Ionic sync issues

[Propagandian]

At this stage getting the device to sync requires more effort than actual exercise. You have to keep restarting bluetooth and pressing the sync button to hope against all odds that a connection can be made for just a few seconds. This is a problem that seems to have gotten worse over time instead of better.

Now, I'm not going to ask if there is a fix, because many have the same problem, and having me follow the troubleshooting list, or having me forcibly restart the device, or having its battery run out is simply not the answer. After over a year of this being an issue it's obvious that this is a flaw on Fitbit's side and not the user's. It's clear the Ionic doesn't function as required.

Instead, I want to ask if this is a general problem across newer Fitbit devices? I own a Flex 2 and it doesn't have this issue, but does something like the Charge 3 have better performance, or should I just cut my losses and move to another platform?

Moderator edit: edited title for clarity

[clly]

everything was removed and unloaded. reconnected to bluetooth and reloaded app. The fitbit itself after failing halfway through the update mentioned in the previous post seems to be completely dead. no display, no green light on the back, and reset buttons doesn't display the fitbit icon on screen. 

I noticed a long time ago when it says "synchronizing" that doesn't actually mean it's syncing anything.  And even clearing out the cache for the app didn't help. 

The Ionic seems to now be dead. It was fully charged this morning before attempting to factory rest and reload it and the app.  when it was working the upload failed to connect initially switch wifi and bluetooth. 

It does seem like this is a very common problem. I'm wonder what they actually test it on and if they test it on a phone that has reasonable protection and AV such as Micfee or AVG, etc... I'm assuming there's a hidden permission that is off kind of how google wants access to your contacts or something like that and pings your phone every minute while trying to navigate.  In this case it wants access to something that's on and still has an issue. right now fitbit costs about $10/mo to use...third watch in 5 years.  The weight scale seems to have no problem syncing to the internet. Not sure why they can't do the same with the watch. ...although I'm assuming the new one probably need to sync through the phone.

Can't seem to find a way to connect to a computer to hard reset the watch. What do you do when it fails halfway through a software upload and becomes completely unresponsive...can't pushbutton reset and phone app doesn't see it

[Rich_Laue]

Could we maybe condense the novel to include only the issue at hand?

It is not a very common problem, we do know that the many without issues member post I'm this forum, and the few that have issues so post.

I'll bet that after watching an hour or two of accidents on YouTube, you will be thinking that everybody gets into accidents

[Propagandian]

That seems like a rather careless response to address a known and frustrating problem. And how would this comparison even work? We're already in the accident, we have the problems right in front of us. This is similar to you saying to a person who just had an accident that there's 'plenty of others that don't have accidents and I'm sure you're just biased'. And it is a problem; there are threads littered throughout this forum regarding sync issues and I'm willing to wager that there's a significant population of Ionic owners affected by this. Perhaps enough to classify it as a common occurrence.

This thread is different as my question isn't 'how do I fix it?', but rather 'do newer fitbit devices share this fault?'. After over a year of struggling and it worsening I no longer care much for jumping through hoops, I'm past that, and I'm past being patient. I'm at the point of looking for a new device, and from what I can see on the Charge 3 forums (not good) and the general response here that jumping through the hoops is the accepted method, my path forward is crystal clear; read into that what you will.

But, sure, let's condense the issue and debunk some accepted explanations and solutions:

The device doesn't reliably sync data, or hold a connection in order for notifications to work. As such a reasonable expectation as to what the device is capable of isn't met.

• Restarting anything for this process to complete isn't an acceptable solution
• Wiping any cache or memory for this process to complete isn't an acceptable solution
• Having to wait for more than ~10 seconds for this process to complete isn't acceptable
• Having to sit with this problem for over a year and after several firmware updates isn't acceptable
• The problem propagates throughout different devices (phones, tablets, PC, I tried them all)
• The problem propagates through different app versions (it's been a problem for over year, this should go without saying)
• The problem does not occur with devices like the Flex 2. This means:
  • It is unlikely that the phone/app combo is the problem
  • It is likely a fault on the Ionic itself
• Most importantly: It is unlikely that this is a user error, but rather an error on Fitbit's side. As such we do not hold the capability of fixing this issue unless it is recognised and directly addressed by Fitbit.

