Ionic GPS Inaccuracies

[MP4]

Hi, 

I'm a new Fitbit user, bought an Ionic on Monday and I'm having some issues with the GPS. Went on a couple of runs (at a track) and the gps seemed to be completely out both on the distance travelled and pace per kilometre.

I'm a long time strava user so yesterday I went for a run with both the Fitbit Ionic going and the strava on my iPhone running at the same time. Here are the results:

Strava - 7.9km   @ 4:15/km

Fitbit - 7.2km     @ 4:34/km

The difference of 0.7km is quite big and the difference in pace is also worrying. I waited till both had connected to gps before starting the run and I run in London where gps signal should be good. 

Is my Fitbit Ionic GPS not working correctly? Any help/advice would be appreciated. 

Thanks

Matt

Moderator Edit: Updated Subject for Clarity

[vilvic]

There are a few points here;

First is the patronising and condensending tone of the message. Most runners in this thread have had previous experience with other GPS devices and thus know how to use these devices. Plus it's not exactly rocket science.

Second, comparing the ionic to things like Garmin and the surge is exactly what we should be doing. When I run with others and we have different devices I expect both devices to have the same distance and speed give or take.

If I run a 10k race and it comes out at 9.2k I have every right to question it. Even more so when it is consistently 10% less than than the official distance.  

I can understand FitBit not wanting to make public the inaccuracy of the watch since they don't want to impact sales. However there will be thousands of people that bought this watch for the purpose of running. Their statistics since owning the watch have be affected and to suggest that we're not using the watch properly is wrong and disappointing.

[SunsetRunner]

Agree. I emailed them with proof of a bug and they don't acknowledge it. A shame because they could maybe improve these issue based on the data I have provided.

[FlashAM7]

This was my run this morning. I wish I could run on water but sadly, I cannot.

I tweeted at Fitbit support and they blamed ME because I was running downtown with tall buildings. One thing I've noticed about Fitbit customer support is instead of apologizing for the problem or looking into it, they always send you a link to an instruction manual on things you already know how to do. They sent me a link on how to track my run... I know how to track a run Fitbit, I want to know why your GPS is so laughably far off.

[bbarrera]

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@SunsetRunner wrote:

Can anyone explain this? Never had anything like this with a GPS watch before.

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@SunsetRunner Out of curiosity, it would be interesting to know the results of the following:

- download TCX from Fitbit web dashboard

- upload TCX to Strava or some other fitness/mapping platform

- compare original Strava/Fitbit to site where you uploaded TCX

(I maintain a second Strava account for such purposes)

If I understand your post, the Ionic captured a good track and forwarded that to Strava (via TCX, I assume).

Basically I'm wondering if the TCX version on Fitbit dashboard is also a good file. If the Fitbit TCX imports into other fitness/mapping platforms without issue, then the problem is with Fitbit dashboard. 

[Troutking]

I am having the same issue. The distance is coming in short (10-20%) somehow although the map looks right. My HR is wrong at least initially. I'm 48 and my HR had been starting off around 200-210. My previous HR w showing 185 on other devices but rarely gets there. Fitbit needs to get a firmware out soon.

[SunsetRunner]

@vilvic  Exactly i mean 1-3% could be expected etc. or more if going through wooded hilly turning trails, but when it is consistently off every time down the road in good conditions... there is an issue.

Here is the latest response for them for me:

Hi Nicholas,

Thanks for coming back to use and provide us further details and information about your issue. We're really sorry to know that you feel that way. At the end, we just want to provide you with the information and resolution available. 

We'd like to let you know that, at this time, we don't have official information of GPS accuracy being an ongoing issue nor can we escalate your case directly to our engineering team since we don't have official information of this issue currently being under investigation. Please accept our sincere apologize if we provide you with incorrect information.

In regards to your question, though you can compare the data gathered by your Fitbit Ionic with other Fitbit devices or devices with the same functionality from other brands, there isn't infallible way to guarantee that all this information with match in all the devices. Keep in mind that some factors can affect the accuracy of the GPS and not all the devices have the same algorithms to calculate this information. 

