Ionic Heart Rate Accuracy

[Kat_W]

Has anyone else noticed that the Heart Rate sensor is very inaccurate?  Currently my Ionic is showing that my heart rate is in excess of 120, while at the same time my pulse ox machine (a medical device) is saying it's 82.  The Samsung health app is inline with what the pulse ox is saying.  I'm not sure if I have a defective Ionic or if others are having the same issue. ( Note: Sorry if there are any spelling errors, I am tryping around my cat, who has decided to sit directly in front of the screen)

Moderator edit: edited title for clarity

[Quantm1366]

For those that think this issue only applies to elevated heart rates during exercise I can assure you this is not the case. While sitting at rest, the Ionic reads my heart rate anywhere from 80-90 most of the time. It occasionally goes down to the 70's but have seen it as high as 99, all while at rest. It is wildly inaccurate compared to my charge or chest band. This is my 3rd fitbit (previous flex and charge hr) and the only one I have seen this issue with. 90% of the data this fitness watch collects uses heart rate, from calorie counting to sleep tracking. All those metrics incorporate heart rate...so if the heart rate is grossly inaccurate this watch is completely useless other than for telling time and getting notifications.

[Nettuno]

I repeat here too because it is outrageous ... it should be denounced the Fitbit for fraud

In Italy, the Fitbit Ionic, was voted as The worst technological device of the year 2017 ...
the link can not put it but look on Youtube:
FITBIT IONIC è il PEGGIORE del 2017 - Recensione ITA 
and

FITBIT IONIC, CHE PECCATO! Fitbit Ionic ITA 
For:
Unreliability of cardiac detection
Unreliability counting steps
Unreliability connection and synchronization
Incompatibility with accessories and cardio bands
Useless Wifi system
Useless VO2 sensor

... it is considered to steal money

[fluxx]

@Quantm1366 Unfortunately, that's true. The HR on my Ionic is a joke. Sometimes it's around 90 when I'm resting, counted by hand it's about 60. The Ionic is way off during training and resting. I think it's a design problem, the bottom is quite flat and doesn't enforce tight contact between the sensors and the skin like eg. the Charge 2 does. Therefore, the Ionic is loosing the HR very often (which I can confirm anyway) and then tries to recatch it. During recatch it often starts in the middle (~70bpm) and then goes up or down into the right direction, but as it has problems with reading anyway, it chooses the wrong direction which leads to wrong results. 

[tstark]

@fluxx  I too am seeing wildly different HR on my ionic.  I just upgraded from a Charge 2 that I was really happy with and had accurate HR readings.  I just went through chat and while they had me troubleshoot a bunch of steps to no avail and tried to play off the discrepancies as being accurate.  It is currently reading 20BPM above me taking my pulse and what I read on my Samsung phone sensor and that is just sitting at my desk.  Why is it that Fitbit can't resolve this issue that has been going on since October.  My Ionic isn't even 12 hours old and I am probably going to box it up and return it.  Not sure where to go from here though as the ionic has everything I want.....  

[YFG]

You may be on to something with your design comment. I’ve noticed that the Ionic does not fit the “curve” of my wrist like my Garmin did. It does not appear to fit snugly on my wrist especially as I move my hand and arm.

[Mayu1805]

I was really on the verge of buying Ionic, but totally put off after reading this thread. 

[SunsetRunner]

I returned my Garmin Vivoactive 3 because it was buggy. The HR monitoring was fantastic and it wasn't curved. Something else is going on here. Maybe Garmin's Elevate sensor is just...better.

[tstark]

The thing that I find frustrating is that Fitbit won't even really acknowledge this problem in any real way.  After spending a while on with tech support yesterday and kinda being deflected as to discrepancies between my Ionic, my manual taking of my pulse and my Samsung health app on my phone, she downplayed the problem as if it was just a minor discrepancy.  When I am sitting at my desk just resting and am seeing between 20-50BPM difference in devices, that is an issue.  And that isn't even working out.  Then to be sent documentation on how to wear the watch and why your heart beat can vary, I kinda felt like they have a script that they stick with in order to not admit there is an issue. BTW, I had a Charge 2 for a year and never had any of these issues.

When there are over 2000 views (and growing) on this thread over multiple months and 5 pages of posts, how can they continue to say there isn't an issue?  Anyone from Fitbit want to chime in on this?  

[Mayu1805]

Now, there is an FB ionic users group where quite a number who says that
there is no problem at all. I was wondering if this is a an issue to a few
or not.. ( a very interested buyer)

[Denodan]

I accually hace no real issues with my heartratw accuracy at all and at resting is 3 bpm slower than my Sansung gear sport and alongside apple are the more accurate. So my ionic is pretty much in line with my Samsung Sport but a bit lower but would not say wildly out at all.

