Charge 3 is tracking steps while swimming

[SunsetRunner]

I've had a Charge 3 now for several months, initially it did not track steps while I was swimming, then randomly it started. I was advised to always set my exercise to swim in stead of letting it auto detect. I have now been manually setting it prior to starting my swim. 

The past two weeks though it has again started adding steps while I'm swimming - I swim at 6am, so I'm getting in the pool with around 800 steps and after swimming for an hour I'm getting out of the pool with 3000+ steps. I've been adding 'driving' to my activity log for during the swim so that it deletes the steps that it has decided to add on during a swim (even though the tracker says N/A in the step part). While doing this has removed the excess steps, it is also removing the calories I've burned during my swim.

Is there any way to stop this? - It's driving me insane - I have also rebooted the Fitbit, as well as deleted all data before re-syncing it to my phone - both of these did not work. I've purchased a Fitbit to track my swim and my steps and it seems like doing either of those is more effort than needed. 

Moderator edit: updated subject for clarity

[Rich_Laue]

Probably not, changing the swim stroke may help. 

[MarreFitbit · Accepted solution]

Hi there @SunsetRunner, welcome to the Community Forums. I am sorry to hear that you are going through this situation. Thanks for the details provided about what you've been experiencing during your swimming activities. 

While logging a swimming activity won't give you steps the movement you actually do while swimming could be interpreted as steps by your Charge 3. These steps will be superseded by the detected swimming session so you have a better caloric burn estimation on your account but it won't mean that steps won't be counted at all. This also happens when you drive a car with stiff suspension or on a bumpy road. You can read more about this at: How accurate are Fitbit devices? and How do I track my activity with my Fitbit device? 

Thanks for helping out @Rich_Laue. 😉

Let me know if there's anything else I may do to assist you with. 

[SunsetRunner]

This Charge 3 problem has been vexing me for the 2+ years I've had this tracker.  Doesn't matter whether pool swimming or open-water swimming, the tracker is recording BOTH the swim AND adding steps.  For pool swimming, once i set it at 25 yards, the tracker does a pretty good job at estimating distance, though I don't really need this for pool swims, having been counting my own laps for decades. Still, at least it does that well.  But for open-water swimming, forget about it!  It gets the time spent swimming right, but it always grossly underestimates the distance; I map my swims in Google maps, and a 2 mile (3600 yds) swim will be recorded as 2000 yds, something like that. And it also adds a bunch of steps. I've come to learn that open-water trackers are a thing unto themselves, and it would be unreasonable to expect the Charge 3 to get that right (on the the other hand, Fitbit should've made this clear in their marketing). Since it is water-resistant/proof, I keep it on when I swim, mostly out of laziness. When I view my steps for the day -- in the expanded view -- it shows a time period of increased step intensity corresponding exactly to my swim.  Screwy.  I've brought this up with "Support" several times over the past couple of years, and got nothing but evasive responses suggesting that I restart the tracker, all with the goal of getting me "back on track," as though my problem was that I'm just not getting my steps recorded accurately.  I send screen-capture pics of the phone app, documenting all of this, and it's like they're just not bothering to read my emails; I think some algorithm is used to determine that my issue is with my step count, and that none of these support "specialists" actually read my emails. In one of these rounds -- including my most recent one -- they offer to replace the tracker, which I've done twice, with of course no change in outcome. 

Having done more research on swim trackers, and since open-water swimming is a big deal for me, I'm throwing in the towel with Fitbit, and have decided to buy a Garmin Swim 2; it's been getting great reviews.  And it does all the other things my Charge 3 does.