GPS tracking problems getting increasingly worse

[SunsetRunner]

I have had an Inspire HR for about half a year now. A couple of months ago I reached out to get help on a problem I was having with the GPS tracking function on my Inspire HR. Unfortunately I got no solution at all, Fitbit stating that the problem was that my phone was "not a supported device" for Fitbit. Which is ridiculous because my phone hasn't changed in the last year but the problems with my Inspire have only gotten worse.

In the beginning (when I first reached out) the problem was that with some exercises (in-line skating, biking) the distance on a tracked exercise was inaccurate. It would give a distance that was about 70-80% of the actual distance travelled. Fortunately I did have a map so that I (or Runkeeper) could calculate the actual distance of the exercise. But there is no way to get Fitbit to record an accurate distance.

And yes, I have tried every suggestion that was offered.
- I reset my device every time I charge it
- I wait for the device to be connected before I start the exercise

- I close all other apps on my phone except for Fitbit

- I keep my phone close to the Inspire during the whole exercise

- I have tried setting the stride length to automatic, and I have tried entering my actual stride length; this did not make a difference

- and every other suggestion there is in all the articles concerning GPS or exercises

Unfortunately, as I have mentioned above, the problem has only gotten worse. The distance tracked on walking exercises has also gotten inaccurate, and increasingly so. Sometimes the recorded distance is less than half of the actual distance that I walked! Even with all the precautions mentioned above. And again: as long as I had a map, I could calculate the actual distance; or let Runkeeper do this (apparently Runkeeper is able to calculate an accurate distance with the GPS data, where Fitbit is not). But since last week I didn't even get a map in the app after synchronising the device! It just shows the first couple hundred meters of the walk and then nothing. So now I can't even recall how much (or where) I have walked during the exercise. Totally worthless!

So Fitbit, unless you are able to come up with a proper solution this time, I'm switching brands. 

And please, before you respond, read the whole post and don't ask me to try things that I have already tried. 

[AlvaroFitbit]

@SunsetRunner It's great to see that you've visited the Fitbit Community!

I am sorry to hear about your issues with the GPS signal detection with your Fitbit app and Inspire HR and thank you for troubleshooting this issue. Since you have tried the suggested troubleshoots I have created a ticket so our Support team can further assist you via email.

Let me know how it goes.

[SunsetRunner]

Thank you!

[LostEchoes]

@SunsetRunner 
Thank you for this post with all those details and the elaborate troubleshooting.
I have seen other reports, too, and I have also tested and confirmed this with Runkeeper.
I hope this time they will take this seriously and try to provide an actual solution.

p.s. all those things, claims and excuses (by some Fitbit representatives) about phones not being compatible or supported, etc are really unrealistic and false. As long as an Android phone is NOT on any kind of Power Saving mode, everything should be working without issues regarding the Location / GPS. If a specific phone works fine with a GPS app (such as Runkeeper, Strava, etc), then the Android Fitbit app should also work correctly without distance inaccuracies and other similar issues. It's as simple and clear as that ! 

[SunsetRunner]

@LostEchoes 

Thank you for confirming this!

I have never had any trouble using GPS with other apps such as Runkeeper. Fitbit is the only app which doesn't seem to get this working. 

Unfortunately since I have already gone through a lengthy process with Customer Support a couple a months ago (different people were picking it up each time so I had to keep repeating the same stuff over and over again), which didn't yield any solution so I have little faith that it will all be resolved this time. I'm giving them one last chance but I've already started looking at devices from other brands as well. Fitbit is seriously lacking in this area, and in Customer Support as well. 

[SunsetRunner]

@AlvaroFitbit @LostEchoes 

Too bad... After a couple of emails hence and forth, Fitbit still keeps blaming my phone for the problem. Totally lame.

So thanks Fitbit for nothing, and goodbye.

I'll be switching to another brand.

[LostEchoes]

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@SunsetRunner wrote:

@AlvaroFitbit @LostEchoes 

Too bad... After a couple of emails hence and forth, Fitbit still keeps blaming my phone for the problem. Totally lame.

