What do you Think of your Ionic so Far?

[gibbyhome]

So I just ordered the new Ionic and it should arrive on Friday and was wondering about the ones that have received their Ionic so far what do you think?

• is it very heavy or light ?
• is it to big ? 
• what to you think about transferring music?
• how is the battery life? 
• is the screen bright enough?
• do it stay on long enough to read your text messages and can you respond to texts from the watch.
• how is the accuracy 
• I'm sure I will have a lot to say once I get mine in, i'm going from my Microsoft Band 2 that I loved and will miss dearly

[Sadpaul]

Sounds strange but I don’t have a phone

Regards Paul Mcinerney

[esarhaddon]

I figure fitbit would want to know why someone would return their device so here are my thoughts about owning an Ionic for a few weeks.

I purchased an Ionic on the new year because of the sale and a bit of a holiday windfall, and used the Ionic for a few weeks. I really wanted a single device that would do HR, Music and GPS while running + 24/7 HR monitoring, and do the other fitness related things my Motoactv or Fenix 2/Scosche Rhythm+ combo could do.

1) The 24/7 HR monitoring worked great. 2) The onboard gps was rather accurate for distance of runs and rides. 3) Fitbit pay worked great whenever I tried it. 4) I would get roughly 2 days of battery life with two workouts and generous bluetooth music usage which is pretty good compared to any other device I have used. 5) Also, I liked the form factor, and 6) the heart rate monitor worked well for steady state running.

For minor annoyances, 1) syncing worked most of the time (I had some problems if both my computer's and phone's bluetooth was on, but turning one of them off normally solved the problems). 2) Putting on music worked with almost no sync issues, but it took 10 min to load just a single 1 hr podcast and this was frustratingly long since I would put on new podcasts every day. 3) For some reason I could never divine, I would receive duplicate notifications in the morning (this probably had to do with me setting the ionic to turn off notifications when asleep and then not moving much after waking up, but I did not have the device long enough to troubleshoot this).  4) Also, the instantaneous pace reading when running was not very stable, so it was hard to determine exactly how fast I was running with the watch. 5) Plus, the ionic should output more data ... cadence, indoor running pace, and maybe motion during weightlifting ... these numbers would be useful to know.

In the end, I returned the device for two major reasons. 1) The heart rate monitor was total garbage for me in non-steady state applications like weightlifting, track workouts and playing ultimate. 2) The Fitbit website does not allow you to export the heart rate data for non-gps workouts. I run on the treadmill in the gym quite a bit in the winter, and I use a third-party application (Sporttracks) to analyze my workouts so this was really annoying, even though I could do a 5 step process to get the data to where I needed it. This should be such an easy fix for Fitbit, I am flabbergasted they have not addressed this.

Since the Ionic does not connect to other heart rate monitors, I could not fix major issue 1, and it has been 3 years since the first person brought up issue 2 on the website forum, so I doubt that will be fixed anytime soon. These were the dealbreakers for me.

So the Ionic went back. Good device ... a few minor annoyances, and two major problems for me. Back to the Motoactv/Rhythm+ combo for me.

[LakeGeorgeGirl]

I do not like it.  It won't charge.

[swduncan]

Well I've had mine since 10/1/17, and it's my favorite Fitbit so far. I've had a few minor issues, but nothing chronic - didn't sync time zone automatically on a recent trip, but did on the way home. Once it didn't register my sleep. I'm not convinced either of these are specific to the Ionic. 

Like the battery life, love the timer, like having the alarms adjustable on the device, hate not being able to set them on the phone. 

Overall I'm pleased. 

[Rhonda64]

I really like my Ionic.  There are walk and hike options in the exercise section. You might need to go into the app to select them, but they show on the ionic and work well.

[Rhonda64]

Not sure why your HR and GPS are so off. I've compared both features with other apps and a polar HR strap.  The accuracy is really amazing. On occasion, the HR might be off by a couple of beats for a few seconds during vigorous exercise, but seems to do well overall.  I run both on a treadmill and outside and the HR and GPS work. I hope you can get yours straightened out.

