How do I get more accurate data on exercise....or even semi accurate?

[Elizabeth2222]

I am so frustrated with this fit bit! I exercised today and my data is WAY off.

I went to the gym and worked out on one elliptical machine for 60 minutes. I worked hard core and the machine was measuring my heart rate as high (they are pretty accurate as far as public machines can be).

I worked on another elliptical machine for 30 before going home.

so...60 min on one elliptical machine

       30 on another

Here is what my Ionic says:

Walk 20 min. Burned a whopping 17 calories

Elliptical 35 min. Burned a whopping 31 calories

Run 64 min. Burned 56 calories

I have 453 of fat burning min, which is highly inaccurate since they were in the middle of the day, and not when I was at the gym at 6:30a.

I really don't want to return my fit bit, but this is pretty worthless data for me.

What am I doing wrong? Can anyone help?

[JohnnyRow]

First question: How did you record the exercise? Did you manually start and stop it, or did just use auto-recognize (SmartTrack)? If manually, what type exercise did you call it? My own preference is to start and stop it myself to be more precise, and let SmartTrack just handle times I forget, or walks that get longer than I expected.

Do the walk, elliptical, and run correspond to the time you were at the gym?

All three sets of numbers are about the same calories per minute, and look like they might be just the BMR (basal metabolic rate) calories you are always burning with no exercise. Are you sure that you got the Ionic synced with your phone?

[Elizabeth2222]

Johnny, all the data was for the time I was home and not at the gym.

I didn't manually start and stop any exercise. I had the Blaze (for about a month) and it auto recognized my work outs, so I didn't think I needed to do it for the ionic.

Do I need to manually log each exercise? This seems like a pain to do, especially when arriving at the gym and trying to snag a machine.

Thanks for your info.

[JohnnyRow]

You are right. SmartTrack should take care of it without manually starting and stopping. I just prefer it, to be more precise but it should not be necessary.  Though it can be done in a few seconds once you get used to it.

I would suggest looking at the dashboard graphs of heat rate and steps on fitbit.com for the time you were at the gym. It sounds like it doesn't even recognize that the Ionic even got out of bed to go to gym.

Which data were you reading from the Ionic itself or from the phone app?

This might be a long shot but are you sure your phone app is linked to your Ionic and not still to your Blaze? Do you have different accounts for each or still have both tied to same account?

[Jim_R]

Your stats seem accurate for a 15 pound body. No chance your weight was entered incorrectly in your profile? 😉

[Jeff2017]

As Johnnyrow mentioned if you have the old Blaze setup still as a primary, then when it syncs up with the app your Ionic will change the stats on your Ionic to its stats. I found this out when seeing if I could use both and track the steps. I had to go to the Blaze and turn off the blue tooth on it. Eventually I removed it from the app cause I gave it to a friend.

[Martinefski]

The issue is that Fitbits do a horrible job tracking elliptical and stair stepper exercises. I think it primarily has to do with one typically holds on to something with those exercises. 

When I am on the elliptical my heart rate is off by as many as 70 beats per minute and I typically only track about 1/3 of my steps. 

I had had this exact problem with my Blaze and I have it now with my Ionic so this is definitely a Fitbit issue with tracking these exercises. 

[Elizabeth2222]

My fit bit Blaze has been deleted from my account, so I don't think it is confused there. My weight profile is correct too.

[Elizabeth2222]

I used the exercise smart track (I think that is what it is called) and I manually put in my exercise for today.

The data was much more accurate, so I am pleased with that. I wish I didn't have to enter my exercise, though.

[Elizabeth2222]

Well, today was not a good day for the Ionic. My elliptical data was broken into 3 sessions (I only had one session, so started once and ended once). The first session said I burned 45 calories, and the last two were less than 20 each.

I'm sorry, but I didn't pay all this money for have a worthless tracker. What the heck is going on???? I wanted a tracker I could put on and rely on the data to be recorded. This is  bull.....yes....I am fuming now.

