Steps not always counting as exercise

[JeniJeni]

Amy ideas on why my Charge 2 is suddenly not counting my steps as exercise when on my morning exercise walk.

Yesterday I walked 12000 steps within 2 hours and this does appear in my steps but does not count as exercise.  This has happened a couple of times within the past month.

[AlvaroFitbit]

@JeniJeni Welcome! It's nice to have you on board!

Let me help you with your activity detection. Your device detects activities based on the motion on your arm. The automatic detection is a feature called SmartTrack. For example when using the elliptical machine make sure you have the moving bars so your device detects the motion and record the activity itself, once an Elliptical activity is saved on your account it should show on the Recent Exercise area. Since your walks aren't being labeled as such please make sure the detection time is set to 10 minutes. If your heart rate is high but there isn't much motion (yoga, weight lifting, etc.) then these activities will be difficult to be detected by your device. Still you can manually log your activity so you have a record on your account or use the activity mode on the device itself.

Let me know how it goes.

[JeniJeni]

Thanks but this is not the problem.  I have had 2 different Fitbits now for a number of years and not counting as exercise when actually walking for almost 2 hours (around my neighbourhood) is something that has recently just started.  (I am aware that when using a walking machine that my arms cannot be on the bars.)  I am walking outside so this has nothing to do with arm movement.  I did manually log the exercise but this then changed my steps so not very accurate.  My heart rate is also something that is not always showing up now.  It seems to be hit and miss and this has never happened prior to the end of October either.