I don't understand active minutes?

[lakemomma6]

So i'm brand new to fitbit so please be gentle. I went rollerskating with my family last night for 2.5 hours. I was active the entire time...believe me my **ahem** hurts so bad!! But when I logged in last night it said I was only active for 18minutes. That does not make sense to me. Can someone please explain? 

[SteveH]

Welcome to fitbit!

Active minutes are weird. Really weird. Understanding them is more of an art than a science.

You'll only get them if fitbit thinks you have been very active, not just mildly active. As it says in the following help file you need to be at least 3 times as active as you are when at rest. Fitbit works this out based on your stepping and, if your fitbit has it, your heart rate. It's possible that with rollerskating it wasn't getting the step count to convince it that you were being active enough to get active minutes.

https://help.fitbit.com/articles/en_US/Help_article/1379/

[wmchapman]

moderate to intense activity (as determined by your HR feature and accumulating steps)

You can expect more active minutes running, or during a hike vs a stroll in the park.

Hope this link helps, active minutes are a guide to what portion of your activity effectively elevated your calorie burn.

Welcome to fitbit LM, good question and good activity, sounds fun.

[Rebucket]

It's possible that, because roller skating generally doesn't involve a crazy amount of arm movement, FitBit just wasn't able to track it. After all, you're not taking as many "steps" when you skate.

[Colinm39 · Accepted solution]

@lakemomma6   Welcome... We are here to help you through the Active Minutes dilemna..  This link  will take you to another topic where I explain how to analyse your roller skating effort.. and see why you didn't record active minutes..

Do you have a HR type Fitbit..?

You will need your Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR) to analyse your activity.. Use this calculator

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@lakemomma6 wrote:

So i'm brand new to fitbit so please be gentle. I went rollerskating with my family last night for 2.5 hours. I was active the entire time...believe me my **ahem** hurts so bad!! But when I logged in last night it said I was only active for 18minutes. That does not make sense to me. Can someone please explain? 

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[JohnnyM34]

Welcome to FitBit life!

      So I’m going to go straight to the point. Active minutes are literally just the number of minutes you’ve been active. I hope this helps.

- John