my fitbit doesn't record my activity on a stationary bike

[abul236]

fitbit works well for walking running and eliptical, but not when i'm on a stationery bike or lifting weights.

[WendyB]

Because those are not Step based activities

I do put my One on my shorts legs to get some steps but its not accurate.

Weights you really do not walk that much. I know I dont. This is best to manually add.

[abul236]

thanks for the feedback, which confirms that fitbit doesn't record your TOTAL daily activity; as you can burn quite a few calorie on a punching bag or weight lifting. 

[ChaelAZ]

Very few deveices record daily activity as such. Even for my MotoACTV you had to select the activity and then it just estimated the calorie burn based on height, weight, age, sex, duration, etc. You do the same by manually adding the activity to your fitbit acitivty record, which then adds the calories to your TDEE.

That is also the same thing you would do on other fitness websites. I use MyFitnessPal and used to manually log exercise. Nice things about the Fitbit paired with MFP is now a majority of my walking and running (step based activities) are automatically tracked. For Tennis, strength training, and other HIIT I just manually log it.

If you want more accuracy you will have to step up (no pun intended) to a more expenisve tracker and included a heart rate monitor.

[abul236]

did as you suggested, added 20 minutes on the stationery bike, only to lose the active time registered earlier for walking and the elipitical. can suggest what caused me to loose that information.

[CrystalG]

If you use myfitnesspal also, and sync the two- you can log those activities into the fitpal, and it syncs 🙂

[abul236]

Crystal,

thanks.

[slysam]

This will sound silly, but sometimes people don't get this and it effects their stats. Since you lost active minutes when you logged your stationary cycling I mention it. Be sure you log the activity for the correct time (according to your Fitbit clock) and duration. Whatever you log, the calorie burn you log replaces whatever Fitbit estimated. For logged activity, the activity minutes are strictly based on calorie burn per minute. Usually the Fitbit doesn't pick up much on the stationary bike so it should generally be an increase in calorie burn and either moderately or very active minutes (depending on the average calorie burn for the workout). I know when I wear my Fitbit One to Spin class it counts 2000 steps over an hour--so the equivalent of walking 1 mph for 1 hour. The calorie burn Fitbit estimated was 150 calories lower than my HRM's calorie burn estimate. When I logged it, it did increase my calorie burn and my active minutes.

[sammy109]

I've experimented w/the One, and it seems to only notice when it's moved side-to-side, not up-and-down. THat may be why. WHen you sleep, it's another thing, if I understood right.