So thanks Fitbit for nothing, and goodbye.

I'll be switching to another brand.

---

This is sad and frustrating. 
And it also shows some kind of ignorance maybe (?) about basic things regarding phone operating systems and related technology?

[SunsetRunner]

@LostEchoes 

Right. Because the OnePlus 6 is fully supported, but the 6T runs into all kinds of trouble. The difference between those two is insurmountable. Sure.

[SunsetRunner]

@LostEchoes @AlvaroFitbit 

Just out of curiosity is just looked up which devices are compatible with for example a Garmin Vivoactive 3 or 4. Turns out: "any device with Android 5.0 or later".

So they don't discriminate between specific models or types at all. 

Well, I know where I'm going!

[LostEchoes]

@SunsetRunner 

This is what I've been wondering about, too.
It's actually what I've posted yesterday:

As long as an Android phone is NOT on any kind of Power Saving mode, everything should be working without issues regarding the Location / GPS. If a specific phone works fine with a GPS app (such as Runkeeper, Strava, etc), then the Android Fitbit app should also work correctly without distance inaccuracies and other similar issues. It's as simple and clear as that ! 

---

I'm not trying to sound like a smart @ss but as an IT guy (I'm a network engineer) I could accept an explanation as long as it would be detailed and had some basic logic. I could accept that for proper syncing and accurate Location tracking, our phone should have specific versions (and above) for OS and Bluetooth, e.g. Bluetooth 4.0 and above,  Android OS 5.0 and above, GPS or Glonass, etc. That would be an explanation that I could understand.

I mean, in a similar issue about "MobileTrack" not supported on every Android Phone, etc, someone cared enough to explain WHY it is not supported. 

https://community.fitbit.com/t5/Fitbit-Challenges-Adventures/Add-Apple-Watch-data-to-MobileTrack-for-challenges/m-p/2476531/highlight/true#M6731

Did you ever wonder why some devices support MobileTrack and others don't?  Search the devices page for reference.  So if you look up:

• Microsoft Lumia 950, supports MobileTrack
• Microsoft Lumia 520, does not support MobileTrack

It's not really a question of which handset is newer or more powerful (kinda but not really), it's a question of which processor each device has.  When Qualcomm releases new Snapdragon processors, they add features.  One of the features that they added at one point was the ability to operate the motion sensor (and I imagine gyroscope) all the time while consuming very little power for activity data.  It's described on this article as course motion classification, and it's what Fitbit uses to collect MobileTrack data.

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Now for Fitbit's (official) statement that some Android phones are "not compatible", the developers could at least share with us some technical details regarding the reasons WHY some phones are not compatible ! Does it have to do with the Bluetooth version ? Does it have to do with the OS version? Something else ? And how come other brands such as Garmin, Polar, etc do NOT have a compatibility list and they just work fine with every Android phone, as long as they meet some basic criteria (again, for example: Android 5.0+, Bluetooth 4.0+, GPS / Glonass, etc).

Searching the community, I've found another very generic reply regarding Android:

https://community.fitbit.com/t5/Android-App/Mobile-Track-for-Android/m-p/1763949/highlight/true#M40405

In Android is bit harder to make compatible all the Android devices brands and models, since despite many device are built with the same core specification not all are able to support the features of the Fitbit app or the trackers, nonetheless our teams are constantly testing devices to make wider the variety of mobile device to sync with the Fitbit app.

---

But I repeat. These generic replies do NOT help anyone.
Some times the only thing people need is for something (even if it's bad news) to be communicated CORRECTLY, EFFICIENTLY and with respect to the ...customer !

Fitbit could post a very simple (but detailed) sticky announcement, here in the message boards, that would explain with technical terminology why some phones are listed as not compatible.

@AlvaroFitbit , @AlessFitbit , anyone cares to send this request to the developers ? 

[SunsetRunner]

@LostEchoes 

Right! Thank you for sharing that. 

