Fitbit Inspire Undercounting Steps for Walk Exercise

[Blue24]

 I have had my Inspire for a couple of weeks now and I think it is undercounting steps for the auto recognized walk exercise.  I read the various suggestions to correct this issue but none worked for me.  I changed tracker wrist location and band tightness.  I measured my stride and entered that data.  I tried to keep my hands/arms moving as I walked.  The tracker is on the non-dominant hand.  No success.  My basis for comparison is my waist mounted pedometer and my Strava app in my phone.  The pedometer has its own 3-axis accelerometer, and Strava uses the accelerometer in my phone.  For an approximate 2800 step walk my pedometer and Strava are in excellent agreement with respect to steps.  Fitbit is about 100 to 250 steps lower. I walk the same route every day. My pedometer and Strava are very consistent.  My Inspire is very inconsistent from walk to walk.  I don't know what to try next to improve the Inspire step accuracy.

Does anyone know the criteria used by Fitbit to "start" the walk exercise and the criteria used to "stop" the walk exercise?  As an aside I don't understand why my Inspire would need my stride length for an accurate step count. My pedometer and Strava app do not need my stride length for step counting.

[JohnnyRow]

Stride length has not effect on step count.  Stride length is only used to convert step count to mileage.

If you are relying on it auto-recognizing your walk, it might indeed be missing the first few minutes of your walk before it recognizes it.  I don't know how precise it is on recognizing and counting the exact beginning.  That would reduce the step count of your "walk" but those steps would still contribute to your daily step count, just not as part of the "walk".  But the way to be sure the whole thing is included is to use the Exercise App to tell it when you start and stop your Walk; then it will know for sure to include the whole walk, and know to get the time right when you start and are done, without having to guess if you might just happen to be stopping to talk to someone or to smell the flowers.

[Blue24]

Thanks for the suggestion.  I manually initiated the walk exercise with the following results:

Pedometer:  2850 steps

Fitbit:  2666 steps

Based on this one sample I continue to experience low step count with the Fitbit.   I will try again but with the Fitbit attached to my pocket (clip mode).  I won't obtain heart rate data but that is OK.  In my limited experience the Fitbit heart rate during exercise is inaccurate, sometimes excessively so.

[Blue24]

After a bit of experimentation I found attaching my Fitbit to my ankle for the walking exercise provided a more accurate step count compared to my wrist location.  I set the walking exercise to auto recognize.

For 4 days I recorded the following step counts:

1) Pedometer         2885              Fitbit (ankle - auto recogn)   2834

 2)  Pedometer       2892              Fitbit (ankle - auto recogn)   2876

3}  Pedometer        2946              Fitbit (ankle - auto recogn)   2903

4)  Pedometer        2916              Fitbit (ankle - auto recogn)   2898      🙂

As a side benefit the heart rate data for the walking exercise look very reasonable.

Perhaps this will be helpful to others.