Seems we have a theme here with the Charge 5

[shelco05]

I’ve had my Charge 5 for about 6 months now and at first the battery started draining far faster than normal. Called support, opened a ticket and now I’m waiting to hear back as to my next steps because now my Charge 5…..won’t even charge. I’ve had several Fitbits over the years and have never had issues like this with them. I’m pretty disappointed in Fitbit at this point and hope they can send me a replacement that works. This seems to be an issue with a lot of the Charge 5’s after reading the threads. Fitbit what are you doing to rectify the situation, because right now I think your brand has a huge tarnish on it and you’re about to lose a ton of loyal customers. 

[Dmkw]

Yikes. I just purchased 2.  They just arrived yesterday. I’m thinking now I will return them. 

[Fbituesr766]

Here is what I have discovered while investigating the rapid battery discharge on charge 5 devices, leaving the battery dead in as quick as under an hour:

- Your battery is draining rapidly. up to 10% per minute or so.

- You try a hard reset (by going into the Fitbit device menu and selecting “clear user data”)

- the hard reset does not work as the device does not turn back on. You’re left with having to reset via plugging in the Fitbit and pressing the button on the charging cable three times (with a 1s pause between each press).

- the device then boots back up, and you confirm that the hard reset did not work, as all settings such as watch face are the same and nothing reverted back to factory default.

- you then go into the app on your phone, and try to change the watch face manually there, and notice that a sync of apps/watch face is not possible, indicating that there may be bluetooth connectivity issues.

- you then remove the device, and reconnect it by pairing with bluetooth: interestingly, this step to pair with your phone works every single time (after removing the device first from the app and re-adding/pairing.

- you then proceed to try and adjust watch faces etc to only find out again that bluetooth connection is a problem.

- you then proceed to try a hard reset and run into the same problem as above…

- you notice that bluetooth is off and on in your phone settings in regards to connection to Charge 5 (while other bluetooth devices connect to your phone fine).

- Conclusion: possibly bluetooth connectivity causing issues with battery drain.

[JGONDAR]

Yup...been using fitbit since 2013 and bought the Charge 5 over Mother's Day weekend...it had issues syncing with my phone immediately, thought it was user error. The screen is fussy, sometimes it flips easily, other times not...gps not working, tried all the troubleshooting, etc etc..finally had a Help chat...they just gave me the same troubleshooting info, stepped through it they could see it 'sync on their side'...but I can't on my phone? Abruptly ended with a 'we are aware of the problem and working on it, here is your case number'.   

[Bouchonne]

If at all possible, would the programmers ensure the GPS is turned off when the exercise selections that have a GPS on/off toggle switch have been exited.

I know this would likely involve coding but, Google is notorious for their coding skills.

Perhaps at the same time, they could make the GPS maps work when these exercises are selected. 

This would make for some customer satisfaction at selecting the Charge5 for its GPS capabilities.

Just a thought. Provide the customer with a quality product perhaps?