Fitbit One Battery Life reduced since September 2019 change?

[michae1a1ee]

Do we have any verification that something has changed this month (September 2019) that is negatively impacting the battery life of our Fitbit One trackers?  I've also been having the sync issues other people have commented on, but but have been manually restarting my One using the charging cable connected to a PC USB port and holding the button down for 10-12 seconds.  I've been able to get the syncing working again for a day or two at a time.  That's still not good, but what is perhaps more alarming is the sudden severe drop in battery life.  Are you seeing this as well?  Has Fitbit acknowledged this?  I am only syncing the One with a single Android phone with an updated Fitbit app, version 3.6.1.

[WendyB]

How old is it? As they dont last forever and could be on its last legs

Im not having any problems with battery life and mine is 3 years old. But I do except it to be going downhill soon

[michae1a1ee]

Fitbit sent me my current One (replacement) in November 2017!  That is not very old at all.

My battery life was quite reasonable (about a week or so between full charges) up until about a month ago.  The software update that took place this month seems to have affected my Fitbit One and I've seen other One users on the forum post similar comments which has led me to believe this is a software issue, not my specific hardware.

[samanthagillan]

I've been having the same issue! The battery drain and syncing issues came around the same time as the September update. I've been dealing with battery drains down to nothing within two days of use without sleep or activity tracking.

[Frodoreavis]

Just charged my One early yesterday, today it is dead.

Have had for two years and this happened all of a sudden.

On vacation and did not being charge connector, but it should not have been out of power in a day.

As they don't still make, unless there is a solution, will I have to by something else. Not enamored with having to go to a wrist band type.

Ideas?

[amakatner]

Agreed to all of the above-- just charged by One yesterday and it was dead when I plugged it in today to try to reset it to force the sync to work with my Android phone.  Pretty bummed that Fitbit is not supporting the One anymore. I don't like wearing watches, so this was perfect for me. If this continues to happen and they aren't going to make or support the One anymore, I will be looking for different options.  I've had a Fitbit One since 2015 (had to replace due to battery death, but I've worn one in some form, for the past 4 years).

[paltroon1]

The software is dog meat. My One is also showing very poor battery life-all of a sudden after the last two updates. My saved data is not accurate, also after the updates and syncing is problematic. FitBit just can't seem to get it right no matter how hard they try. The only reason I am with FitBit now is because my One is still working. When it dies I'm through with this rinky-dink bunch of **ahem**s. Personally I think they are not attending to the One issues in hopes that we'll ditch our trackers and upgrade to some other FitBit tracker that is more expensive. The desktop program also has issues. When I am able to sync my One, the synchronization is always a little off. And after syncing instead of taking me to my dashboard, it takes me to the FitBit store no matter what I do. Smarmy is the only word I can use to describe my opinion of them.

[michae1a1ee]

I appreciate everyone that has posted that have confirmed the same or similar behaviour with their Fitbit One that I've been seeing with mine.  The battery drain is the most concerning to me and Fitbit Support had been useless.  I'm finding with my phone I'm having to toggle the Bluetooth antenna off and on at least once a day to get the syncing to work.  I've also done the reset on the device itself several times when Bluetooth toggling wasn't enough.  I definitely think software is to blame here, but I don't know if it's the latest Fitbit Android app, or Android 9 (Pie) that is the culprit.

[ejjsinsights]

Hi everyone...I had the same syncing issues after the update but that is better.  However, my battery life is now a day and a half and this issue seems to coincide with the syncing issue and the last update. I had several phone conversations about the syncing issue with technical support to no avail.  I kept telling the tech that it coincided with the update but was always told there was no relationship. 

[Williger]

I did notice battery only getting only around 2 weeks between charges in September when previously, I'd been enjoying nearly 3 weeks. Unsure what specifically changed in the new software update, perhaps it's simply syncing more frequently? I've had zero sync issues except for the few days last week when many times I got "unable to reach server", which I understood impacted the majority of Fitbit users. Cheers!

[michae1a1ee]

I think a lot of us would love to be getting two weeks out of our Fitbit One trackers right now.  I've been noting my charging times to keep a log and the best I'm getting between full charges is about 4 days.  My One isn't brand new, but I was getting at least double that about a month or so ago.  I too an questioning whether the newest software app they've released is calling on the tracker more frequently and that this might be causing a more continuous battery drain than what we were experiencing before.  Over the last couple weeks I've also had a more frequent need to toggle my phone's Bluetooth off and then back on in order to get the Fitbit One to begin syncing again; although even that hasn't been as bad or as steady as the battery drain issues.

[theumpire]

Interesting discussion.  I have suddenly noticed that my Fitbit One "appears" to be losing charge quite rapidly, but it also "appears" to charge up quickly and it would appear to coincide with the last update from 3.6 to 3.7.  I have uninstalled the app, downloaded the 3.6 app and reinstalled.  This "appears" to have solved the problem, but only time will tell.  I just have to make sure my phone does not update back to 3.7.

[michae1a1ee]

My Fitbit Android app is showing as version 3.6.1.  Where did you find access to multiple different versions to pick from?  The Google Play Store generally lists the latest and keeps the app updated automatically.  Curious what you're doing differently.

[theumpire]

Search Google for "download old version of fitbit app".  There are sites that list all the versions of the app.  I simply downloaded 3.6 to my phone, uninstalled the current 3.7 version and installed 3.6.  Battery certainly seems to have held up very well overnight,

[michae1a1ee]

I just wanted to verify you weren't getting old versions from an official Fitbit site.  That might indicate Fitbit were accepting of the idea that some people were experiencing issues with the newest release.

[neal2zod]

I'm having the exact same issue - battery life went from one week to one day(!) after the September app updates. I was also having problems syncing. When I was finally able to connect after multiple resets and reboots of my phone, I ended up toggling "all day sync" and "always connected" on and back off again, and that actually helped the battery life issue.

Unfortunately it lasts about 4 days now instead of the 7 it was lasting a few weeks ago. Better than a day, but still...I worry that it's Fitbit trying to kill the One and getting us to buy a wristband model, which isn't going to happen in my case.

[Jackie777]

I am technically challenged 😔 I’m reading about all these problems from having updated the ONE. How do I know which update I even have? 😟 And, BTW I agree that they’re trying to phase out ONE to get us to buy the wristbands, which I too, do not want to get! 

[theumpire]

Go onto your phone and open the app.  Go onto your account and the help section.  It will tell you what version you have.

[neal2zod]

In the fitbit app, click on your picture in the upper left, then go to "Help" under the "Discover" section. It should say the version #. Mine is 3.5, which is behind the original poster, but I'm certainly not going to update it any more since the battery issues started for me two updates behind that. I should have just left it alone since everything was working fine until then.

[Jackie777]

I’m not even sure how I got to it. I don’t have a picture of myself, but I have the little drawing they put in.  Anyway, I clicked on that and I forgot what else I had to do, but I actually found where it states my version: it’s at 64! That doesn’t even make sense compared to what you all have 😕