You guys must have bought from a bad batch and agree with fb users no issues.

Mine are very slow syncing slow app. Apps not working or clock faces. Lately cannot even load a new watch face or new apps.

[LeBrok]

"You guys must have bought from a bad batch and agree with fb users no issues."

That would be my guess too.

[mbcastle]

The last couple of runs I have tightened the band down as much as possible without it being uncomfortable, and that seems to have helped quite a bit. Before it would spike to around 170 immediately upon starting a run. Now it's more like 130-140. Also, I have never had a problem with the HR reading while at rest.

[SunsetRunner]

I swapped out the stock band with the sport one and just got back from my first run with it. It was BETTER. An improvement, yes. Still not great. Good enough? Probably. 

It's much more flexible which might allow the watch to be more snug on the wrist while  still being comfortable. Again, BETTER. Not great.

Good enough for most people? Probably. But I know that the Garmin had no issues with it's HR monitor while being much looser on my wrist.

[Denodan]

The only time the Garmin have better hr accuracy over Apple and Samsung is with a strap.

Without the strap both Samsung and Apple have a better more accurate hr monitoring. And there are videos on you tube confirm this if you look.

[fluxx]

Just re-activated my Charge 2 to highlight the very bad hr sensor of the Ionic. (Therefore, don't look at the step counter and time, just the hr).

Typical situations with the Ionic, and I absolutely didn't enforce these results, this is common.

The Ionic doesn't get the heartbeat at all.The Ionic is off during resting (~60 bpm validated by hand).Way off during light training. (Against Charge 2 and a polar chest strap.)

I tried various positions and nothing helps. The Charge 2 does well in every position, the Ionic is wrong so often, I absolutely don't trust the watch any more. 

[Denodan]

Why are you guys getting inaccurate hr's? I am not finding this. If anything its a little lower than what my Samsung indicates but not that far off, so think it does a great job.

[LeBrok]

@Denodan

Maybe it is a bad batch.

I bought mine mid november directly from Fitbit site.  All the numbers:

8542A-FB503, XRAFB503, 280-0426-01 B, 1B244636080A

How about you guys?

[Denodan]

I just got mine from an online store here and not getting the inaccurate hr readings others are discribing.

[fluxx]

I don't know, I could go on with this forever. Sometimes it does things like this. I'm resting with a slow hr and the Ionic thinks I'm doing some exercise and nearly doubles the hr. Most of the time, it's just "resting" at 70 bpm where the Charge 2 shows much more realistic values between 60 and 80 bpm depending on moving and resting activities. The Ionic also moves much slower in a certain direction, for example if I start an exercise the Charge 2 adapts much faster to the heart rate, the Ionic is almost half a minute behind which makes it obsolet to use it as a tool during the training. 

I'm gonna contact the support about this next week, I somewhat hope it's just from a bad batch, but the hr sensor looks clean and fine and other comments lead to the impression, that I'm not the only one with this problem. 

[kiki]

I've had the Ionic (upgrade from the One) for about 3 weeks now. Here are my observations with regard to Heart Rate Monitoring: 

First, the good stuff:

• Seems to be mostly fine for when I'm sitting around doing nothing. I think the resting heart rate values are pretty good. 
• Has been (knocking on wood) working quite well during manually recorded Runs. I have seen a few spikes at the beginning of a run, but, in general, it is in line with my actual heart rate (and the Garmin I tested it against). 

Now the bad:

• The HR monitor is HORRIBLE when I'm walking, especially if I'm "cold" and especially walking DOWNHILL. It almost always LOCKS ONTO MY CADENCE and records that instead of my actual heart rate. This is particularly annoying because its over counting calories. I thought maybe the problem was my cold hands, but I walked around with a heat pack the other day and that didn't help. I assume it's probably that my heart rate is fairly low and it's not filtering out the noise of the actual steps I'm taking (especially downhill steps). Sometimes it seems to work if I'm warmed up first (meaning, my blood is pumping... like after a run, the walk data is usually OK). 
• I take the watch off when I shower. I leave it in a place that I don't think suffers from vibrations (because apparently the bathroom counter does, so I get "fake steps"), but I still notice that it registers a heart rate. The bigger issue is when I put it back on, the HR doesn't go back to "normal" and I have to reset it. Again, this is overstating calories, which really, really bugs me.
• When you turn HR monitoring off, it doesn't record the data, but it still uses the information to calculate calories. I turned it off during one of these downhill walks and still see the same elevated per minute calorie burn as when the HR is being logged. So it's not getting "logged" but it is being "monitored" and used in the calculations. 

Mostly all of this bugs the crap out of me because the calories burned are so overstated. But it's also really annoying that I spent almost $300 on this thing and it has some major issues.