[Rhonda64]

If you have no phone, it should sync with your fitbit account online. Mine works very well. No syncing issues with the app or strava, which I love. 

[Martinefski]

A few beats???

There are times my ionic is off by 90 beats and this was true with the 3 charges I owned as well so it is not a particular defective unit. It’s a defective product.

i just came to the conclusion don’t bother caring what the heart rate says during exercise. It works ok during light activity and rest times.

Overall just don’t count on your fitbit to work, because it will let you down when you most think you need it. Everything about all Fitbit’s they are at times flakey, connectivity issues, hr monitoring issues. 

Use it it as a basic tracker, tracking a few thousand steps a day and you will think it’s fine. Try actually using it to it fullest and you will see it fails and fails often.

[geepondy]

Both the Fitbit Ionic and Apple Series 3 have been out for several months.  There are many reviews comparing the two but not much info on user thoughts from people who have tried both for a period of time.  Anybody here try both for any length of time and ultimately settled on one or the other?  My thoughts:

Fitbit Ionic Advantages:

- Longer battery life (a biggie for sure)

- A slicker fitness app (though Apple isn't bad)

- From what I read a slightly better/more accurate heart rate sensor.

 Apple Series 3 advantages:

-Everything else.  It's faster in operation, a more polished user experience, many more other apps, etc.

I have a $100 Kohls gift card which I am considering putting towards one of these devices.  I know the charge was very erratic up turning the wrist to wake up and I read the Ionic is not much better so this is a disappointment.  The Apple watch is very sensitive.  Right now I have a Fitbit One which is still working fine (well it's my fourth one) but I like the idea of heart rate, sleep and other available Fitness data.

[ConnieL429]

• Apples and oranges in my opinion. Apple watch is only an option if you have an iPhone. It's a smart watch that can do some fitness tracking whereas the Ionic is a fitness tracker that does some smart watch stuff.  You need to decide which is more important. Also, if you get an Apple watch, you're pretty much locked into iPhone. With Ionic, you will have more options as far as the phone you use. I've used both and I like them both so it just comes down to those questions. Do you want your watch to do a lot more than fitness? Choose Apple but if you only care about Fitness tracking, then Ionic is your choice. They are both comfortable to wear.

[Martinefski]

I would not buy an Ionic thinking you are going to be getting any sort of great battery life if you actually intend to use the Ionic for anything more than a basic pedometer.

The only reason the Ionic can claim it has decent battery life is, it does not do anything if you are not using any of its more advanced features. 

Try using the Ionic to stream some music and use the GPS and you will find it can get easily  less than 10 hours of battery life. 

Honestly if you have an apple watch I would go that way. Unless you really don't care about the smart features, but if that's the case pick up the Blaze or Charge 2. Now if you only intend to use the Ionic like a Fitbit Flex with a pretty screen you will probably love it and think it's amazing.

The Ionic is really too under powered to do anything that is not the usual basic activity tracker kind of thing. 

As it is the Ionic is worth about 100 dollars, Fitbit really needs to step it up or get out of the game as far as the Smart watch business goes. 

[Tim31415]

I have posted my not-too-positive attitude with regard to the Ionic before (in a different thread).

I have always read on the inaccuracies of the HR-monitor and taken it with a grain of salt: you cannot expect optical HR technology to be perfect, especially around times when things changes quickly.

However, yesterday I was, according to my Ionic, running at faster than a 5 min/km pace with a HR as low as 80 bpm for almost a kilometer. I wish this was true of course, but it simply cannot be. So this was the first time I was affected by (non-transient) inaccuracies of the Ionic HR monitor.

So I am even less positive than I used to be

[Fids]

I've had mine since Christmas and so far I'm about 50/50 on it. I like the fit and size and it is easy to use. However, I do regularly have syncing problems with it, I've connected it to my iphone and my ipad and the bluetooth just seems very intermittent on both (I do only have one working at a time just so it doesn't get confused), it does seem to have more difficulty connecting in the mornings and evenings though.

