Clarification on Stairs Climbed feature.

[Stratguy]

Concerning many posts about scrapping the 'Stairs Climbed" feature, FitBit needs to clarify. Many contributors claim that this totally inaccurate feature screws up some of the other functions whilst JohnnyRoy ( in January 2020) said: Floors climbed do not affect steps, calories, or anything else. It is entirely a stand-alone stat. Who is correct?

[SteveH]

I doubt you will get a definitive answer and I don't believe this is covered in any of Fitbit's online documentation.

My understanding is that it is a stand-alone statistic. I'm very confident that tracking floors does not affect the step count (and therefore does not affect the distance). The question used to be that it may affect calorie burn. Years ago I did test this out and found that I could see no difference in calories burned when the steps were the same but the floor count differed. 

I hope you do get a definitive answer here - it would be nice to put this one to bed.

[Stratguy]

Thank you SteveH but this only goes to reinforce the view that Stairs Counting is a complete waste of time and offers nothing to any of the other features in Fitbit Trackers! Why would you want to count how many times you have walked up and down stairs? Doing this exercise adds to steps and, possibly, calories burned but why not just incorporate these metrics into those for steps and calories burned??  I think it is time that Fitbit realised that Stairs Counting is a completely useless feature and to incorporate whatever metrics that walking up and down stairs can add to the much more useful features of steps, calories burned and an accurate, ongoing heart beat count shown in graphical form! This discussion has, apparently, been going on for the best part of 5 years and still Fitbit have done nothing to resolve this ongoing, and thorny, issue!! Fitbit, get your fingers out and do something about it!!!

[SteveH]

Some may see them as a waste of time, and they can just ignore them.

Others see them as motivation for being just a little more active. For those it's surely a good thing?

[Stratguy]

Hi Steve, I agree but what counts is the perception of why you are doing it! If you look at this as purely trying to get your stats up as to how many times you go up and down stairs then this is a complete waste of time  as this data is meaningless. If, however, you see this exercise in terms of steps taken, calories counted, part of your total exercise regime then I would agree that running (or walking) up and down stairs could provide valuable information in terms of the metrics that you are really looking at and are important to you but this is only meaningful if that information is truly accurate and can be incorporated into other, existing, stats! I think we have all seen that the altimeters built into the Fitbit Trackers are inexpensive and basic and, as such, really need to be dispensed with as they are totally useless! I know this from having flown Drones that have, allegedly, this feature but unless you are flying hundreds of feet in the air they give you no meaningful information unless you are flying the much more expensive, and accurate, film or documentary quality drones - £5-6000 plus! What we really have here is a feature that many Fitbit users don't want (see posts over the last 5 years!); gives no meaningful data and can be easily replaced with a much more accurate HR monitor, or the such like!

[LZeeW]

@Stratguy   This is my take on the Floors Climbed feature.  I haven't been a Fitbit user as long as @SteveH, but my science background (primarily physiology, with some engineering tossed in) always has me asking, "How does this stuff work?"  In one respect, the floors climbed are stand-alone.  It is a number that is reported by the altimeter.  In another respect, you take steps and burn calories to walk up stairs, so those steps and those calories do add to you daily total.

Imagine this.  If you could take the stairs in the Washington Monument, you would take 896 steps and climb roughly 500 feet (50 floors).  And you are going to do this with three different trackers at one time:

• Charge 4 -- steps, floors, heart rate based calories
• Inspire HR or 2 -- steps, no floors, heart rate based calories
• Inspire -- steps, no floors, calories based on algorithms using your age, height and weight

This is what you should get:

• All three will give you the same steps and distance added to your daily total using your steps x stride length
• The Charge 4 will add the 50 floors
• The Charge 4 and the Inspire HR/2 should give you the same calorie burn, because it is heart rate based
• The Inspire will give you a lower calorie burn because this method of estimating calories burn is much less accurate (one source says that walking up 10 steps is the same as 38 steps on level ground)
• If you could add in a Fitbit one and make it four trackers, you would get the steps, distance, the 50 floors, but the same calorie burn as the Inspire

I agree that the floors counted are inaccurate and inconsistent on wrist trackers.  My trusty Fitbit One tracked every flight in my house.  Every wrist tracker has been 65-75% accurate in that same house.  As long as you are wearing a heart rate based tracker, you steps and calorie burn will not be affected, but it will take you longer to get the next Floors Climbed badge.

I also want to add that many health organizations encourage us to take the stairs instead of the elevator.  This is Fitbit's way of letting you say, "I did take the stairs."

