Fitbit app drained iPhone battery overnight (background app activity)

[CharlotteBell]

I have an iPhone 6s using iOS 13.3. Last night I went to sleep with my phone around 90% of battery. I woke up this morning and my phone was completely dead (luckily before my alarm or I would have been very late for work!). On the battery tab in settings it seems the Fitbit app was using battery all night in the background, for nearly 7h which completely drained the phone battery. The app wasn’t even open on the phone overnight (I had swiped up to close all my apps before bed) and I seem to be have issues syncing with my Versa. I assume the battery drainage could be from it trying to constantly sync all night? My Versa also seems to be not holding charge well recently and I updated it’s software recently too. 

Moderator edit: Subject for clarity

[RicardoFitbit]

Hi @CharlotteBell, It's nice to see you again participating here in the Community Forums, welcome back!

Thanks for bringing this to my attention and for the details that were shared in your post, the screenshot attached was helpful for me to better understand this situation, seems odd that your Fitbit app was working on the background for that long. To better assist you with this, can you please let me know when was the first time you experienced this and how many times since then? Do you have All-Day sync feature enabled? If you haven't already done so, please restart your Versa following the next steps:

1. For Fitbit Vers, press and hold the back and bottom buttons until you see the Fitbit logo on the screen. 
2. Let go of the buttons.
3. If you still have issues with your device, turn it off and turn it back on. For more information, see How do I turn off my Fitbit device? 

Don't hesitate to ask me any additional questions you may have, I'll be waiting for your reply.

[Asquared_Fit]

I'm having the same issue with my battery since the latest Versa update. I did notice that all day sync is on. Was that something new with this update or did the latest update turn that on?

My watch doesn't even last a day and I turn it off every night.

[Aussiemomma3]

I just got the Versa 2 and it is draining my iphone battery too. I turned off background and all day sync. But it is still running in the background for 7 hours a day. 

[CharlotteBell]

 

Hi Ricardo, thanks for responding!

I think this has happened three times now, and it happened again last night with my iPhone draining from around 90-95% to 0% when I woke up, with the FitBit app showing again as the only thing using background battery for 6h+. I have all day sync turned on, and actually I have been trying to turn it off but every time I re-open the app it has turned back on again! 

I think the battery issue may be related to a syncing issue/losing connection with the phone. Both times I’ve checked, the Versa last synced just before the battery started to drain (last night was 1:44am) and then didn’t sync since that time. In the morning it then cannot sync with the Versa and I have to restart the Versa and phone multiple times until it finally syncs!

[Aussiemomma3]

I found that by default connected gps on the exercise app is on. That caused my phone to drain. Go to the app menu on the fitbit. Then select exercise. Then select walk and turn off connected gps. My fitbit app now only runs 1 hour instead of 7 hours daily. It is still too much but it does really help the battery drain. 

[SunsetRunner]

I have exactly the same problem, same phone, same watch. First time this happened is around a month ago and it happened 3-4 times, quite annoying when you rely on the alarm in the morning but it's not starting due to Fitbit being active the whole night. Have you found a solution yet?

[Aussiemomma3]

I found that if I shut off the GPS on all exercises it does not drain. Unfortunately the default setting for a fitbit turns them on. My phone was draining even during during the night if any of the exercises were set to GPS on. There must be a bug that keeps the GPS on even when resting if you do any exercise with the GPS on. Once I set all of the exercise GPS settings to off, my battery is not draining as quickly. 

[CharlotteBell]

Still not solved for me, and happened again last night. Happening very regularly now, to the point where if I don’t charge my phone overnight more than likely it will be dead or almost dead when I wake up due to this problem!

The background app usage seems to pick up from when it last synced overnight and then the Fitbit hasn’t synced since that time. I’ve tried turning off all-day sync but it doesn’t seem to stay off, when I go back onto the app it’s switched itself on again.  

[Aussiemomma3]

I turned off the background app sync on my fitbit settings too. I do not know if it is a cause of battery drain because the drain continued until I turned off the GPS setting in every exercise on my fitbit. Apparently turning GOS off in one exercise was not enough.

[Mr.Swampy]

 

I’ve had the same problem since my Versa was updated in December. I don’t have the same issue with my Charge2.  Yesterday, I didn’t use the phone  at all and it was 100% charged. This morning it was at 17%, with Background App Activity draining the battery. 
I don’t use all day sync or notifications or anything other than the basic functions (time, steps, heart rate).

It seems to be related to the Bluetooth & Mobile Data. If I block those in settings, it doesn’t drain the battery. As soon as they are enabled, the Versa drains the battery. 

[Mr.Swampy]

@CharlotteBell  @Aussiemomma3 I’ve found there re multiple exercise activities, with GPS automatically connected, generally any time you are going from one place to another. Check walk, hike, run & bike as a minimum. Hopefully that will reduce the problem.

if all else fails, turn off auto synch (it is unnecessary really) then go to Fitbit tab in your phone setting & turn off Bluetooth. When you want to download your stats, open settings (Fitbit will be visible), turn on Bluetooth, down load your stats, then turn it off again. It won’t drain the battery anymore.

It is infuriating we have to do this in the watch - especially when we have used the settings in the Fitbit to NOT allow it to happen. @SunsetRunner @RicardoFitbit 

[Aussiemomma3]

I tried a fitbit a few years ago and returned it due to phone battery drain. I got a new fitbit around Christmas and it had the same problem but I solved it. It is too bad that fitbit does not test its software, I have a technological background but regular people would not be able to make it work. These products are supposed to be designed for everybody. I certainly cannot recommend fitbit to anyone even if I asked. 

[ricsto]

Same for me. It's frustration. It's started draining the battery heavily since the end of last year and without fail will drain constantly. I spotted a pattern to it and a kind of fix (messy workaround).

Here's what I noticed.

In the Fitbit app on my Iphone 7 I've disable "all-day sync" but every single hour of the day the battery monitor on iPhone shows excessive background activity from the Fitbit app. Usually the biggest battery user on my phone. I can't figure out what it's doing during background activity because I have to manually refresh the app to sync data from my Inspire HR.

What I noticed is that all night long when I'm bed, the Fitbit App will be running 60 minutes every hour in the background. During the night my phone is always out of reach of my Fitbit. It seems to be that the app is polling for a Fitbit that it is not connected to or within range. This may explain the behaviour you see. It drains a lot of battery. During the day when Fitbit and App are in range of each other the battery drain is less but still a lot considering I've all day sync disabled. I've no clue what it is doing in the background for hours of every day. 

A really rubbish workaround is to remember to close the app, double tap home button and swipe the app away to close. This stops the crazy background sync battery drain.

I'd love to know what it is doing and how to fix it but I've just reached the conclusion that there's a lack of quality, design or testing of the app.

Hope that helps. I'd appreciate if anyone knows how to resolve this. Other than buy different vendor equipment.