Does Fitbit plan to solve the battery charging problems for Fitbit Ones?

[JasonW12]

It seems like there has been an outbreak of fitbit ones that are not charging/holding a charge lately.  Does Fitbit intend to put out a fix for this?  I, like many others, have tried resetting several times and while that works for a few minutes it ultimately goes back to appearing to be fully charged and then losing power shortly thereafter.  I have noticed that this started around the time when I started using the new ios dashboard which included an auto-sync function.  I've turned that off & switched back to the old dashboard - which is more convenient & easy to use anyway, but it does not seem to be helping.  Has anyone had any luck w/customer service on this?  From what I'm seeing it's nothing but small discounts that probably wouldn't rival Amazon's normal prices.  I really love my Fitbit one because I dislike having to wear something on my wrist all day and I really want to know what has happened to it and how I can bring it back to normal.  

[PureEvil]

Hello @JasonW12,

Hmm...  I continue to get good battery life our of my One (about 7-9 days), but I'm on a Windows phone device.  That said, I know for a fact that if you leave the Fitbit App connected (I left it with the screen on when I was charging the phone) to your Fitbit, it will drain a fully charged Fitbit in less than a day.

If this is truly the cause (the new App update), I have good news and bad news:

The bad news: It won't really matter if you do happen to get a replacement Fitbit tracker, it'll likely drain it quickly as well.

The good news: If it is the iOS Fitbit App update, then it's ultimately (easily?) fixable through software.  I'm not suggesting that this is a fix, but something you may try to diagnose the problem:

• Turn off bluetooth on your phone.  If the persistent connection is draining your Fitbit's battery, then this should stop it.  You can turn it back on when you want to sync.
• Log out of the Fitbit App.  This may work as effectively as turning off bluetooth.

May we trouble you to try it and report back?  Hopefully we can start to narrow down the cause.

I hope this helps.

[JasonW12]

@PureEvil - thanks for the idea.  I left my fitbit plugged into the wall outlet all last night & today.  I have also turned off bluetooth on my phone & computer as well as removing the little fitbit dongle tracker USB thing from my computer.  I unplugged this at about 6:10PM and I will see how long this stays charged.  I've had this for over a year and until last week my normal charge would last me at least one week - the past week it's been more like a couple hours if that.  If it's not the bluetooth my thought is that something in the battery thinks it is fully charged when in actuality it has no power as whenever I plug it in it shows it is fully charged.  So, I'm wondering if there is a way to "reset" the battery to recognize what is going on.  I'll keep a running update of how long this charge lasts.  Thanks, again!

[JasonW12]

1.5 hours and still working.  Briefly plugged it in to my computer charger to check the battery level.  It showed a little less than a quarter charge even though I had left it charging for almost 18 hours today/last night.

[JasonW12]

2.5 hours - it's still working but checking the battery showed completely empty...

[brudon82]

Was reading some of the battery issues, and noticed my fitbit one battery drains in a couple of hours if I leave the app. "looking" for the fitbit, hope this helps  

[SunsetRunner]

Like JasonW12, I too am suddenly having the suddenly dying Fitbit One, but when I plug it in, the fitbit bar shows fully charged.  I leave it charge for an hour (which used to fully charge it for well over a week), but then within a couple days it is blinking the "I'm dying!" warning on it.  And this just started within the last two weeks.  I've had my fitbit for 2.5 years with zero problems previously.  What's going on??

[JasonW12]

@brudon82 I thought that might be the case but last night I turned bluetooth off on my phone (computer, etc.) and the battery still was completely drained from "full" in under 3 hours.  

[PureEvil]

@JasonW12,

Sorry, I haven't been ignoring you, but I've just been unusually busy.

I'm actually surprised.  The only other things that cross my mind are:

• Is a rogue computer using Fitbit Connect in a way that is misbehaving?  Typically, Fitbit Connect is pretty well behaved, so I doubt it.  When you turn off bluetooth on your phone (and unplug the dongle from your computer), do you see it sync at all on your dashboard
• I assume that you've done this, but it doesn't hurt too mention again (for the other folks reading the thread).  I assume that you have tried restarting your Fitbit One (make sure that you see the 'FITBIT 6.60' message, otherwise you haven't gone long enough).
• Are you running Windows 10 and have the Fitbit App installed and always running?  If you are, then that may also drain your tracker (the Windows 10 Fitbit App connects through just bluetooth like the phones), so it may keep a constant connection even if you have unplugged the dongle.  If that's the case the lower left hand portion of the app will look like this:

If you leave it in a connected state, it will drain your battery.

[JasonW12]

@PureEvil  Thanks for following up again - bluetooth was totally off on my computer & phone which are the only two possibilities in my house.  I've tried the reset multiple times as well.  I am fairly confident it's a battery calibration problem at this point but can't find anything online about if it's even possible to recalibrate fitbit one batteries.  I reached out to customer service via email on 8/3 but it's been 3 days and I haven't heard back from them.  The website said 2 days for a response so hopefully I'll hear from them soon about other potential fixes.  

[camtosh]

I too am having this problem, having used my One for 3 years. Wondering if the new app versions are screwing up the One battery. Any further news on this?

[Julison]

Ditto, same problem as others.

Shows fully charged.

Remove it from the charger and I make it less than 100 steps and the battery dies.

This is a replacement One - my first lasted 2 years and it took a car running it over to finally kill it.

Is there a moderator or someone that reads these and answers the questions?

I think the original question was:

Does Fitbit plan to solve the battery charging problems with FitBit Ones?