Feedback about Fitbit Ionic

[MelissaRN]

I've never owned a Fitbit product.  I recently began using the Fitbit app as a way to log water, food and steps and I am enjoying it and finding it motivating.

I'm thinking about making the plunge and purchasing the Fitbit Ionic.  (I also was looking at the Blaze.)

So question, would you buy the Fitbit Ionic again?  Do you regret it?  Love it?  Think it's worth it or not?

Any feedback is appreciated.   Thank you in advance!  

Moderator Edit: Clarified subject

[Swing43]

I have had three Fitbit watch type devices.  The Surge is the one I find most accurate.  Heart rate compares to other devices I have checked it too, but I can't be 100% sure on that.  Surge is pretty good on steps in most instances, shopping being one exception and the big one is treadmill.  On a 3 mile treadmill walk it is typically 1800+ steps short and just under a mile short.  This is compared to good pedometers I've had and the mileage I get on the same route in my car.  Strangely, Surge seems good on calorie burn.  Blaze is terrible on steps and calorie burn compared to other devices.  Ionic did good on heartrate but steps, miles, and calorie burn don't seem to be it's strong suit.  Probably the strongest feature I saw on Ionic is the sleep graph.

I gave the Ionic to my granddaughter as the sleep tracking and heart rate are what she is after most because of some conditions she has.  GPS seems to work good on those that have that feature, which I look for.  Of the devices Fitbit has put out, the Surge is my favorite.  It doesn't have the pretty colored screen or the ability to change bands easily, but I would say accuracy is bet of the three.  Sometimes updates seem to take a step backwards though.  

[Ericws]

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@Xenoide wrote:

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@Ericws wrote:

Interesting.  

I don't have any heart rate measurement comparison to make, because as I said this is my first device that has that.  I have no reason to not trust it, your testing notwithstanding.  But GPS is 100% spot on compared to my other devices, and I have tested it a lot.

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May I ask you the following: please go outside, set your Ionic activity to Run or Walk and walk in a constant pace 300 steps which you count in memory. Then stop and finish the activity on your Ionic and check what it reports to you in steps. If it matches your counted 300 steps, you might be the lucky one to own a golden sample. The two Ionics I have tested lacked already about 30-50 Steps on that figure...

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Done.  It matched my counted 300 steps.

[Izlet]

No. I bought 2 Adidas Editions. One's pretty inaccurate, the other doesn't track anything at all. Save the money and buy something else that's proven to work.

[Tottis]

Had you asked two days ago I would say "Hell yes!". Now the Fitbit Iconic has not synced for two days so right now I'm a bit frustrated. Hope the problem can be fixed.

[TomDuke]

I tried your 300 step experiment and it was within a step or two accurate, very interesting.  This morning on my treadmill run after 30 minutes the treadmill counted 4653 steps while the Ionic registered only 3920 steps.  Running outdoors on a 1 mile course, the watch registered 1.96 miles for 2 laps around according to the Ionic GPS, and 2866 steps. So I guess my treadmill is way off in it's step count and overcounting but still under estimates the mileage based on my pace.

[SilviaFitbit]

Hey @Mark2018/ I've created a case on your behalf with Customer Support, they will continue assisting you on this matter. Keep an eye on your inbox. 

Hey there @pedris. Please let me know if your Ionic continues to reboot itself during runs as this is not intended behavior, I'll be happy to create a case for you. 

@Xenoide and @Izlet, I would recommend to set stride length and you can double check this advice to improve accuracy of your trackers.  

Hope this helps! I'll be around if you need further assistance. 

[SunsetRunner]

I have had the IONIC for a few weeks now, it was my first "Smart Watch" and was a gift from my husband for my birthday.  I had previously used the Alta HR, which worked fine for what it did. I didn't have any complaints and never once contacted the help desk or spent time on these Forums.

Now I find I am spending an incredible amount of time sorting through the community to find issues to my problems... or even worse, on a help chat with a fitbit person who's only suggestions are ALWAYS "Turn it off and back on again" and "Factory Reset" ... All of which I have done.. Then finally they said "Well that's all I can tell you to do".

This is an Advanced Fitness Tracker that does not do it's job very well as it commonly stops tracking in the middle of a run or biking exercise, creating huge inaccuracies.  (Hmm, a fitness tracker that doesn't track fitness... marvelous). 

It is NOT a smart watch... the few apps it has work marginally (including the fitbit Provided Apps). If your Activity Tracker is not currently synced to the phone it will provide you NO information of value... except for maybe the time... but if you have changed time zones, it doesn't even do that. (Funny how with a GPS this device can not automatically take a survey of your location to determine the correct time without being synced to the phone.)  And this device is notorious for sync issues.

