Using an Sp82 clock face (Fitbit points out in this article that you may have to charge your Fitbit device more often when collecting SpO2 data).

Regarding the return process, keep in mind that Fitbit as a 45 day return window. You can find more information about this policy here. If you prefer to proceed with a return for refund, I recommend that you get in touch with the Customer Support team for further assistance with this. Click here to get connected

Hope this helps, I'll be around. 

[Wojodaisy]

Just wanted to let you know that I replied your email 3 times but they were returned because your box was full.  I tried everything you suggested and was charging my futbit every 3 - 4 hrs   I couldn't even wear it to bed.  Since it was only 17 days that I bought it I returned it to the store.  I have bought a Luxe and it has been 5 days and the battery is at 50%.  It has everything that the Charge 5 had.  Thanks for your help.

[Jules1138]

Same problem here. I’ve only had mine less than 5 months.
Was working fine on Thursday night. Then Friday morning the charge level was dropping 1% every four minutes. 
I’ve contacted support and gone though the various resets and procedures. Nothing worked. 
I’ve been advised to wait for a firmware update to be released to solve the problem, which doesn’t make much sense considering the issue was not caused by interference with the current software, and feels more inline with component failure.

I guess I’ll have to wait for software update, which support didn’t know when would be released 

And if that doesn’t work, I’ll have to consider buying a new one, or look elsewhere.

[DavideFitbit]

@Wojodaisy @Jules1138 Thank you for your replies and for sharing your experience with the Customer Support team. I'm sorry to see that it wasn't possible to find an immediate resolution for the problem with the battery. 

Thanks again for sharing your feedback and and comments about this. 

[pegleg_pete]

Bought Charge 5 in November 2021.  Good battery life for first couple of months (about 7-8 days), then it suddenly dropped down to 1-2 days.  I went through all the settings - made sure that GPS on the tracker was not active, turned off all notifications and set the display to dim.  This had a dramatic effect - got about 8-10 days life for the next few weeks.  Then it suddenly dropped back to requiring a recharge after only one day - for the last several days.  Checked all the changes that I had previously made in case they had somehow been reset (not by me) - anyway, all seemed to be as I had set them before.

So came here looking for help.  Found this thread.  Never knew that you could reboot the device via the charger cable; had never even noticed the button on the USB connector.  Anyway, I have just successfully rebooted using this method.  Will just have to wait and see if this fixes the problem (currently at 50% after charging to 100% at bedtime last night).

[Spins103]

Really glad I found this article because my Fitbit 5 is only 4 days old and I have had to charge it everyday, twice today. I have checked all the setting and restarted so hopefully will get a better result tomorrow. Not really happy to hear it is a firmware issue on such a new device.  Hope it will be fixed quickly.

[Bike-man]

Suggest you look at a well established thread on this topic.  
https://community.fitbit.com/t5/Charge-5/Charge-5-battery-draining-too-fast/td-p/4973720/jump-to/fir...

Much discussion, some good suggestions, lots of frustration.

[pegleg_pete]

Thanks for your response.  I tried the reboot procedure as you described.  Before the reboot, the remaining charge display was at 50%.  After the reboot, it was 50%.  Some seven hours after the reboot, it was still showing 50%.  The following morning: 50%.  Obviously this couldn't be right - somehow the remaining charge display was stuck at 50%.  So just now, I rebooted for a second time in two days.  Immediately before: 50%; immediately after: 34%.

Assuming that 34% is the correct value, it looks as though one or both reboots have made an improvement.  However, it remains to be seen whether the display will continue to count down as the battery discharges, or is now stuck at 34%.  Also, will have to wait until the battery discharges below 20% or more and I can do another full charge to 100%.  Then I can really test the effects of the reboots.

Up until a couple of weeks ago, I was getting about 10 days battery life (apart from a brief period when I was having to recharge every second day - at that time I turned off the features I wasn't actively using and set the display to DIM).  Then suddenly this problem.  Nothing changed in my settings and I am not using the device any differently.  Reading the other thread referred to by Bike-man (thank you), I see that this problem is widespread (and apparently random), and that a firmware update is in the works to fix it - although that was some 3-4 months ago and there has been no word on its progress or ETA - do you have any update on this?

Re GPS settings:  it is recommended that GPS be set to OFF to prolong battery charge.  My device has three GPS options: Dynamic, Phone and Built-in.  No specific OFF setting.  I have set mine to PHONE - is this the same as OFF (using the phone's GPS, not the device's)?  I don't actually use GPS in any form at present, but that might change in the future.

Thanks for any further insight.