In this case, we've escalated your case to our team in charge of handling Ionic cases, so they can review it with the specialized team to provide you with further information. We'll be contacting you as soon as possible via email. We appreciate your time and cooperation with us in this case. 

If you have any other question or there is something else we can assist you with in the meantime, let us know. We'll be here for you at any time. 

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Which is utter crap in my opinion lol

[Fattire]

That answer would really bother me.  I get they are trying to protect themselves legally and from a PR standpoint but that's too rigid.  

Just ran my route with my old Charge 2 with assisted GPS and had great tracking.  Sure there's no smartwatch features but I like it more since it works 

[shipo]

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@Fattire wrote:

That answer would really bother me.  I get they are trying to protect themselves legally and from a PR standpoint but that's too rigid.  

Just ran my route with my old Charge 2 with assisted GPS and had great tracking.  Sure there's no smartwatch features but I like it more since it works 

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I'm not sure what you're trying to say, I run with a number of folks who wear either the Charge HR or the Charge 2, and at best, the Connected GPS works as well as the GPS in my Ionic, and when I say "at best", that is maybe one day in five, the other four days the Connected GPS is nowhere near as accurate.

[SunsetRunner]

The connected GPS on my Charge 2 was laughable, it was so inaccurate.  Way high or way low, never finding the right distance.  (I walk/run the same course day in, day out).

I have been fortunate with the Ionic, in that it has been accurate for almost every run for the past three weeks.  My route is consistently logged as 4.02 to 4.05 miles.  I run in an area with few trees and buildings, that probably helps.  Only once did it log the run as 4.15; however, the GPX file had the accurate data and reflected that when I exported it and re-added it to Strava. 

The GPS came in .4 short on a recent urban hike in an area with only minimal building / tree interference.  Ionic logged it as 4.6, but the GPS file indicated 5 miles when viewed in Google Earth. 

It is super frustrating to have to double check the mileages, and yes, I agree - comparing this watch to a Garmin is totally appropriate.  It has a GPS, it should be consistently accurate.

[vilvic]

Does anyone wear their watch on their dominant wrist?

I'm switching mine over from my dominant wrist to see if it makes a difference.

[Tunah85]

I can confirm this fits with my experience.

I have been doing some interval runs (5:00min/km pace jog for 500m, followed by 4:00/km place run for 500m).

**I have already turned off auto-pause and auto-run detect.

During my last two interval runs, it seemed to be tracking the initial jog correctly... right around 4:55 pace... but then as I started my run/sprint portion my pace time jumped up to 7:20/km for about 10-15 seconds before falling back down.

When tracking the same run via runkeeper the first km split is almost always 15-20s off (with the Ionic being too slow), and the overall distance tracked is usually off by around 100-150m/run (with the Ionic at the shorter distance).

Even when I ONLY track my run with the Fitbit Ionic and the data gets pushed to Runkeeper, Runkeeper manages to correct Fitbit's overall pace and distance... and it doesn't seem to change the map.  So the GPS is tracking the whole run, but just not giving me an accurate distance/pace read-out early on.

[Ksphs]

I am having similar problems with GPS connecting and disconnecting, losing distance, etc.  My strava account is now completely wrong, especially for the long runs.

[SunsetRunner]

I'm seeing something similar with my runs/hikes.  The GPS is capturing the data accurately, but it is getting screwed up in how Fitbit is interpreting it for some reason.  Fitbit reports the distance shorter or longer (but usually accurately, fwiw), but then when I view the track outside of any app (using something like this http://maplorer.com/view_gpx.html), the distance is correct based on what I know it to be from running the same route repeatedly.  YMMV.

The Ionic seems to have a great GPS chip with the Fitbit software being the weak link. 

[MonteC]

I will just add that I have the same issue.   Ionic always showing less distance and much higher pace than any other device I have compared it to.  It is consistently out.   

[gladtobe]

Hi well today on my run  i did my usual 3 mile loop route - mix of road and trail. Everytime before this it has recorded the distance and pace well and I have used my old garmin as well as my Ionic for comparison and all was good.

