My experience with Charge 6

[Billyella2]

Charge 6 absolutely rubbish! Just over 2 years old and losing battery rapidly! Not the first watch from them I've had do this, but it will be the last! I'll never have another they're rubbish! And they're just not interested been on to them 3 times 

Moderator edit - updated subject for clarity

[ManuFitbit]

Hi @Billyella2. Welcome to the forums. 

Thank you for taking the time to share this feedback with me regarding your Charge 6.

I’m truly sorry for what you’ve been going through with your devices. I’ll be honest: this is definitely not the kind of experience we strive to provide for our users.

We take great pride in making products that last, but we also realize that no device is 100% perfect forever. Because we value your experience, our warranty is designed to give you the best coverage possible. We're here to help if things don't go as planned.

I see you’ve already been in touch with our Support Team about this. Please feel free to follow up with them if you feel any part of your concern hasn't been fully addressed yet. Just reference the tracking number they gave you so they can pick up exactly where you left off.

[Billyella2]

I've fully charged my device like asked now I've to let it run down to 5%! It's definitely not right, the steps on the watch don't match what my app says.

[BetseyD123]

Billy, 

I think you got a lemon and they need to replace it!

I have had my charge 6 for going on about 3 years now and I can still get almost a full week's charge out of it, however I have had other problems as of recently with food logging, calories in VS. out, and big time manual activity logging.

They've got some kind of issue going on right now - I don't know what it is, but they need to fix it! Fast! I'm frustrated enough now where I'm at the point of seriously considering purchasing a Garmin watch!

[michaelda]

Same experience, i've owned charge models beginning with charge 2. Charge 2 lasted years even with cracked screen. It finally failed so I purchased the charge 5 thinking it would be as reliable as charge 2 but that failed within the warranty but google refused to honor because i purchased it at ebay. The charge 6 display went dark yesterday while I was working outside, it is 1 year outside of warranty. I don't know what google plans to do with the company but why did they purchase if only to sell junk that will cause fitbit to fail?

[BetseyD123]

Maybe these problems are cropping up more and more now since Google took over Fitbit? I, for one, did not appreciate this change - as in "If it ain't broke, don't fix it!". 

I purchased my Fitbit Charge 6 two (maybe three) years ago now, before the great Google Takeover, and as I stated above I hadn't really many problems with it until I was forced to make the great switch. For now, I'm still at the point where I only charge it once, sometimes twice a week, depending on activity levels. 

RANT AHEAD:

My main problem with the Charge 6 right now, and I do caution others, is manually logging an exercise activity; it has been my experience that it will not correctly record your input. For instance, just last week i did a Stair Stepper workout for about 40 minutes, and where normally it would automatically record the activity and show a burn of, say, at least 250 calories, for some reason it didn't record anything this time. After waiting for an hour, as well as syncing watch (which recorded everything correctly) to app a couple of times, I was forced to manually log my activity. After I entered the exercise name, along with my time, the fitbit app is supposed to automatically calculate your energy expenditure via your heartrate for the stated duration of the exercise. My heart rate was in PEAK for most of this activity and the app calculated my calorie expenditure at 74 CALORIES BURNED , FOR OVER 40 MINUTES OF PEAK ACTIVITY! This stupid app cheated me out of, at least an extra couple hundred calories of food that I could have had for that day (which I went ahead and had anyway, I just didn't log it). The big takeaway is that my WATCH recorded the correct stats (Peak heart rate/energy expenditure X time spent on activity = correct calories burned!), but it could not/would not sync with the app! Between repeated syncing with the stupid app, waiting, farting around with syncing the Health Connect app (which also matched the watch's correct stats), waiting, and rebooting my phone twice - I think I wasted about two hours of my time on this!!! Needless to say, the issue was never resolved. 

Another issue I have is periodic problems with sleep tracking, and that was one of the main reasons why I purchased the watch, as I have a lot of problems sleeping, along with sleep apnea. For some reason, again at totally random periods, it will either not record my sleep at all (and I'm talking about 6 to 8 hours worth), and/or will not sync with the "my air" app for my CPAP machine. Frustrating! 

Now, I'm just gritting my teeth and waiting for the next problem to happen.

When I get to the point of having to finally replace my Charge 6 I'm really not sure what I'm going to go with. Should I go with another fitbit? Should I go with a garmin? Give the Samsung Galaxy Watch another try? I really don't know what else is out there on the market. I like the Fitbit because of its ease of use in reading the device screens and the app functionality - when it works.

I had a Samsung Galaxy watch 4 years ago, and a Garmin that preceded it, and I found those to be a little confusing with setting and reading the watch screens (Especially the Samsung Galaxy Watch 4.) and dealing with the apps. As far as the Garmin is concerned, well there would be a definite learning curve for me to be able to use their present-day product (plus it's so darn expensive!).

I don't know, I guess I need to research these things, but all I need is for something to just simply put on my wrist and be able to RELIABLY track and log my sleep and exercise activities, and not require me to have to take a course in order to learn how to use the thing. Tracking and logging food/water intake and setting diet parameters would be a big plus for me as well. I also don't want to be trapped into having to pay for a monthly and/or yearly subscription fee to do this. Right now I'm making fairly good use of the free version of the Fitbit app. 

One other thing regarding the Fitbit food/water logging and diet functionality with the free app - even though I don't think it's all that accurate at times, I've been faithfully using it for a little over 3 weeks now and so far - so good.

Fingers crossed. Hopefully, I haven't just jinxed my diet by stating that! 

[Billyella2]

I might have a look at these! For me I've been done with them for ages but I never know which brand to switch to! I got one when I last fell out with Fitbit and it was never as good!

[michaelda]

I've had all of the rants coming from myself with all the problems you describe. Why google would do this makes no sense. They removed features that customers used, the panel on their website, being able to challenge others, weekly report removed components for exercise. I'm finished with them and like you have my fingers crossed.