Ionic does not keep time despite being synced

I am currently within my return window and am strongly considering that option. Would I buy it again?  Absolutely not.  It's a fancy Activity Tracker that allows you to customize the face... that's pretty much it. Not the Smart Watch it advertises it's self to be.  Keep in mind... I was very excited about this device when I received it.  I had high hopes from all of the promises the fitbit Website made.  Every moment with it has been a further disappointment because it doesn't meet the expectation in which fitbit claimed it to be.  I hate that I get overly excited when something it was designed to do actually works... which is a rarity.

[Michael6266]

Im gonna give an honest awnser here and say no, i got my ionic since around october last year, and while i do like it, its just not good enough who wants to take sports to the next level, the friends options, and challenges are nice, and its a good watch for day to day use, but my next one will probably be a different one.

[Jappie]

I would say Yes. I tried other watches like Samsung gear sport and Tomtom Spark 3, but this one is definitely my favorite. A bit of a sport watch an a bit of a smart watch.

[SunsetRunner]

Nope, nor any other Fitbit Device.

[Steve80222]

Good news, I was able to take suggestions from a couple of posts to restart the watch, which I admittedly should have done on my own, and also to shut off all notifications. Looks like from other posts Fitbit is having issues with notifications, not only not working, but adversely impacting other functionality. Like apparently activity tracking. So after doing those two things the run tracking stabilized and doesn’t crash. Glad I was able to avoid a factory reset and having to load everything in my watch again.  Now I really bought the watch for GPS run tracking and am less interested in notifications, but gee, shouldn’t a smart watch have those?  Otherwise how smart is it really?  But otherwise glad my area of concern is working again.  And my Starbucks app has always worked great. Thank God, that’s mission critical.  I hope Fitbit doesn’t give up on the product, I would like to see it reach it’s potential.  But there’s work to be done. 

[Oilykayaker]

Flat out NO! I waited for the ionic to come out, and was excited as I liked my basic Fitbit tracker.  I have lost so many hours in the past 6 months trying to sync, get notifications to come through, constantly trying to troubleshoot.   Disappointed that there aren't more activities that it can track-kayaking and exercise bike would be great.  It doesn't auto recognize hiking, I mean really? I'm wearing a really expensive watch that quite frankly does very little other show me the time most days.  

[Izlet]

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@SilviaFitbit wrote:

Hey @Mark2018/ I've created a case on your behalf with Customer Support, they will continue assisting you on this matter. Keep an eye on your inbox. 

Hey there @pedris. Please let me know if your Ionic continues to reboot itself during runs as this is not intended behavior, I'll be happy to create a case for you. 

@Xenoide and @Izlet, I would recommend to set stride length and you can double check this advice to improve accuracy of your trackers.  

Hope this helps! I'll be around if you need further assistance. 

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Thanks, but I've already tried this. Along with every other 'fix' for every other problem on this forum. Both devices I purchased have multiple faults, not just step accuracy. I've already opened a ticket for the worst one, which fibit say they can't see any restarts or factory resets on... it's had multiple! I'm just hoping I can return them to where I purchased them 'cos it's a lot of money to waste on devices that don't work

[Bujica]

I have done the 300 step experiment and it's spot on. Also, I have walked and ran with the GPS and it's within a few metres of the other GPS I used for comparison (a few metres for a 7K run I would think it's quite remarkably accurate). I have used a chest strap for HR for comparison, again, spot-on. Sleep is super accurate and matches my observations, including the sleep stages. Treadmill is off in terms of distance, but I have counted the steps and they match the watch, I trust the watch more than I trust the treadmill, LOL). Now, I have tested mine against hubby's (who has the Adidas edition) and my son's (who has a regular Ionic, like me) and they're all almost identical in stats for the same workout (with the exception of steps and stride, of course - a kid, a tiny adult and a tall one could not match), so what are the chances of having 3 "golden" devices in the same family... My only thought is that maybe "bad" Ionics are not the norm but the exception and the people who actually have no problems don't just post on the forums since they have no reason to visit them in the first place...

[kicki22]

I will never buy or recommend Fitbit to anyone ever again.  I was a very early fitbit adopter and have had increasingly "nice" versions up to the original Charge HR. Fitbit customer service used to be fantastic. They sent you a new device if something went wrong without you having to ship a device back to them. That said, starting with about the third Fitbit I owned, I was having to replace them at least every six months because something failed. Then customer service got worse. They started giving a coupon code for dollars or percent off of you purchased through their site even a six month old product failed. I left them and went to Pebble. My Pebble performed beautifully for more than two years! Never a single issue. I decided to give Fitbit another go and purchased the Ionic. Again, six months in, it's basically dead. I'm done trying and probably going to the Samsung gear. I'd recommend if you've not started don't waste your money. 

