Charge 6 cannot connect with my equipment

[Triletics]

Why there is no option "No, Charge 6 doesn't work with my equipment"? My equipment supports external HR monitors, just doesn't work with Charge 6 🤷

Moderator Edit: Clarified subject

[Toruko61]

It's so **ahem** infuriating. I managed to connect my charge to technogym equipment a few times with trial and error (no consistent step to step setup) and get HR broadcasting to work.

Nowadays I get it to connect but not to broadcast my HR data ( no prompt to accept the broadcasting on the charge 6 after connecting).

[Triletics]

@Toruko61 this is because Charge 6 uses non-standard way of establishing connection and uses encryption. 99% of equipment don't expect that. Equipment that works is usually build with Android and that implements it as part of OS. Regular equipment has minimalistic software and connectivity expects the broadcasting after initial handshake. This is a standard behaviour of all HRMs (just connect and done). But because of the way Charge 6 works, I can't broadcast to my bike computers, to rowing machine and other equipment I come across. The industry standard is based on simplicity and that isn't going to change. Implementing encryption for HRM is considered pointless (it's not kind of data people want to protect anyway) and adds more boilerplate code to the software that is supposed to be tiny. I think, Fitbit could make an update and simplify connectivity for broadcasting (and support ALL the equipment) but that isn't going to happen. In fact, because this feature works with a very few devices, this poll will tell Fitbit/Google that it's probably next thing to be removed (rather than improved).

[Toruko61]

Thanks for the informative Insight, but the technogym cardio Equipment ist actually android based.

 You even get access to a password prompt, if you press and hold the Bluetooth symbol.

When I managed to get a proper pairing, it worked flawlessly. That's why it's so irritating to me that it doesn't work anymore and I'm unable to find a solution.

[Broj446]

I've got exact same issue . Have you had any feedback ?

[Broj446]

Seems might have switch to Google branded watch 

[Toruko61]

unfortunately no. i´m eagerly waiting for the next firmware/feature update. google has to pump some resources in the dev team of fitbit. kinda weird getting monthly updates on everything from google except my charge 6.

[Triletics]

@Toruko61 that is probably still in Fitbit's hands. Fitbit was never eager to release FW updates and updates were always rare. Got even lazier and the latest Charge 6 FW update hasn't even been announced 🤷