Charge 6 dead when I woke up this morning - OK now. Was it the battery....

[DavidNS]

I got up this morning to find my new Charge 6 had a blank screen and was unresponsive. App had not data from about 3:50am.

I put the device on charge and it did not respond, tried again later after leaving on charge for about 20 minutes, still no response, so did the 3 button press 1 second reset routine. Device woke up and battery was showing 35% and clock indicated a shutdown time of 3:53am.

I have had something similar with my Charge 5 when the battery died in the middle of the night!

My question is, was this a battery drained issue? Is there anyway I can see a history of battery charge level data?

My Charge 6 arrived on Friday, was charged to 100% about 2pm that day. I did a 30 minute run on Saturday (dynamic GPS, but appeared to be connected to the phone's GPS), a 30 minute walk using Google maps on Sunday and 90 minutes yoga on Monday. A few Google payments from the device and only taken off to shower.

So roughly 3.6 days of relatively normal usage. I would have expected 5 days minimum. Also, I didn't receive any low battery warning - probably as device doesn't routinely sync over night. As there is no longer a battery % displayed in the app, and only on the scroll down screen on the device, it's hard to tell when it needs charging.

[SunsetRunner]

1. Connect your device to the charging cable.
2. Press the button located on the flat end of the charger 3 times within 8 seconds, holding each press for about 1 second.
3. Wait 10 seconds or until the Fitbit logo appears.

[Aviartrix74]

Mine did the same thing. Tried to do the fix above, but there’s no button on the charger. Did you mean on the flat side of the Charge (i.e. the FitBit)? If so, that didn’t work either. Any other ideas?

[bobdob]

The button in question is on the USB plug of the charger. It is flush with the side so if you're not looking for it you'll never notice it's there.

I've had mixed luck using it. After about 30 different tries over the past couple months, holding the button for different amounts of time with different spacing, and never getting it to work, yesterday I tried 3 really quick presses in quick succession and it did work.

Also, since the button just cuts power to the charger, you can get the same effect by unplugging it and plugging it back in 3 times. Again it might take a few tries but I've had more success doing that.

And finally, if your fitbit is not dead, there's a reboot function in the fitbit's menu itself  - from the watch face, swipe down until you get to settings, tap on it and then swipe up to the 'restart device' option. I'm not sure if that is an equivalent type of reset when the fitbit is working.

[andrewwk]

On the USB charger that came with your Charge 6 there should be a small
black button (on the USB-A end, not the end that connects with your
fitbit). Look on both sides. I don't recall the exact steps to do a reset,
you'd need to Google that.

However, when this happens to me I don't need to do that reset procedure. I
just need to make sue the charger is making good contact and give it some
time to get a charge and come back alive.

[Aviartrix74]

Thank you. That’s helpful.

I see the button now… tried it, and nothing. But I’ll try the three quick pushes.

Very frustrating, given the device is only six days old!

--------

How much time do you find you have to leave it on the charger before it resurrects itself?
Sent from my iPad

[hereandthen]

hi, didnt work for me, it's still dead.
I just found the USB cable, no charger came with it. Hence I tried the
button on the casing.

I bought 3 SAMSUNG GEAR FIT 2 PRO. Best tracker I ever had functionwise.....
long term reliability - ZERO.
Everyone broke after a short while. SAMSUNG precisely knew why to
discontinue it.
Hoped FITBIT would last longer - seemingly not the fact.
Will now check with the helpline/online chat.

[hereandthen]

right - took a very close look and found the button.
But did not succeed to revive the tracker..... :-(.
Since it is realy dead I ve no chance to follow the other reset instruction.

[hereandthen]

Hi guys, after several non successful tries I went to call FITBIT HOTLINE.
call was picked up instantly and I got a call center guy who asked a
couple of questions. I told what happened and waht I d done do revive it.
At the end of the QnA session he told me I ll get a new one.
Email with instructions came, so I now just needa wait a few days.
Let's cross fingers that the replacement functions more reliable.

[Aviartrix74]

Interesting. I tried the online help chat, and the person asked me what country I was in, I told him, and he said someone would email me. Still waiting.


Sent from my iPad

[KT09]

Mine has died completely button doesn’t press to restart and connecting it to charger does nothing. Had 70% battery this morning and just literally went blank and died. Anyone got any ideas, only had it a few months. Had Fitbit’s 11 years without any problems. TIA

[Alicadden]

Mine drained during Sunday 7th. The battery went from 24% to 6% in a very short space of time....a few hours. On the app now it shows 4% but won't sync When I connected it to the charger the watch buzzed and the logo appeared, so I left it to charge. Came back a few hours later - nothing. And have not been able to wake it up since in spite of leaving it to charge, pressing the button 3 times etc. Any other suggestions? I am thinking of uninstalling the app, reinstalling it, unpairing the watch and repairing it - has anyone had to do this before?

[bobdob]

You have two choices. Either give up now and contact fitbit support, or keep trying for a while longer and possibly still contact fitbit support. I have had to reset my dead fitbit a few times now, and my experience has been that usually it takes several attempts before getting it to work (sometimes leaving it on the charger for an hour or more as well). Varying the speed of your button presses may lead to a winning combination. Unplugging and re-plugging the charger or even quickly removing and replacing the fitbit from the charger may work better for you than the button.

I haven't contacted support yet because I'm completely unconvinced mine is a hardware problem because the behavior is inconsistent. A bad battery could cause uneven discharge (i.e. it will discharge at a normal rate and then quickly die) but I would expect that to happen on every charge, which it doesn't for me. I keep hoping for a firmware update that addresses this.

[Alicadden]

amazingly I tried again with pressing the button 3 times and it woke up.
And was fully charged from around 9pm last night. So now working fine

[hereandthen]

Hi, since I bought mine in Germany, I called the German hotline. They
asked a couple of questions and decided right away that I get a new one.
The process was smooth and easy.