I will be returning the Ionic if I can't get this problem solved.

Has anyone had luck contacting Fitbit about this issue?? Is it worth my time and effort?

[shipo]

What does your heart rate graph look like?  I ask because something doesn't seem entirely kosher with your data; as a point of reference, I ran for 92 minutes today and the Ionic calculated 1,341 calories burned.

[Elizabeth2222]

The heart rate seems to be fairly accurate. I don't understand why the rest is not.

[shipo]

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@Elizabeth2222 wrote:

The heart rate seems to be fairly accurate. I don't understand why the rest is not.

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Hmmm, makes no sense, if I am not mistaken, heart rate is one of the heaviest weighted metrics when it comes to how the Fitbit software calculates calorie burn.  Can you post either your daily heart rate graph or better still, the heart rate graphs from your workouts?  I'd love to look at them to see if there are any anomalies.

[Elizabeth2222]

Ok, I think it was  user error yesterday (may be because I am exhausted taking care of my 9 month old granddaughter!) and I probably didn't manually put in the exercise.

I went to the gym today and the exercise, and heart rate, match up.

I really don't like having to manually record my exercise every day. I thought the Ionic was supposed to do this on it's own? What can I do to fix this? Do I need to send this back and try another??

[Colinm39]

@Elizabeth2222There has to be an answer.. You have been a Fitbitter nearly as long as me and I'm trying to help a Fitbit One user because they have fluctuations in Active Minutes. I have suggested they use the Active Record feature to analyse the data in this link

You could use that to compare effort at 1 minute intervals between the days.. This method is a copy of your existing data and will not affect your existing graphs. I use it because it's annoying when you create a Custom Activity that Fitbit average the calories over time of an activity and you can lose active minutes you cannot use the calorie graphs . Unless you set your Ionic to say, Workout before you started your Gym session

This is probably old hat to you, but new Fitbitters can pickup a few clues by reading these posts.

I'm finding the Ionic isn't picking up things that my Blaze was, maybe because I'm using HiiT without the timer and  I have it set to the minimum of 10 minutes, same as the Blaze. In the early days I set every SmartTrack exercise to 10 minutes to determine what the Blaze was interpreting. See this link about SmartTrack. The Blaze used to pickup my gardening as Sport and Pruning/weeding etc as Outdoor Bike.. Didn't worry me because the calories expended were as expected.

But we need to smile, because I'm analysing my nights sleeping HR and by creating a custom activity it adds the day as exercise so I meet my 5 day exercise goal by being asleep.  They average 54 bpm and only 1 minute of fat burning over 7-8 hours for a bathroom break.. Fitbit have enough issues without worrying about this.  Fitbit need some logic in there to determine that this is not exercise while asleep.  133 steps/arm movements in 9 hours sleep last night.

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@Elizabeth2222 wrote:

Ok, I think it was  user error yesterday (may be because I am exhausted taking care of my 9 month old granddaughter!) and I probably didn't manually put in the exercise.

I went to the gym today and the exercise, and heart rate, match up.

I really don't like having to manually record my exercise every day. I thought the Ionic was supposed to do this on it's own? What can I do to fix this? Do I need to send this back and try another??

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.

[Colinm39]

@Elizabeth2222Here is a simple test walking test I performed and it did not SmartTrack.. I received 15 out of 16 active minutes with my settings at 10 minutes.. So now I'm looking for a clue as to why !!!!.  Maybe it has a threshold on steps etc.. and not HR/Calories. Obviously it is trying to work out a pattern of movement.

On that same test my One recorded 6.5% more steps and NO active minutes, and that is where the Ionic kicked in with the HR/Calories. I wont accept the spikes but in the 80-90 bpm range I will accept and the calories burnt reflect that.

Ionic

[TerryLiindsay]

I’m wondering why hasn’t fixed its app so one could at least edit your mileage as well as steps if needed