HR not accurate- Fitbit CS Useless!

[npat90]

HR during workouts is significantly lower. I did a 30 min workout- on my Fitbit my HR showed an average of 130bpm and I also wore my husbands Samsung Galaxy and it showed an average of 159BPM. This has been ongoing to ages, I have tried everything they have suggested with placement, not wearing it too tight/too loose, placement, cleaning the sensor etc. Nothing gets it to get even close to the real HR. 

Spoke to Fitbit and they said it's not faulty because I cannot compare it to another smartwatch as they use different algorithms. A slight discrepancy is to be expected but this is extreme! So I tried again by using an HR monitor on my treadmill and experienced similar- the treadmill was showing a much more accurate HR and Fitbit was totally underestimating the HR by a huge amount. 

The customer service is shocking and they basically have said the product is not faulty (IT IS!) 

Asked to raise a complaint, which they would not acknowledge and said you can email your feedback but no one will get back to you 

Asked to speak to a manager and I was told the managers do not accept calls so I cannot speak to one! 


It is annoying because I am on Vitality health which means I need to show 5 days of exercising at 70% of my Max HR in order to get my points which gives me cashback on my premiums and other rewards! And the annoying thing is my workouts reach this but FitBit and its useless device doesn't pick this up as the Versa 3 is just ridiculous! I am aware FitBit know this is an ongoing issue but they still do not acknowledge that this is a problem and they just wash their hands off it and are saying it is an estimation of the heart rate and is not a medical device! 

So FRUSTRATING

[Guy_]

Hi @npat90 - yes annoying, but probably due to the construction, and/or algorithms used, there is nothing much that can be done to resolve it. It has been reported in the forums by many since September 2020.

Exercise and Heart rate don't go well together on this watch unfortunately and results can vary by person or exercise. Mine reads double at times for some exercises.

The good news though is that resting heart rate and sleep still measure well, even if during exercise it doesn't.