Heart Rate Zones do not match most other devices

[WinthropDC]

The Heart Rate Zones on the Fitbit do not use the same ranges and colours as most of the other devices and this makes comparisons very difficult, especially when I am concerned of the accuracy of my Ionic.

Fitbit uses 3 ranges:

Peak (85% or above) Red

Cardio (70-85%) Dark Orange

Fat Burn (50-70%) Light Orange

Out of Zone Yellow

Most other devices (including Garmin and Polar) use 5 ranges:

Maximum (90% or above) Red

Hard (80-90%) Orange

Moderate (70-80%) Green

Light (60-70%) Blue

Very Light (50-60%) Grey

Out of range 

It would be nice if the ranges followed the industry standards closer.

According to the ionic, I spend all my time in the Peak range when cycling and I really don't believe that is true. I will try moving the ionic up my wrist further as mentioned on some of the other threads.

David

[SunsetRunner]

Yep, you’re right, and most frustrating it is too. For as long as I’ve been using Fitbit products I’ve wanted better zone analysis but not to be. I can only guess it’s due to Fitbit’s legacy of focusing on steps and weight control through walking as an activity. It may come at some point in the future but I’m not holding my breath.

[SunsetRunner]

This is definitely true and a pain point for me after coming back from Garmin.

Here is a feature request related tot his that you can common on and up vote.

https://community.fitbit.com/t5/Feature-Suggestions/Heart-rate-zones-more-of-them-all-editable-custo...

[WinthropDC]

I have voted. Hopefully they will adopt what is the industry standards.

Thanks for pointing out the suggestion, I looked for something before I posted, but could not find how to get to the suggestions area instead of just the forums.

[Colinm39]

When I go through the literature available in the Internet, Fitbit are following the American Heart Org , Mayo Clinic and the CDC (Center for Disease Control and Prevention)for exercise HR zones..  This would fit in with their other criteria , mainly from CDC.

It would be nice to be able to adjust the zones because at my age my fat burning zone starts at 71 bpm...