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How accurate is Ionic GPS?

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‎01-25-2021 14:56 - last edited on ‎01-26-2021 17:47 by Fitbit Moderator

‎01-25-2021 14:56 - last edited on ‎01-26-2021 17:47 by Fitbit Moderator

I run with a friend who has a garmin. I have a Fitbit ionic. We start and finish our gps tracking at the same time and place on each run but when we look at our stats we have very different results. For example today, her watch showed 5.81 miles but my ionic showed 6.13. The ionic always records a greater distance. Which one is most likely to be accurate?

 

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‎01-26-2021 17:47 - last edited on ‎08-18-2025 09:57 by Fitbit Moderator

‎01-26-2021 17:47 - last edited on ‎08-18-2025 09:57 by Fitbit Moderator

Hi @SunsetRunner, welcome to the Community Forums.

Thanks for bringing this to our attention and for the details that were shared in your post. Let me share with you that all devices with GPS sensors require a direct path to GPS satellites to calculate location. A weak GPS signal might affect the accuracy of your route and other activity data. Your Ionic uses your step count to calculate distance until it finds a signal, so the total distance calculated for a workout may be slightly less accurate when GPS isn't available for the entire time. To learn more, see GPS.gov.

Let me know if you have any additional questions.

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