Not Able to Sync Ionic

[tppt]

I have had my ionic for a week tomorrow. Still have not been able to sync it properly and use it. I have talked  to the customer service team multiple times and spent hours trying to trouble shoot with them.

It takes about 2 hours to get it set up. It syncs for about 5 minutes and then disconnects. It then goes back and forth from looking and syncing but never connects.

How long do we need to wait before this gets fixed or they can give some update. I have tried all the trouble shooting including factory reset, etc. Very frustraing.

Moderator Edit: Updated Subject for Clarity

[Lopemon]

have the same inconsistent sync issues as all the others out here! since a month now. (exactly after the os 2.0 and app update. (iPhone 11.3) was assisted by an email support case. nothing helped. lost a lot of time. it's a shame... I’m going to believe the Ionic is only syncing if someone at fitbit pushes their sync-button on their end. 

[Joes1962]

In the 6 weeks I had it I never could get the Ionic to Sync consistently. Fitbit finally just refunded my money. 

Ive been using the new Versa for a couple of weeks now and I haven’t had any issues with it at all, working flawlessly so far and I like it even better than the Ionic. 

[Lopemon]

cool, hope the versa stays well for you. for myself I want the gps feature and love the „retroish“ look of the ionic. if the ionic would work as advertised it would be a perfect tracker for me.

[Marauder2]

Since the last update I can't get my Ionic to sync with my Galaxy S8 on Oreo. 

I know it is communicating with the device because as soon as I restart the fitbit, the sync status stops spinning and goes to the pink exclamation point. This leads me to believe it's not a connection issue but rather what communication is being done from the phone to the fitbit isn't working.

I've tried restarting my phone and fitbit, both twice. Tried on wifi and network.

[PeteG-1]

Yeah, everything about the Ionic was cool, design-wise, but the sync (both daily data and music) seems to be its downfall, IME.

I got it to sync with one particular Bluetooth dongle/chipset (I have a few, from some device testing over the years), very consistently (Win10 PC), I had maybe 5% failure rate.

This was the only chipset I could really get working this well however, my other two dongles (and the motherboard built-in chipset) were very hit-miss, but really mostly miss.

I wasn't able to do the same with the chipset in my phone or tablet (5.0 and 4.1, versions), it was consistently-inconsistent (basically unreliable, to any real degree).

I'm sort of disappointed in the new Versa, for me anyway, I want to have the built-in GPS for "occasional" use.

[Hulu888]

Like everybody said here, I like Ionic, everything else is cool except syncing which is killing me to make it sync to my iPhone 6 or iPhone 7 Plus. I have to do one of the two things to make it sync: to restart the watch itself, or to remove the ionic from the Fitbit app and add it back on, meaning to register it again. I keep thinking how hard to make Fitbit to commit for this seemingly small but crucial problem? Or is it time for me to switch to some other brand who can commit to make customers happy?

[Lrlatino]

I was having the same issue syncing with my new phone. ( Samsung s9+)
The only way i can get the iconic to sync without restarting iconic is to
make sure the fitbit is syncing to just one device.. it syncs for me every
time i open the dashboard. Good luck

[Prestonw1]

Hello I have exactly the same problem I am waiting to see what the new Apple Watch will offer
Rey disappointed with Fitbit and their response




Sent from my iPad

[bfel71]

I feel the same way about the sync being lamely controlled by someone out
there not paying attention.
Also wish I had waited and saved my money for the new one. Ionic was for
people who couldn't wait for the new one.
Wish fitbit would fix the issue.

[Lopemon]

I had to bring back my Ionic to the shop as it was not syncing anymore at all. Lost all my exercise date from my 3 days stay in London. Very sad not being able to see my running route at the Hyde Park... The watch even did not update to the local time! Luckily I have a 2 years warranty. Now it's time for waiting on a repaired or new device. Fingers crossed it will be better with that. I’ll report here. Btw. wearing my old Pebble 2 now and it works and syncs like a charm.

[ScottKilbo]

The Ionic was for people who wanted GPS built in to the watch.  That's why I bought it.  The Versa doesn't have GPS and I need it for running/walking/hiking.  Otherwise, I would have just gotten the Blaze.

It'll be interesting to see the results of a repaired watch.  I believe that this is an issue that Fitbit cannot fix.  I'd love to be proven wrong.

[Lopemon]

Exactly, I bought it because of the GPS and its battery lifetime. Versa is nothing for me. I'm also very curious about the repaired watch. Probably they won't repair and just send a new one. I was an early adopter and bought a very early version of the Ionic. My hope is to get one from a later batch that hopefully has not this bug. I'll report here.

[catherinekirby]

Summary: My new replaced Ionic works flawlessly.