However, today, on a cloudy day and my first really cold run,  I did my well known route and 0.4 miles in it lost GPS and i could see it trying to connect. It did this several times. I turned round at my usual point and it said the correct 1.5 miles. However, it continued to lose the gps intermittently and then the mileage showed more than it should, and continued to do so. My 3 mile route finished as 3.6 miles (which I know it is not!) and that my pace was down to 8 min mile pace (i wish).

To add to this Strava doesnt let you edit your run like Runkeeper (which does this very well without encouraging cheating) so I lost all my split times, and just had my total. I have linked my run to the route I did by saving the route from a previous activity. 

Does this mean that now we have hit winter in the UK that my watch, which previously did not lose gps in any of my runs, is going to regularly lose signal because we have some cold and clouds !! This is not acceptable!!

Note - I was using my Fibit Ionic and playing music from it. Next time I will use my phone for music, maybe this was making a difference. I will heed other advice and have turned of the auto pause and run detect settings. 

[edit001]

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@gladtobe wrote:

Does this mean that now we have hit winter in the UK that my watch, which previously did not lose gps in any of my runs, is going to regularly lose signal because we have some cold and clouds !! This is not acceptable!!

Note - I was using my Fibit Ionic and playing music from it. Next time I will use my phone for music, maybe this was making a difference. I will heed other advice and have turned of the auto pause and run detect settings. 

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Cold does not influence the GPS and if you are wearing the watch on your skin to be able to measure HR the watch should stay warm as well. It could be a software bug that made the watch behave so strange... can't really explain it otherwise.

You could try and soft reset the watch before a run... a reboot could make some bugs go away.

Clouds on the other hand could affect the GPS signal and precision depending on how heavy they were.... the environment could also play a role ... if you are running under heavy foliage for instance.

Also depending on the satellites constellation above you at the time of running the GPS precision might be a bit off on some days. I've seen a lot of good and very good GPS watches that had bad GPS days from time to time.

Playing music from your watch should not be an issue in your case, the GPS antenna is not influenced by the  BT antenna.

My advice is to take more runs in the same configuration and see if all are bad before drawing a conclusion... then change 1, just 1 thing at a time... say not playing the music from the watch.... the idea is to try to isolate the problem to your GPS dropouts, if possible.

Also when the watch looses the GPS signal stop and wait for the watch to reacquire the signal before you continue to run and keep your watch face up to have clear view of the sky.... if you don't wait for the watch to recapture the GPS signal and continue to run while the watch struggles to reaquire the signal it will aproximate the distance resulting in distance errors, tracking errors at the end of the run.

[shipo]

@gladtobe, I've had one Garmin and now two different Fitbit trackers with in-built GPS; I've found the denser the foliage and/or the denser the clouds and/or the further north I've been, like north of the 45th parallel, the higher the likelihood of the tracker losing the connection with the GPS satellites.  Add to these issues, the GPS satellites are constantly moving relative to your position on the surface of the planet; one day you may have an optimal shot at several satellites, the next day your tracker may only have a strong lock on one or two.

The above holds true regardless of whether one is discussing wrist based trackers or any other terrestrial bound tracker for say, cars and boats.

[gladtobe]

Hi thanks

I have to say my Garmin that I have owned for years has only on very rare
occasions lost gps.

Interesting to hear other views thanks
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Moderator edit: personal info removed

[gladtobe]

Thanks very useful

Let's see
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Moderator edit: personal info removed

[MattFitbit]

Hi everyone! 

Just wanted to take this opportunity to thank you all for taking the time to provide us with such detailed feedback. I have taken much of what was posted in this thread and forwarded it to our partner teams for investigation and want to assure you that your voices have been heard.  

For anyone else who may be having a similar experience, I would recommend reviewing this article for some tips on how to improve GPS accuracy. 

Additionally, if anyone else has had success improving GPS accuracy by turning off the Auto-Pause feature, please let me know. I would be interested in hearing more about that. 

Thanks again everyone! If you have any questions, let me know.