Moderator edit: format

[clly]

I'm curious how many issues aren't reported because I hear about sync issue too often at the gym or work. They need to go through ALL the required settings to get these working and why so we can figure out what is going wrong rather than having to guess & reset each time.  I'm still wondering why it would only sync once a week (well it would only show that it uploaded each Friday just before midnight, not sure why it aleays showed this but until yesterday night I knew it would upload but last night it didn't)

But there is an accident in the USA on average every 5-6 seconds (5-6 million per year)  So on average 12.5 per state per hour...and those are the repored accidents.  

[Rich_Laue]

A quick search will show that the issue does not seem to be the cause of any Fitbit hardware, but with the Fitbit app    

[SunsetRunner]

@Rich_Laue that doesn't really change anything for the user. I have the latest app and this morning no matter what I did - no sync. The app shows 19142 steps ( this is happening every morning, a huge amount of steps until first successful sync ) and nothing's going on. It may be the app problem or the firmware ( which isn't hardware, it's also the software ). Still, it doesn't change the fact that the functionality doesn't work. Yes, I know that it may be working for everyone else but you know what? I just don't care about that 🙂 Because simply speaking - it doesn't solve my problem with my watch for which I paid with my own money 🙂 That's why the fact that I may be in a less significant group of users is irrelevant. If you say that it works for you, that's great but it doesn't solve anything for me 😞 I know that you trying to defend Fitbit at all cost, I can see it but that is not a solution to the problem. People are not imagining this issue. Here, there's a state of the sync as of now:

My last successful sync was yesterday at 18:30. I couldn't sync it again. I left it like that till the morning, still no go despite performing usual actions. Maybe it's the latest version of the app, maybe something else - why should I care? I don't work for Fitbit. I bought their product which should work at its core functionality.

As a side note, I know only one person who owned Ionic and in the beginning, he was quite happy. Two weeks later he started experiencing issues with syncing, then he removed Ionic from the account and couldn't add it again. That part was funny, as I found out you won't be able to add your watch if somebody else wearing another device nearby. Since it was me wearing the other device, I had to leave the floor so my Ionic was not detected and the poor guy could try to add the device to the account, however, still no success. I told him to contact customer support. I know he never went to the forum and unfortunately never bothered to contact CS. He just stopped wearing Ionic. Not everyone really bothers to go through all the trouble and not everyone comes here. Same as we don't know about the number of people who don't have any issues and are happy users, we also don't know about users who gave up right away.

Bottom line, for me, syncing still doesn't work as it should.

[Rich_Laue]

As I have mentioned many times, my App has not been happily syncing since January 1st.

With the latest v2.88 it has been syncing a lot better, with only having to clear the app cache and once I killed the app.

My last post was answering @clly 's question about, if the newer trackers where syncing better. I was not trying to answer your underwear asked question.

[EdsonFitbit · Accepted solution]

Thank you for visiting the Fitbit Community and sorry for the delayed response. I regret to hear that you experienced difficulties to sync your Fitbit Ionic. Thank you for the time you spent trying to get the issue resolved.

@Propagandian @SunsetRunner @warren52nz @Jeff.B @07vstrom Thank you for your feedback about Fitbit products. If your mobile device is not part of the list of compatibles devices, we won't be able to guarantee a good synchronization of your data. The devices on the list have been confirmed as fully compatible with the features of Fitbit devices and the Fitbit app.

While a phone or tablet may not be verified as fully compatible, the Fitbit app may still work with the device, but keep in mind that we can't guarantee syncing or other Fitbit features. There is some factors that can affect the synchronization of Fitbit products. We recommend you performing some troubleshooting steps to make sure the information has been set correctly, to resolve any problem that might be originated during the set up process and fix any other situation that might occur. For more information about this topic you can visit this article.

If after following our recommendations you still can't sync your Fitbit Ionic to a supported mobile device, please let me know in order to send your information to Customer Support for further investigation. In addition, please let me know which phone do you use to sync your Fitbit device.

Please be aware that if your phone is managing multiple Bluetooth connections simultaneously the synchronization might get interrupted. I would recommend taking a look at this site.

Location services are required to sync due to Google requirements. For more information please visit this post.

@Longbow52 @clly I noticed that you contacted Customer Support already. I'm pretty sure they will do their best to provide assistance as soon as possible.

