Ionic battery short life

[SunsetRunner]

I bought my Ionic during the first week it has been available, and up until now, it has been working just fine.  I have been taking it off and charging it when I have gone into the bathroom to take a shower, every morning before I head out for the day and every evening before I head to bed.  Usually, after a charge to 100% in the evening, it has been down to the mid-90's in the morning -- 94 or so.  During the day, after a charge to 100% in the morning, it may be down to around 90% or so in the evening.  Bottom line, it was always quick and easy to get it back to 100% while I was in the shower.

But just a few days ago, I started seeing the battery percentages in the low 80's.  Then the low 70's.  Yesterday, after a 100% charge in the morning, the battery was DOWN TO 51%.  If this keeps it up, my Ionic will not last a full day without needing to be charged.  At which time I might as well toss it in the trash and move on to some other company's technology.  I am NOT happy to see this three-hundred-dollar purchase utterly die as I watch it over the course of one week.

I have NOT been doing anything strange that seemingly made this happen.  It didn't happen "right after a firmware update" or anything like that -- I have been updating things as they have happened, but the last one was months ago.  I did NOT install any new apps or anything like that.  It was just functioning normally, and then it went to hell in a handbasket one day, and it just keeps on getting worse, every day.

I have been doing daily "reboots" with the Ionic.  I have uninstalled every app that I could uninstall.  I am using a very simple watch face.  I have fully uninstalled the Fitbit app on my phone, and reinstalled that.  Nothing has helped.  It simply appears that my Ionic's battery is going to die within the next week or so.  By all means, if you can suggest anything else I could do, I would appreciate it, but I think I've gone through the gamut of what can be done with the thing, already.  I can tell you one thing, though -- if this thing dies on me, I sure won't be buying a new Ionic, given how this thing hasn't lasted much more than about six months.

Moderator edit: Updated subject for clarity 

[Tony.r]

@Colinm39 Thanks for updating us all. Last night I was down to 26% which is 65 hours into this charge cycle. I swapped over to my Charge 2 overnight to ensure my sleep stages were recorded.  I am back on my Ionic this morning currently at 20 % with 66 hours now  elapsed.

Yesterday I used no GPS at all, just one spin bike track for 25 minuites and standard activity tracking and hrm only.

My partner has just recharged her Ionic and we have also done the 3 reboots on that to see how the battery goes on hers too.

She has experenced a different issue since updating the firmware where she is being asked to recalibrate her Ionic on a daily basis. I have discussed this in a different thread on this forum which is currently being looked into.

I have not experienced any issues with my GPS since updating.it all appears to be functioning as it should. Hope your GPS tests go to plan keep us updated.

[sk8erchic925]

Wednesday night at 8pm I took my Ionic off the charger at 100% and by
yesterday night around 11:30pm it was 34%. So it used over half of my
battery life in 27 hours!! The past month it was lasting 4-5 days! Now that
I think of it I think my issues started after that firmware update.... 😠

[tytyler]

So the battery solution was get another ionic from Fitbit. That is not a solution. Just get another one? My battery does not last 24 hours without a charge, How do i get a new one, (hope this is not a problem every so many months). I don't see anywhere how to talk to or email to Fitbit directly. Not happy. 

[Thewahlrus]

Thers a phone number or you can open a chat window. I tried the chat yesterday, waited 45 minutes to connect with soesomethen gave up.

[tytyler]

I am on with chat now.

[Thewahlrus]

Let me know what they say. I didn't buy it from fitbit so if it's a warranty replacement I'll have to try through where I bought it.

[tytyler]

They were willing to send me a replacement ionic. That is the solution...good luck

[Tony.r]

@Colinm39 battery finally died after 81 hours. This is the 1st time I have ever totally drained it to 0%. What I did not mention in my earlier post was when i was stating 4 days battery life before the firmware update, that was to get down to 25% low battery warning so the battery would have lasted longer than a total of 96 hours.