I use mine mainly for walking, swimming and the gym.  Now the auto recognise function works fine with the walking and recognised the elliptical trainer, but I can't get it to work with swimming which is my main bug bear at the moment as that was one of the main reasons I got the ionic.  I also insert manually the other equipment I use in the gym after my workout, so I kind of have to keep track of the time, so I can be as accurate as possible.  I haven't tried using it with music yet so I can't comment on that.

On a positive note, I like the step tracking and that it reminds you if you haven't moved, I've also been aiming to achieve all the targets so that has definitely increased my activity rate.

[pandabird]

I was absolutely smitten with my Ionic from the moment I brought it. I would have rated it a generous 9/10 (1 missing point for the lack of apps which is inevitable considering its new) but a week ago it started to stop syncing and eventually stopped working completely yesterday. I returned it today and reluctantly decided to exchange it back for a good old Charge 2. The retail attendent today was unually honest and said that there had been 6 Ionic returned to the store this week. Ended up being able to get two Charge 2 for the Ionic. Gave one to a friend. 

I would like like to go back to the Ionic some day but I think it’s best to wait for a year or two for them to work out any hardware and software issues. 

[Binky1]

I am not tech savvy at all.  That said  I LOVE MY IONIC.  It was easy to set up and the tutorials are great.  I also contacted a fitbit staff person and they were FANTASTIC.  I previously had a Flex 2 which I still like but wanted to have a few more features that I could use when swimming.  I have friends with apple watches and they now wish they'd gotten the IONIC.

[Harboe]

I like mine, but I wouldn't call it a smartwatch. It's a fitness tracker, and a great one at that, with a few apps and some clock faces. But that doesn't make it a smartwatch in my eyes. I'm still hopeful that it will become one, but whenever I try and ask Fitbit about a roadmap and their plans, they are silent or, as always, refer to the suggestion forum. That does unfortunately leave me skeptical about their commitment.

[FitEmYao]

I really love my Ionic! The size is perfect, fit comfortably on my wrist too. The heart rate monitor is accurate, and the watch functioned well as promised. Music would sometimes pause while running and might be due to signal interference. Otherwise playback streaming is seamless. I would recommend this to anyone looking for a running watch.

[Hendos]

I'm fairly happy with mine, I have had it since Boxing day, and managed to update the firmware on the same day, it did take almost 6 hrs though. I have had a couple of issues with random re-booting / freezing a couple of times, so I now manually re-boot weekly which seems to help. I find the GPS is mostly accurate, however last Friday it was out by almost 1 km distance wise, I did pause the run that day for a few minutes so don't know if that effected it somehow. I managed to add over 200 Mp3's after a couple of attempts, but it was a long drawn out process, roughly 1 minute per song transfer, I also decided to delete a few songs from my playlist using Windows media player, thinking this would be mirrored on the Ionic when I connected it to my PC, no chance, the Fitbit PC app decided to delete all songs from my Ionic, so I had to start the music transfer from scratch. I'm hoping another firmware update and a app update will iron out these niggles, fingers crossed.

[Uruzu5]

I'm very disappointed.

Ionic is ok. I can accept Ionic not much apps. 

However, Ionic is not a standalone product. When you talk about the sync, notification between your pc or phone. It is totally a rubbish.

I don't know why we always have this issue. This is a basic features and it is not working all the time.

Nightmare...

[geepondy]

From reading thru this thread and all the different thoughts on the Ionic, it seems a few conclusions can be garnered.

-The Ionic can be buggy at times, requiring reboots, etc.

- The ionic has reliability issues for many

- Many who have managed to have a relatively trouble free experience really like their Ionic.

It seems to be to be typical of a first generation device (I don't consider the Blaze to be in the same category), in that users are paying to be beta testers and most likely the Ionic 3 or so will be a more polished and hopefully more reliable product.  To me, the Ionic would be more enticing if at a lower price point say maybe $230 instead of $300.  And / or Fitbit would offer a free extended warranty that would demonstrate faith and commitment.