@Rich_Laue Thanks for your support.

If you have any question, please let me know.

[clly]

Yes, remarkably Fitbit customer service is much better than most.  Just trying to see if on here people with the same issues found what actually helped to resolve sync issues (trying to avoid the standard reset and reload each time this happens). But, ended up trying the factory reset and reload of all apps and such. The watch reconnected then failed about midway through firmware update so it lookes like it was the watch. Getting a replacement in the mail.

This is just a frustrating problem with the watches that have all the functions for what I do and it's hard to find one that matches the Surge or Ionic. Luckily it was still in warranty or I'd have to take time to look around again. Hopefully this issue will be resolved but I do believe it might be linked to the way the aapp is compiled for Android where it requires both a separate wifi connection setup (yet the fitbit doesn't seem to connect via wifi, only bluetooth) and it for some reason needs location services but chrome, google, and other apps work with it turned off.  I think it might be a programmer adding a configuration paramerter setup as required as opposed to optional. The issue might be related to not all ISPs and internet connections report the correct city so mine usually shows I'm in a town about 600miles away when on some web sites and this might conflict with the location service. So this might produce a location error. When shopping I usually have to update the zip because other sites show me as over 1,000 miles away. 

[warren52nz]

@clly  Someone should break into the BT link while it's trying to sync and find out what the code's doing.  I bet it's stuck in some sort of loop waiting for something.  My Ionic often syncs without telling me it has.  I tell it to sync and it goes into that endless waiting stage and never comes out and I give up but when I go back later it has the latest info.

[clly]

Mine would often sync on its own Friday night with location services off. But when I would attempt to tell it to sync it wouldn't even after turning location services fully on. I think it might actually be going direct wifi to the router although I can't setup wifi in the app. The wifi setup just gives the spinning circle. So it would beninteresting to find out how it's actually communicating because it only ever syncs at home where my wifi router is located. (Although I think it also synced at a couple friends' houses where I had wifi connection.)

[Curlywoo1]

Here, here. Fitbit WHAT are you going to do as this is beyond a bloody joke!! 

[Curlywoo1]

So what are FITBIT going to do about it then!! 

[Rich_Laue]

Have you called Fitbit and asked them. Your currently posting to the community of Fitbit users.

With the latest Android updates my tracker is finally syncing more a like it should.

[Curlywoo1]

Thank you, yes, I went on live chat and it got sorted then, I had to shut down my watch and reinstall device, which after only having for 2 week's is concerning me. Watch this space... 

[clly]

I was trying to figure out if others had found a workable way to make sync work well without having to do all the reseting and reloading of the watch an app.  This time it looks like it was the watch that failed and support was very helpful and is sending a replacement.  I was hoping someone had found some specific setting that was the root cause to most sync issues (some say location services but mine seemed to only sync at home when not trying to sync and the location services off, hopefully with the new watch this won't be the issue)

[Curlywoo1]

When I had got sorted, I asked what the problem was and why it happened. My question got ignored.... 

[warren52nz]

It's suddenly working.  I guess it's updated and fixed.  Hope so.

[SilviaFitbit]

Hey everyone! I appreciate the details that each one has shared, I apologize on the delay on my reply. 

@warren52nz Thanks for the details that you've mentioned. If you have all day sync on, then your
Ionic will sync automatically every time it has new information to sync. If you have Bluetooth on, it will
sync automatically as well. 

@clly I'm glad to hear that you're getting a new replacement. Hope you can continue reaching your goals and enjoying your Fitbit Ionic. 

Thank you for your advice @Rich_Laue. Hey @Curlywoo1, I'm glad to hear that you chatted with our Support team and it's working now. If there's a syncing issue, it might be due to various reasons and if it's affecting various users our team will investigate and find the root cause. That's why we're always reviewing the forums and providing procedures that can help you solve the issue that you might be experiencing. 

I'll be around if anyone needs further assistance. 

[warren52nz]

Thanks Sylvia

I know it's supposed to sync frequently when All Day Sync is on but mine doesn't.  I tried to sync manually yesterday and it failed.  It's been trying to sync just now for about 3 minutes and still hasn't.  It's last sync date is from 2 days ago.

UPDATE:  As I was typing this, it finished a sync, so about 5 minutes.  Not sure what to expect time-wise.