After going back to my Blaze, then buying an Apple Watch, then hated Applewatch and returned, Fitbit finally accepted my Macy’s purchased Ionic and replaced it with a brand new in box watch. I have not had to do anything, it just works. The ol syncing only when it’s an odd day of an even month IF the wind is NE etc... anyway, LOVE the replaced Ionic. HATE HATE HATE how Fitbit has handled this whole debacle. Major blow to reputation

I finally gave in and

Sent from Catherine's iPhone

[PeteG-1]

---

@Lopemon wrote:

I had to bring back my Ionic to the shop as it was not syncing anymore at all. Lost all my exercise date from my 3 days stay in London. Very sad not being able to see my running route at the Hyde Park... The watch even did not update to the local time! Luckily I have a 2 years warranty. Now it's time for waiting on a repaired or new device. Fingers crossed it will be better with that. I’ll report here. Btw. wearing my old Pebble 2 now and it works and syncs like a charm.

---

@LopemonIf you still have access to the watch, you can probably get it to sync.  

You have to get a couple of USB dongles with 4.1-4.2 chipsets, I had the best luck with a Broadcomm one, myself, or the most "consistency" if you want to call it that.

I'm pretty sure there's something not great with the chipset that they chose for this model, you can see where I had my woes in previous posts, but ultimately I could get it to sync, it was just a giant pain, and not really "sustainable".

Even trying an old tablet, another phone, a laptop, these will all probably have a different BT chipset, and the PC/laptop will accept a BT dongle, which run about $8-12, for a good Broadcomm one.

I'm almost positive you can get it to pair, without a reset, if you have enough devices/chipsets/dongles to test, really most people have enough "random" devices sitting around to get at least one "recovery sync" done.

I HATE losing data, being a long time s/w engineering person, so I will usually go the extreme to recover it, it's either a fault or helpful, depending ;-]

[PeteG-1]

---

@ScottKilbo wrote:

The Ionic was for people who wanted GPS built in to the watch.  That's why I bought it.  The Versa doesn't have GPS and I need it for running/walking/hiking.  Otherwise, I would have just gotten the Blaze.

It'll be interesting to see the results of a repaired watch.  I believe that this is an issue that Fitbit cannot fix.  I'd love to be proven wrong.

---

Yeah, I sort of think this too, or did, when I returned mine a couple of months ago.

I bet their BT chipset has an issue, and either they can't get a firmware fix from the chipset manufacturer, or there's another weird issue with the chipset, a weird antenna orientation that wasn't optimal, but I really think it's a h/w handshake issue myself.

I probably could've hooked up a Bluetooth stack debugger, and traced the messages, but this would've been a big project (long time since I directly debugged a stack driver), and to what end, really, was my thinking, since it didn't seem like FB was going to "own" this, in any way that I was seeing...

I was able to get mine to work, sort of, on a good day, with a Broadcomm 4.2 dongle on my PC, but even that, the "best" chipset I found, was hit-miss.  My newish phone (OP 5T) with a great Qualcomm 5.0 chipset was almost hopeless, as was my tablet, also running a new 4.2 chipset (Qualcomm again), they would sync maybe 1 of 10 times, if that.

BLE (Bluetooth Low Energy) has been slow to "mature" in general, IMO, but there are TONS of devices that worked around the various chipset issues, before the Ionic.  In 5.0 LE, things are going to get better, but that will only really be evident once there are mostly "client devices" with the new chipsets, which could take a long time, depending.

My old Charge2, which I reverted to, has maybe 1 failure out of every 50-100 syncs, or one "non recoverable" failure that requires me to re-sync manually anyway, some minor failures users never really see anyway, the h/w handles it with a new handshake and things go on about their way.

I'm not in a big hurry to get the Versa either, I want the optional GPS in whatever I settle on, as an upgrade to my Charge2, even if I only use it a couple of times a week, those times are incredibly handy, at times. GPS has become commonplace, in today's day of fitness watches, so I'm waiting for whatever comes next, hopefully an improved Ionic (i.e. better chipset or whichever).

[bfel71]

The new fitbit is based off pebble. Never heard of it before until I
started researching why mine was working and found fitbit was releasing a
new one that's also a phone! It's a combo of fitbit iPhone. It's cheaper
too. I Feel suckered to buy the ionic. If my friends would use another
brand I'm at a point to switch 🙂
Good luck! Keep me posted 🙂

[Lopemon]

@catherinekirby I‘m glad to read that your replaced ionic works like it should. gives me hope that mine will work when arrived.

[Lopemon]

@PeteG-1 I don‘t have access to it anymore and I won‘t play around with other dongles/chipsets and other devices than those I really use on a daily basis. the pricy product ionic should just work as advertised. now hoping on a working replacement. I‘ll report when arrived (in about 2-3 weeks).

[Lopemon]

@ScottKilbo I got my Ionic replacement (brand new) yesterday and since then it syncs flawlessly like it should. setup was also easy with no errors. fingers crossed it stays like this. I'll report if that should change.

[bfel71]

Great to hear the new 1 works.