What always amazed me, from the beginning, is that it's not the GPS data itself. Fitbit shows an inaccurate distance stat, but when I export an exercise from Fitbit and upload that TCX file to Runkeeper or Strava, these websites are able to calculate the correct distance. So, based on the exact same GPS data that Fitbit gathers, other websites are able to calculate an accuracte distance... why can't Fitbit?

There's no reason whatsoever.

[LostEchoes]

@SunsetRunner 
And now that you mention this, it seems similar to another issue I have posted about.
When we track a GPS activity, the Elevation Gain on the Fitbit Dashboard is always reported as ZERO (0). Fitbit seems unable to calculate the Elevation Gain, although it has the numbers / data and the graph is there ! The elevation gain is calculated with the help of our phones GPS (because as we know in our case Inspire uses the phone's GPS)

Meanwhile, after the activity is uploaded to Strava and Endomondo, they (Strava and Endomondo) report the correct elavation gain using Fitbit's data (oh the irony) !

https://community.fitbit.com/t5/Fitbit-com-Dashboard/Inaccurate-Cardio-and-All-Elevation-Gains-0m/m-p/3792959/highlight/true#M100900

Now, as you said - and I tend to agree- probably the issue here has to do with the way Fitbit uses and presents the data, and not with the data itself.

[SunsetRunner]

@LostEchoes 

Exactly.

If other services are able to calculate an accurate distance using the GPS data that Fitbit recorded on my phone, then clearly the problem is not with the data or the phone. 

[LostEchoes]

Hi there.
Just tested Android version 3.9 with my Samsung Galaxy S7.
I tracked a 1 KM walk with my Inspire HR and at the same time I tracked the activity with the Endomondo Android app on my phone.

When Endomondo showed that I had walked 1 KM, the Inspire HR was showing 0.84 KM.
When Inspire HR showed 1KM, Endomondo showed 1.2 KM.

Here are some screenshots with interesting results. I don't really know what to make out of this data.

1) Walk tracked by my phone's Endomondo Android app. It shows 1.2 KM

2) The same walk tracked by Inspire HR (using my phone's connected GPS) and automatically uploaded to Endomondo. It shows 1 KM

3) Strava shows 1KM with the data synced from Fitbit

4) Fitbit app shows the walk as 1 KM

[SunsetRunner]

@LostEchoes 

Would you try something for me?

Go to the Strava website (not the app but the website in a browser). Open the exercise and then in the top right of the screen click "distance", then choose "correct GPS". What distance does it show then?

[LostEchoes]

@SunsetRunner 
I did what you suggested.
Now it has corrected the distance to 0.99 KM

[SunsetRunner]

@LostEchoes thanks.

That's interesting. Of course, it's only a 1 km exercise. But with my exercises the difference is usually bigger, especially if I go inline skating. 

For example: two workouts from last July:

 

  

And when these are synchronized to Strava, and I ask Strava to correct the distance, it shows this:

 

 

Using another website to calculate the actual distance it turned out that Strava was right by the way 😊 so yeah. There's that.

[BigSwede72]

Did you get anywhere with this?
I have the same problem with Inspire HR that is showing to short distances. On a short 3Km run its like 6% short. And that is compared to Runtastic on the same phone (ie the same GPS) and with another phone running Garmin. The error increases with the distance. Interesting theory about the elevation... must invastigate!

[SunsetRunner]

Actually, I found out that although Fitbit claims to use the connected GPS to calculate the distance and speed, that's a lie. The GPS data is only used to draw your route onto a map, and the distance during any workout is calculated based upon your steps and average step length. Which is why the distance on inline skating exercises was way off. 

Of course Fitbit denies this, but I've found proof. 

My solution was to buy a Garmin; problem solved.

Proof is here: https://community.fitbit.com/t5/Inspire-Inspire-HR/Fitbit-and-quot-Connected-GPS-quot-the-biggest-sc...

[BigSwede72]

WTF!
...that sucks! Then my biking tracks should be way of as well, must check!
What proof did do you have? If this is true (don't doubt you in any way) I'm seriously considering returning it!

Edit: saw that you added the link! Thanks!