So I bought a charge 3 with the goal of measuring my running activity. I like the idea of the continuous heart rate monitoring and the pace settings. But I also love the idea of properly monitoring sleep so this watch seemed a decent start as opposed to a Garmin which seemed expensive and ONLY for running really.
I have already bought a couple of much cheaper watches that either broke physically or I returned due to battery life lasting no more than an hour. So decided to invest a bit more this time.
Seems however there are major problems with the charge 3 and measuring distance while running:
First, there was an issue in that while my run would show say 10 mileage markers the run would be shown to be only 7 or something like this. Even with issues regarding stride length (which seem so numerous now that I have read the forums) this cannot be explained by that.
https://ibb.co/PYh6mPn <- issue with mileage points
I tried adjusting my stride length anyway but this made no difference. I went out and ran again. I compared a run I completed with an outline from “on the go map” which I tru. The difference was a mile.
https://ibb.co/wNjrZkR <- on the go image
https://ibb.co/3kpcS4D <- fitbit comparison
Not only this, but I tried changing my units from imperial to metric and the original issue appeared:
https://ibb.co/xDhjM4b <- re-emergence of the original issue (exactly the same run as above, just units change from imperial to metric to imperial again).
Same run, different mileage, faulty mile points.
I know people have said there is an issue with the charge 3 and GPS before and I just wanted to add my frustrations here because it has not been fixed and for a fitness tracker this seems unacceptable. Incredibly buggy and as of now useless for measuring runs. Very disappointed and kind of wish I had saved up more for a Garmin now.