[Bike-man]

Hey pegleg_pete

My experience is that using GPS consumes a significant amount of battery regardless of who’s device you use.   My G____n cycle computer uses about 10%/hr.   I consider that to be acceptable but with gps turned off, the Charge 5 battery should have a duration of about 7 days.  
There is also information re: the country of manufacture.   Most with Charge 5’s made in Malaysia experience fewer battery issues vs. those made in China.  You can determine the country of manufacture by looking at the original box or go to Settings, Device info, regulatory info, scroll all the way to the bottom.  
As far as the firmware release date, there seems to be no information available.

Good luck to you. 

[pegleg_pete]

Thanks for the additional info.  My device was made in Malaysia.  Firmware installed is: 57.20001.149.11.  As far as I know, that was what came with the device last November (unless the device can update silently and automatically).

[SpeedyM]

Same here. Under 2 months old. And the rep blames me for not chsrging. This is my 3rd Fitbit. Think I'd learn. 

[pegleg_pete]

Update:  After the previous re-reboot, remaining charge display said 34%.  Six hours later, it still says 34% - so it is stuck again.  I just did another reboot: when I plugged in the charger, the charge screen said 47%!  After the reboot, the remaining charge display was now 36% (2% higher than the last stuck value)!  Honestly, I have no idea what the real charge state is now.

If the 50% before I did the first reboot was correct (25 hours ago), and the 47% displayed when I plugged in just now to reboot is the real state of charge (3% discharge in 25 hours is very good), then it looks as though the first reboot may have fixed 24 hour discharge from 100% to less than 20% problem.  At the expense of an unreliable display of actual charge state.

So for now I am going to assume that the value displayed when the charger is plugged in is the true charge state (no proof of this).  I will just have to plug in the charger whenever I want to check the true current charge.  However, I have just checked the charge state displayed in the Fitbit app (don't usually rely on this because in my experience it can be hours out of date) - it is showing 49%, which is close to the value shown on the device when the charger is plugged in.

My plan of action now is to wait until the device is discharged below 20% (as per the charger display or the app display) or I get a warning saying that I need to recharge.  I will then charge to 100% (the first time since all the reboots) and monitor how it discharges.  If the reading still gets stuck at some value, I will start a new thread for "Charge level on device gets stuck" (or similar), as this is not the problem that I started out with in this thread.

Thanks for all the help.  I will update this thread after charging to 100% and then monitoring the subsequent discharge.  In the meantime, if anyone else has seen this "battery charge level stuck" problem, I'd be pleased hear about it.  (I did a search of the forum - the only thing I found remotely close was a problem with Ionic in 2017, but the symptoms were not really the same.  However I may be using the wrong search terms.)

[Nghockke]

Yes the battery problem seems to pop up suddenly, in recent 2 weeks. My Charge5 used do have 3-5 days battery life. 

[pegleg_pete]

Further update: Since my last (third) reboot some five hours ago, the remaining battery charge display on my Charge 5 seems to have finally resynced with the display when the charging cable is plugged and with the display in the app. All currently at 47%.  I will monitor over the next day or so to ensure that the battery charge decays gracefully and slowly.  Thanks again for all the help.

[pegleg_pete]

Final update:  After three reboots via the power supply cable button, all three display methods (device itself, device when charging, and on the app) are back in sync.  At that time, the remaining charge was 48%.  From there it took nearly three more days to discharge to 17%.  At that point, I recharged to 100%.  That was two days ago.  In the 48 hours since, it has discharged to 86% which I consider reasonable.

So I consider the problem resolved (until next time).  I don't know what caused the sudden accelerated discharge rate (it happened once before and resolved itself after a couple of charge cycles), so I expect it will happen again at some stage.  But for now, all is well.

Thanks for everyone's help.

[SpeedyM]

Weirdest thing. Mine too corrected. The day battery drained it didn't log my steps.  Working now too. ❤️❤️

[DavideFitbit]

@pegleg_pete @SpeedyM Thank you for sharing all these updates, it's great to know that your device is working properly again! 

Welcome to the Community forums, @SpeedyM @Nghockke. 

Let me know if you continue to have the same problem with the battery life in the following days after all the troubleshooting steps suggested earlier in this thread. Regarding the problem with the GPS chip making the battery drain faster than usual, we always aim to deliver a positive experience with your Charge 5, and we’re working on a firmware update to fix this issue. Your feedback is truly appreciated. 

I'll be around. 

[pegleg_pete]

New update:  That final recharge that I reported in my post of 30 March (discharged to only 86% in 48 hours): I spoke too soon.  When it got down to 67% after about four days, it suddenly dropped to 15% in just twelve hours.  I rebooted once more using the charging cable button and then recharged to 100%.  On this latest charge it has been running for more than six days and is now at 49%, which is very good.  I am waiting with baited breath to see if it maintains this discharge rate until it gets below 20%, or whether it will drop its bundle again in the next day or so.

Cheers.

[DavideFitbit]

@pegleg_pete Thank you for sharing this update. 

Let me know if you continue to experience the same behavior in the following days and let us know if any of the troubleshooting steps has been of help. 

See you around.