Charge 6 heart rate is worth the upgrade

[arochi1]

I see a ton of negative post complaining about the app or the lack of upgrades on the 6

The 6 is so much better at tracking my heart rate while cycling. For years I have had to wear a 3rd party HR monitor and use that to detect the calories burned when I was riding or running. This new feature alone has made this experience so much better because it’s finally accurate

It’s the 6th charge. They don’t need to reinvent the wheel at this point. The battery life is great, the music is what it is. It looks decent enough to wear in most situations. If you keep it somewhat clean it looks great with wear and tear. The price is a tiny bit high, but in the end it is worth it for me personally

I just wanted to write an appreciation post because the constant complaining is a bit of a drag

[Triletics]

@arochi1 you may take a look at my thread , I'm going there more in-depth with an analysis of sports tracking. I do agree HR is better than before (especially, compared with Sense and Sense 2). I have biking on my list to be tested (so far, running, swimming, and rowing) both indoors (Zwift) and outdoors. I ride with a power meter so HR isn't as relevant on the bike (power gives a much better estimate for calories). Depending on the user's goals, it may not be worth yet to quit using an external HR monitor (I definitely can't quit it for all sports I do). For example, if I want to run and use HR I can't do it for strides and during my first run with Charge 6, the tracker locked onto my cadence (didn't happen the second time). It is a decent basic fitness tracker (I agree the price is a bit high for what it offers) and I think it does that quite well. For now, swimming was my only disappointment (and some half-baked functions that I always wanted to have but slightly more finished, I wrote about it in the thread I linked anyway). I can't bash Charge 6 the way I could bash Sense 2. There isn't much wrong with it. It's decent, does what says on the box and HR so far seems to be the best improvement. Not perfect but for those who just want the correct average HR to get calories right it should be alright (which I couldn't say about Sense 2).

[LDietz]

Charge 6 connects to Zwift but doesn't work. Apparently the way google integrated it isn't compatible and they are not willing to fix it on their end and will require zwift to figure out the fix. At least that is what I've been told by google team.

[Triletics]

@LDietz Zwift probably couldn't care less when majority of users use HRMs and other equipment that just works 🤷 Problem isn't to be solved by Zwift.

[AssertiveBard]

Completely agree with you - the HR is much better on the Charge 6! I too use mine for cycling, running and lifting and have found it to be more accurate than the Sense 2 and Vera 4 (most recent Fitbits I have tried) in most of my activity tracking. Also, being able to broadcast HR to Peloton is awesome - prior to this, I used a Polar H10 or Sense to get my HR data sent to other devices. 

[Triletics]

@AssertiveBard for me, HR does work quite well for anything but running. It reports often my cadence as HR. Today, my whole race shows my cadence not HR. This and the fact it cuts the running distance short made me change my mind about it and from initial praise now I am bit disappointed.