[Stratguy]

Hi LZeeW,

Your science and the explanation of it is great but it really doesn't address the basic argument of these posts, that being: do we really need the stairs count or not? I think not and my reasons for this are as follows:

1) If you are wearing a tracker that purely counts stairs as a stand-alone feature then why would you want this? To me it is totally pointless; anybody who can count can count stairs themselves - they don't need a tracker to tell them that and what possible use is that count anyway?

2) Whether you are walking on the level or walking up and down stairs what you really need to know about are such things as rises or falls in heart rate, calories burned and number of steps taken; I repeat, you don't need to know whether you are going up stairs or downstairs! The only downside consequence of this is that you would not get an accurate result for distance travelled since you will not travel as far, in distance terms, if you take 20 steps upstairs (or downstairs) rather than walking 20 steps on the level! 

3) In the grand scheme of things would such an inaccuracy be all that important since we are far more likely to be spending far more time walking on the level than we are going up and down stairs? I would estimate that out of, say, 8000 steps taken during the course of a day probably less than 1% - 2% would be taken using stairs (as a general rule for most of the population). The other thing that people tend to forget is that none of these trackers are tremendously accurate - they are only a guide ( perhaps a very good guide with certain makes and models ) but if you want absolute accuracy then you are going to have to be using the kind of very sensitive, accurate, and not to mention expensive, kit that, say,  hospitals use and most of that kit you would never get on your wrist anyway even if you could afford it!!

[SteveH]

I take a much more simplistic view on this. If someone has a floor goal of 10 and they're currently on 8, they may be motivated to do a couple more to reach the target. It doesn't matter if the floors are accurate or meaningful but they are being a bit more active just down to floor tracking.

[Oeeman]

Me thinks thou does protest to much.

my take is you are arguing about whether it is absolutely correct or consistently inaccurate.  I believe ALL of the fit bit info is consistently incorrect.  This doesn’t make it bad just incorrect however if I can trend my incorrect data (stairs included) I can know if I did something different or more than than the previous reading.  It is like believing that the bathroom scale gives a standards level of accuracy - it doesn’t.  However I have tested the scale and get the same reading when I step on it multiple times in a row.  So I’m comfortable that when it says I’m down .5 the next day I’m comfortable that it is true, but it may not be an absolutely correct number.  Same applies to the Fitbit - consistently incorrect, but still valuable if used correctly  

[Stratguy]

Hi Oeeman. I take your point but, again, that is not the original point of these posts; the basic question was: do we really need the stair count feature or not. Some people say yes, others are undecided but for the last 5 years or so most who have commented on this have said either get rid of it or incorporate an on/off control! My own thoughts are to get rid of it for all the reasons I have already stated and incorporate a more meaningful metric that would be of more use to more users. 

[phyllisj9]

Interesting discussion! I would love to know if stair climbing is a stand-alone stat! I'm new to FitBit (having gotten one on Christmas Day), but the stairs feature drives me berserk. I use a mini-trampoline for exercise, and FitBit always records it as climbing 8+ floors when I work out (plus it also records stairs when I'm walking). Yet I never climb any. And I know steps aren't totally accurate either, but at least they're not 100% wrong. I can count on the stair climbing reading to always be 100% wrong. That really irks me. I had to turn off badge notifications and sharing of badge information with friends because that's just too inaccurate to display. At least the steps seem like they might be ballpark, but there was no way to get the stair reading out of there. I regret not doing the research and asking for a FitBit without an altimeter. Or maybe a different product altogether that gives better control of data displays.  It's not motivating to see information that's obviously inaccurate.

[Stratguy]

Hi phyllisj9

This has been a long discussion and if you wade back through all the posts on this subject you will find a fantastic variety of opinions! I have advocated that the Stairs Climbed facility is a complete waste of time as I cannot see any use for it at all as a stand alone stat. Also, if you look back through all the posts you will find that the Fitbit can give totally unrealistic values for the stairs climbed but really what you have to do is read all, or most, of these posts, use your own experience of your device and then make your own mind up as to whether you like it or not! You also have to remember that none of these devices (from any manufacturer) are 100% accurate in all respects and features but rather they are a good guide as to your activities, heart rate, sleeping patterns etc etc so that if any of the results shown suddenly deviate wildly from your "norm" then this may indicate that perhaps further investigation maybe required (always assuming that the Fitbit has not fallen off its' perch)!!

