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Heart rate stays 120 or lower when working out

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‎12-31-2019 10:21

‎12-31-2019 10:21

I was on an elliptical machine at the gym today, and the heart rate was reading high 90s to 120 on my Versa 2 while the gym machine read 140-150. I was working hard, and the higher number seems accurate to me. How can I make the Fitbit more accurate?

 

(This seems to be an ongoing issue as I was power walking and not getting higher readings as well, but I didn't have alternate readings to refer to.)

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‎01-12-2020 07:38

‎01-12-2020 07:38

Hello @Karietc, welcome to the Community forums. Sorry for the late response. 

 

Thank you for sharing this information about what you've been experiencing with the accuracy of heart rate information. 

 

Before considering other options, I would recommend performing a restart and to follow all the instructions in this article to improve the accuracy of heart rate information: How to I improve the accuracy of my heart rate rate reading?  This has been useful to other users who have experienced something similar. 

 

Please keep me posted on the outcome. 

Davide | Italian and English Community Moderator, Fitbit


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‎01-12-2020 07:51

‎01-12-2020 07:51

@Karietc wrist-based HR sensors suffer very often from external noise which is caused by the motion. It isn't unusual that in the step-based exercises (running, walking, elliptical) the cadence is picked up rather than real HR. The cadence is actually hard to filter out as it nicely fits the pattern of regular signal and may not be seen as a distortion. If this happens then you may try to secure the strap better, place the watch higher (and put something like a sweatband between your wrist and the watch to prevent moving) but there is no guarantee it will solve the problem. I don't use wrist HR at all when exercising as I find it unreliable (introduces too much distortion). You may do better with external HR sensor that isn't worn on the wrist. Either using chest strap or (that's my choice nowadays) optical PolarOH1 sensor which uses same tech as Fitbit (optical) but is worn either on forearm or bicep and uses more leds (is as accurate as chest strap). Unfortunatelly, Fitbit devices cannot pair with external sensors but nothing stops you from using both devices separately (I have been doing that for the time until my Ionic broke).

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