Just done the 3 reboots now to see what happens this cycle. My partners Ionic is now down to 90% after 24 hours no GPS usage just basic activity tracking, hrm monitoring and sleep tracking.

[Colinm39]

@Tony.rIn some of the other battery posts there are some users charging every night because they have been advised it shouldn't be a problem.. I still feel the 30% rule is much safer.. This link has some interesting reading.

Last night in 10 hours I dropped 11% from a 71% base.. A Workout (I use that when I supermarket shop) 35 minutes 2% used.

But the sad thing is yesterday I have lost 29% in 11 hours  and the main loss was the Ionic trying to connect to the GPS.. The Surge and Android connected immediately.. That is in the hands of Support now.

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@Tony.rwrote:

@Colinm39 battery finally died after 81 hours. This is the 1st time I have ever totally drained it to 0%. What I did not mention in my earlier post was when i was stating 4 days battery life before the firmware update, that was to get down to 25% low battery warning so the battery would have lasted longer than a total of 96 hours.

Just done the 3 reboots now to see what happens this cycle. My partners Ionic is now down to 90% after 24 hours no GPS usage just basic activity tracking, hrm monitoring and sleep tracking.

---

[tytyler]

Thanks,  my ionic is out of warranty.  But issue replacement is the solution.  I  saw a post here first about the replacement solution.  I did some research about how long the ionic should be good for. Before it needs to be replaced.  It was from 3 and as much as 5. Anyway I did the survey and gave them a great review. They stand behind their Fitbits. Ty

[tytyler]

If you have to charge your fit bit before 24 hours is up I think You should contact fit bit support. Ty

[Colinm39]

In the last 24 hours I have dropped 12%... This included 2% loss when syncing this morning after sleep.. So I'm still on track for 4 days. Again, using the Ionic as a watch, pedometer and HR recorder.

Still the only thing not working for me is the GPS and that has been escalated to the next level of Support.

[Tony.r]

@Colinm39 Most definatley intresting reading. I would certainly hope my battery would show no major signs of deteriation after just 5 months usage. I am still puzzled as to the fact that I noticed this drop immediately after the firmware update which indicates that consumption for me under the current firmware is greater than the previous.

My firmware upgrade worked 1st time and completed with no reported glitches.

@N8teGee made a feasible suggestion that perhaps the firmware update had corrupted during install even though it reported completing with no issues and mentioned he would be inclined to do a full factory reset which I am apprehensive to do in case it makes things worse or causes other issues.

Current battery level after 26 hours 77% standard activity tracking hrm and sleep tracking. Interesingly my partners is reporting 79% after 51 hours just the same standard activity tracking, hrm sleep tracking and no GPS tracks.

[Colinm39]

@Tony.rI'm going reasonably well now.. Only 3% drop in 7 hours.. I'm with you, I don't want to do another factory reset.. Had too many issues a few months ago.  This OS2/firmware upgrade was seamless and no issues..

[N8teGee]

@Tony.r Just checking back in, mine is still working perfectly, not seeing any noticeable difference since the latest firmware.

Just to add software corruption definitely can happen after an update. Back when the Blaze was my main device I received a firmware update, the update went well without any errors or indications of errors, but I soon learned that the stop watch function had stopped working. It was just stuck on 00:00:00 and any button press would only make the watch vibrate but the stopwatch remained on 00:00:00. Obviously with the Blaze there was no way to perform a factory reset, but I was certain it was a currpted install. Anyway I waited for the next FW update and the stopwatch function started working perfectly after installation. If I had have been able to perform a factory reset on the Blaze I'm certain that would have fixed it straight away.

I know you're not in favour of doing a factory reset, but like you said, the problem only started after the update. This definitely says to me that it's software related as opposed to a hardware issue.