[jjw112858]

My opinion is it takes more energy to go up stairs than it does to simply walk so it is important to me.  Maybe others don't agree which is fine.  BUt I think you burn more calories climbing stairs than it does simply walking and I would like to track how  many stairs I would have climbed.  And yes, I could count them myself but then why I am I spending money on something that should do it for ,e/

[Stratguy]

Hi jjw112858; As I have already said, I see no point in having a count of how many flights of stairs you have been up or down, as a stand alone app. Whats the point, it gives you absolutely no meaningful information and this feature is totally inaccurate anyway for all the reasons already stated? However you are right in saying that you will probably burn more calories going up and down stairs than walking on the level; it will also add to your step count and so these two aspects should be taken into account by the Fitbit and added to the appropriate totals but NOT to show a stairs count as a separate, pointless, feature. You wouldn't, after all, want to be driving a car at 30mph and have the speedo tell you that you're driving at 60mph would you? Again, what would be the point of having such an inaccurate feature??

[LZeeW]

@Stratguy   Your speedometer is expected to give you your correct speed, because it is a precision instrument.  No fitness tracker makes that claim.  If you see the floor climbed as a pointless feature, then I suggest you do the following:

• Open your Fitbit app
• Tap on the Edit button
• Tap on the X on your floors icon
• Tap on Done
• Stop looking at the number

Floors are not just "floors", but any 10 ft increase in altitude.  I know that you are a new user, so you don't understand how popular this feature is.  The Fitbit One was replaced with the Inspire/Inspire HR.  These devices don't count floors.  I thought the Help forum was going to explode.

[47d]

Sorry I do not agree. As one gets older the ability to climb stairs becomes more important. I try and walk up my staircase fifty consecutive times several times per week, it's also a good cardio workout.

[Stratguy]

Hi LZeeW, Further to your last post I may be a newbie to Fitbit devices but I can read all of the posts on this subject that go back a long time and I can see how unpopular it is with many users! I have been flying drones for several years, many of these having what the manufacturers call an "Altitude Hold" feature which utilises an altimeter that works on barometric pressure and I personally know how inaccurate these things are! In order to hold altitude at a set position you have to be using the kind of drone that is used for TV/Film work and these are (1) very expensive,  (2)  have a very sophisticated GPS system on board whose electronics couple to the altitude hold feature and some even have a ground sensing "radar" on board to accurately assess the actual distance from the ground and (3) without all these electronics the altitude hold system just doesn't work accurately especially in high winds.

It makes sense, therefore, if a Fitbit only has an altimeter, and not a very sensitive one, there is no chance it will be sophisticated enough to accurately measure differences in barometric pressure in a house, and the difference between ground level and say, floor number 4, is negligible. You only have to read all the previous posts on this subject, by many different users going back several years (many of whom are not newbies) to see that this as a stand alone feature has little value and has been thought to have little value by many users for a long time! The point that I have been trying to make, and the information I have been trying to find, is that if climbing up and down stairs adds to the total number of steps taken and the calories burned and if it is the case that the Fitbit does indeed take account of these in the appropriate metrics then fine, useful information, but I really don't see the point in having a very inaccurate "altitude" system if it is indeed stand alone; If it contributes nothing to steps and calories then why have it? That is the only point that I am trying to get across and with some difficulty it would seem!

[Stratguy]

Hi 47d, I couldn't agree with you more about going up and down stairs to try to keep fit and I would agree that it can be a good cardio workout. I am in my 70's and I try to walk 10,000 steps a day if I can, with or without my Dog. I also have had a total knee replacement and have arthritis in my spine, hips, knees and feet but I still walk up and down stairs to my office several times a day. The one and only point I am trying to make, as I have said in my post to LZeeW, and several times before, is that as a stand alone figure I don't see the point in displaying floors climbed! I don't go up and down stairs a fixed number of times, I do it until my body, legs and hips tell me to give it a rest - then I do but I'm not interested in how many times I've done it as long as what I have done counts towards steps made and calories burned and THAT is the information that I still can't find and nobody from Fitbit has yet answered the question!

[SteveH]

@Stratguy you do get steps and calories tracked when you go up stairs or a slope. Whether floors are a valuable metric in their own right is just something that some of us think is a good thing, and others a waste of time. We my just have to agree to disagree on this.

It does seem that people who don't like them can just ignore them though, whereas those who do like them can't do anything if they are removed as you suggest.

[47d]

Hello stratguy,

I like the step app and never suggested deleting it in my post. Have you confused me with someone else?

47d