[Ericws]

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@Bujica wrote:

I have done the 300 step experiment and it's spot on. Also, I have walked and ran with the GPS and it's within a few metres of the other GPS I used for comparison (a few metres for a 7K run I would think it's quite remarkably accurate). I have used a chest strap for HR for comparison, again, spot-on. Sleep is super accurate and matches my observations, including the sleep stages. Treadmill is off in terms of distance, but I have counted the steps and they match the watch, I trust the watch more than I trust the treadmill, LOL). Now, I have tested mine against hubby's (who has the Adidas edition) and my son's (who has a regular Ionic, like me) and they're all almost identical in stats for the same workout (with the exception of steps and stride, of course - a kid, a tiny adult and a tall one could not match), so what are the chances of having 3 "golden" devices in the same family... My only thought is that maybe "bad" Ionics are not the norm but the exception and the people who actually have no problems don't just post on the forums since they have no reason to visit them in the first place...

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My experience is very similar to yours, and I have wondered the same thing.  The vast majority who are enjoying their Ionics like you and I are don't come here to share their experiences, so the negative vibe is higher.

[SilviaFitbit]

Thanks for stopping by @Ericws! I truly appreciate the time that you took to share your experience with Ionic. I'm sorry to hear that you're thinking about returning it. Our team is always here to assist you and our priority is to make your experience better and that you can enjoy the Fitbit that you bought. 

@Jappie, @SunsetRunner, @Steve80222, @Oilykayaker, @Izlet, @Bujica, @kicki22, Thank you so much for keep sharing your experience. Rest assure that your feedback hasn't been unnoticed and we're is always reviewing your responses and providing feedback to our product development team. 

I'll be around if you need assistance. 

[SunsetRunner]

I would not recommend it. I started with a fitbit flex, then moved to the blaze and loved both of these.  I was so excited when the Ionic came out that I chose that over an apple watch.  My ionic has been a nightmare. It started to mess up less than 4 months after the purchase. It claims to be waterproof but quit working after I wore it in the pool.  What made matters worse is the customer service. First they want me to send videos of it not working. I did. Then they send me an envelope to mail it back in. I mail it out and it takes 3 weeks before the carrier they use to even acknowledge they rec'd it. I ask if my replacement watch is on it's way and am told I will not get my replacement until the broke one is received. It takes over a month for my broke watch to be delivered and no communication from Fitbit. In other words, if they don't receive the watch back, I'm out of luck. They only want to deal with you via email and even after I express my dissatification with how this process is handeled and asked to SPEAK to a manager, I get an email from a manager letting me know the return policy (which is not good...make sure you read the fine print) and sorry about your bad luck. When I tell this manager I was disappointed that he didn't call me, he reply's back with his phone number. After all the back and forth, not a single phone call or any concern that it has taken over a month and I still have not recieved a replacement watch. So if you buy a fitbit product, know that if somehting happens to it, you have the potential of being out a lot of money. Pick a cheap one or go with another brand. 

[motoscribble]

Like Garmin talking to a human at Fitbit is near impossible. Your description of the customer service makes me regret buying this watch! and I will look elsewhere where customer service actually means something when this one dies.

[Michael6266]

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@SunsetRunner wrote:

I would not recommend it. I started with a fitbit flex, then moved to the blaze and loved both of these.  I was so excited when the Ionic came out that I chose that over an apple watch.  My ionic has been a nightmare. It started to mess up less than 4 months after the purchase. It claims to be waterproof but quit working after I wore it in the pool.  What made matters worse is the customer service. First they want me to send videos of it not working. I did. Then they send me an envelope to mail it back in. I mail it out and it takes 3 weeks before the carrier they use to even acknowledge they rec'd it. I ask if my replacement watch is on it's way and am told I will not get my replacement until the broke one is received. It takes over a month for my broke watch to be delivered and no communication from Fitbit. In other words, if they don't receive the watch back, I'm out of luck. They only want to deal with you via email and even after I express my dissatification with how this process is handeled and asked to SPEAK to a manager, I get an email from a manager letting me know the return policy (which is not good...make sure you read the fine print) and sorry about your bad luck. When I tell this manager I was disappointed that he didn't call me, he reply's back with his phone number. After all the back and forth, not a single phone call or any concern that it has taken over a month and I still have not recieved a replacement watch. So if you buy a fitbit product, know that if somehting happens to it, you have the potential of being out a lot of money. Pick a cheap one or go with another brand. 

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I can find myself in alot of the bad mentions on here, but this is absurt, you expect them to send you a new one without them even receiving the old one? This is not their problem, should take this up to postage, what if you order something worth 300$ off ebay and the seller tells you he send it a month ago, would you just be like, “whoops well my loss lets order another one” I dont think so...