Charge 5 won't register my mowing grass activity

[JanDalzell]

Cut my grass last week. Fitbit said 10.641 steps. Mowing grass activity did not show that total for steps.

Yesterday mowed half the lawn, Fitbit showed only 2,XXX steps.

How can I get these activities correctly logged?

P.S. Account showed bike ride--I did not do that.

Moderator Edit: Clarified subject

[MarreFitbit]

Hi there, @JanDalzell. Welcome to the Fitbit Community Forums. Thanks for the details provided in your post about the inconvenience with your Charge 5.

All the exercise shortcuts that you will find in the Exercise section are specifically designed to track the most out of each type of activity. The algorithms have been fine tuned to get more accurate data for each different exercise so that's the reason why there is a category for each.

When a specific exercise is not available within the exercises we offer, we suggest to use "Workout" (which is a generic catch-all for other types of exercise). Once you finish the activity, you can rename the activity to desired exercise/activity. Please note that the amount of calories burned vary from the exercise you're performing and due to the heart rate tracked by your Charge 5.

Note that the information to enter will change depending on the nature of the exercise. To give you an example, if you change from "Workout" to "Run", it won't remove the calories but will add distance as the main stat to be displayed, this happen depending of the activity you are categorizing. However, your the data already tracked will be still counted for your daily totals.

For more information about how to do so, see How do I add, edit, or delete Fitbit data and activities?

[RiekoC]

Hello & welcome @JanDalzell 

In addition to using the generic "Workout" category to track your grass mowing activity, I also recommend doing a manual start & stop using the Exercise tile on your Charge 5.

• From the clock face, swipe left twice to get to the Exercise tile
• Swipe up until you see Workout, if it's not currently displayed
• Tap Workout, then tap Start. This will start tracking your activity. You can tap to go through the various metrics that your Charge 5 is tracking during your activity.
• When you're done, tap Pause. Then tap Finish to stop tracking your session.

Now, you can go into the Fitbit app and rename the Workout to whatever you prefer. 

[C-Moe]

I put my phone on GPS on the Fitbit app & put my watch in my pocket so my leg moves & counts the steps, I do this when I go shopping because my hands are on the basket or the mower & my arms don’t swing to count steps! Try it it works for me!

[JanDalzell]

Cannot find "Workout" anywhere. Added "Mowing Lawn" as an activity, but it won't let me show steps. Frustrated, which is why I returned previous Fitbit. Now part of "All of Us" Wear program which is the ONLY reason I'm wearing it.

[dz1234]

you would think that "outdoor workout" would be ideal for this, since it will also engage the GPS and track distances. However, outdoor workout (which shows the icon of a soccer player) doesn't count steps and it shows up as 0 steps whenever I use it. It was explained to me that outdoor workout is more appropriate for non-step activities (think kayaking)--but then why show a soccer player? So...which exercise button can one use that both tracks distance with the GPS and steps? I think the answer is none (besides run), but I'd be happy to be proven wrong.

Having said all that, this discussion is essentially moot for me since the GPS on my Charge 5 never worked well and has now stopped working altogether.