[SunsetRunner]

Just thought I would reply to the "out of warranty" statement posted above.  Perhaps you're from elsewhere, but in the US, the Ionic has a 12-month warranty.  It really wasn't available much before October 1, 2017, so it's just about impossible for anyone to have owned one for even six months at this point.  So, you might check into that.  Also, there has been a question about "where you bought" the Ionic in regards to the warranty, but, again, "at least in the US," it just doesn't matter -- you certainly didn't need to buy it directly from Fitbit in order to get Fitbit's warranty on an Ionic.  So, if your Ionic isn't working properly, contact Fitbit support and get them working to help you.

[SunsetRunner]

The "Battery University" article that was linked to showed that (as far as I could tell from the technical discussion) that charging a lithium-ion battery more often, after smaller "depth of discharges," allowed for literally thousands of more charges than charging such a battery after larger depth of discharges, like 70% or more.  i.e., a 70% depth of discharge would be from the display of an Ionic's battery life at around 30% remaining.  I have always heard that it's perfectly fine to "top off" lithium ion batteries, and I have been doing that successfully with all of my devices that have used such batteries.  Especially including smartphones, and previous Fitbit devices I have owned.

So, the Ionic has been the first and only device I have ever owned that had something resembling a "battery failure."  And indeed, I have been "charging often" -- I mentioned to begin with that I would take it off and charge it when I would "hit the shower" in the morning and in the evening, each day.

My usual battery life was that the Ionic would be down to around 90% after a full day (charging it while taking my evening shower), and down to around 95% after an overnight of tracking mostly sleeping (charging it while taking my morning shower).  Then, "all of a sudden one day," my remaining numbers started going down to the low 80's, then the low 70's, then down to the low 50's -- that was one day after another day.  In the end, the "battery test" I did for Fitbit support showed that my available battery life was only around 10.5 hours.

So, I think that might resemble a "worst case scenario."  But I can offer a few other thoughts about the matter:

1.  My original Ionic "went bad" prior to the recent firmware update.  It never got upgraded -- given the length of time it took to re-charge it, I switched to my old Charge 2 for the last few days before my replacement Ionic arrived, and I allowed the original Ionic to just run its battery down and it died.

2.  My replacement Ionic arrived after the new firmware update came out, and the initial setup routine brought it up to date with the new update.  And the battery life has been exactly like the original Ionic, before it's battery started going bad.  So, I'm not seeing any difference between battery life with the new update and the previous firmware version, given the two different devices.

3.  I have wondered about "charging hardware" -- there are aftermarket charging cradles and such, but I can't see how the device actually fitting to the Ionic would make a difference, compared to the original charger included with the Ionic.  Rather, what I'm REALLY wondering about is Fitbit's decision not to include an actual charging block that you would plug whatever charger you've got into -- which means that people are plugging their Ionics into a vast array of charging blocks that might produce a vast difference in power to the devices.  I'm thinking in terms of the "fast chargers" you can get for your smartphones, versus normal ones.  Personally, my Ionic has always just been plugged into the back of my computer, as opposed to some kind of block that plugs directly into a wall outlet.  If it were the other way around -- if I had been plugging it into one of the "fast charging" blocks like the ones provided with my last couple of smartphones -- I could point to that as being a problem that might have caused my battery situation, but I sure don't expect that my computer's USB output provided anywhere near that kind of power.  But, again, this sure seems to be the biggest difference that could exist between different users, aside from the charging routine that I discussed above.

At any rate, these are the thoughts I've got, after my experience, and after reading through other folks' experiences in this thread -- for whatever they may be worth.

[tytyler]

I stand corrected.

[SantiR]

Hello everyone! Thanks for your continuous participation on this thread regarding Ionic's battery.

The battery life depends a lot on the usage of the device itself. I'd recommend checking these tips to maximize the battery on Ionic. This has helped other users in the past.

If you keep experiencing the same the best thing to do will be to get in touch with customer support for them to check the battery functionality and get further assistance on this. If you need help contacting customer support let me know as I can create a case for you.

Keep me posted! 

[driver111]

An 8hr sleep with DND mode on shouldn't use 28% battery.