Adding Cross Country/Backcountry Skiing to exercises

This suggestion is to add Cross Country Skiing as an activity on Fitbit Charge3. Skiing is one of our main activity half of the year in Norway and it would be great to have a specific activity option for just that. 

 

Moderator Edit: Clarified subject

155 Comments
Digitalis
First Steps
Sorry to hear of your experiences.... I ended up using "Bike" for XC skiing. It gave reasonable results, but no intervals. The other issues was that on colder days the additional glove layer resulted in poor GPS tracking. Not so easy to trade off.

Skiing season is brief (or nonexistent) here, so it is now kayaking season. The kayak paddle stroke emulates the wrist activation, so the display is on more or less continuously. Kills battery life which is not up to a full day of tracked touring anyway.

Maybe Garmin have a better product for unsophisticated grunts!
PiperPizza
First Steps

Please add cross country skiing as an exercise option! 

Prof41
First Steps
There is more than 457 request for "country ski" for Versa and not one answer from Fitbits ??? What kind of support is this, the community is raging and is frustrated? No one from FITBIT has replied so far...
Odyssey13
Community Legend

Hi @Prof41  first, you need to know how the process works for getting a suggestion to become reality - click to learn how. When you post and have a link, it's helpful. I found a suggestion for adding cross country skiing and it only has 241 votes and a moderator did respond to it. 

LizzyFitbit
Premium User
Fitbit Moderator
Fitbit Moderator

Hi @Prof41, thanks for sharing this suggestion about adding Cross Country Skiing as a shortcut on the Exercise app with us. This idea was already requested in the Feature Suggestions board, so I’ve moved your post here as this will help us to make sure the suggestions don't get confused, or split a popular vote. Your feedback is truly appreciated and we'll keep working to make Fitbit more useful for you. To learn more about how Fitbit decides which suggestions get developed, visit our FAQs.

FannyJ
First Steps

Yes!! This is something other acticity trackers have, so add skiing (cross country skiing especially!).

LZeeW
Ultramarathon Racer

Please add cross country skiing.  Fitbit's lack of popular exercise shortcuts is one of the things that makes other brands more appealing.

FootballTurtle
First Steps

Please add cross country skiing or NordicTrack! I have used a NordicTrack skier for 10+ years and is is awesome exercise but I would like to be able to use a shortcut on my Fitbit for it!

MC-GG
First Steps

Why do you ignore the repeated requests of adding Nordic ski to fitbit exercises list?

KP_Trondheim
First Steps

Yea! Please add cross country skiing!

I understand there might be issues collecting step counts during this activity, but GPS and distance should be able to do the job fine

Thanks 👍

HelgeD
Jogger

I ended up switching to apple. That would be my suggestion! --

Moderator Edit: Personal info removed

Marshbark
First Steps
I initiated a request and Fitbit never responds.
HelgeD
Jogger

Been doing it for years. Ended up as apple user..

--

Moderator Edit: Personal info removed

DavidSthlm
First Steps

How is this going?

Prof41
First Steps
Same here…. Anybody knows waht activity choice can we substitute that could be the closest to track our croos coitry skiing on Fitbit Versa ?

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JulieLama
First Steps
Add Cross country Ski icon
YojanaFitbit
Moderator Alum
Moderator Alum

Hi @JulieLama, thanks for taking the time to share this suggestion about adding Cross Country Skiing as an exercise shortcut. I've moved it into a similar suggestion which has been updated as "Under Consideration". To learn more about how Fitbit decides which suggestions get developed, visit our FAQs.


 I hope to see you around.

PontusBerg
Jogger

I really can't understand why this is an issue. If the app has a plethora of sports - basically and one you can think of - and then you sync a selected subset to the watch (like with clock faces). Really ...

Prof41
First Steps
Are you talking aboit the Versa 2 ? This is the one we are requesting the « country skiing ». None of the offered choices calculates the mileage properly !
Can tou help a little more about programming a sub-sport please and where to find or sync a country skiing compatible sport ?

Many many thanks

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Marshbark
First Steps
I requested cross country skiing be added to Fitbit devices. Fitbit does
not respond. I am not Fitbit. I am about ready to give up on this company
for reasons not listed here. They have gone downhill.
DvorahR
First Steps

This is a major activity in Canada as well. I was very disappointed to see that it isn't an option. I have been choosing "outdoor exercise" which really doesn't describe the exercise well at all.

Anne-Hilde
First Steps

Hi! Please please add cross country skiing! I was so surprised today when I found out. What?! Today my 35 kilometers were tracked as 24. Not exactly accurate. Think I chose something like walking as I didn’t find the option. 

Prof41
First Steps
Very sad that Fitbit do ‘t even give try or even reply. They don’t seem to answer to any of these request. for Versa 2

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Digitalis
First Steps
The Charge 4 really struggles with cross country skiing (set a biking/run/outdoor workout). The primary problem with tracking is probably due to difficulties deciphering GPS (or GNSS) signals under layers of static-prone clothing. Only one of ten recent ski trips completed tracking, and that had long missing sections. The latter tended to be near evergreen forest where GNSS signals are compromised. Without an external choke antenna, (or phone-enabled GPS like Strava) I am not sure that this can be fixed. However, it might be nice if instead of giving up, fitbit managed to restart the tracking once the signal improves.

There are also a number of cases where the device errs or fails. The tracking might terminate during a brief break when no pause was selected. I also get a "battery not charging" notice when on the trail (or bike). Not a low battery issue (50-80%). No idea what this is about.

It seems that the reported pulse rate is a statistical estimate allowing fitbit to interpret the LED backscatter intensity (the flickering lights). Presumably, this ustilises inclinometer and accelerometer data (i.e arm and body movements) to interpret the exercise type and improve the pulse estimate. This would explain why mowing the lawn is interpreted as an outdoor bike session (elevated pulse with limited arm swing)!

To get to your point, the reported pulse rate sometimes seems to be substantially wrong. Hard uphill climbs seem low and restful downhill descents are much higher. I get different results from selecting Biking, outdoor workout and auto-detection on comparable routes.... So much as the pulse data are useful and informative, I hesitate to assume that they are correct. If so, then the whole VO2max reporting may be in doubt

My fitbit regularly fails to record pulse rate (blank reading) when exercising. When it restarts, the default (seed) value seems to be ~70bpm. As these resets can be quite frequent, they will likely cause short term drops in reported exercise pulse rates.

Some of this chaos was improved by resetting the Fitbit, but the tracking and dubious pulse recording problems have not resolved. After a year of use, maybe time to move on....Charge 5?

It might be nice if Fitbit felt confident enough to explain the situation rather than fending skiers off with upbeat platitudes.

I have not yet tried Strava (which should help the tracking at least). Then any pulse monitor would be viable, including chest monitors. Garmin devices seem costly and rather burdened with unreadable detail. Quite a few "third party" options are less costly, but likely have similar issues if they are reverse engineered from fitbit!
Roctobuf
Jogger

Yes, please add cross country skiing, I do both classic and skate but agree that a generic tracking would be great.  My previous charge 4 auto tracked it as Aerobic workout. I liked the charge 4 because it counted floors when I did uphills.  I have a new charge 4 and sometimes it tracks it as aerobic workout and sometime is tracks it partially and sometimes not at all.  I realize that it probably wasn't extremely accurate, but I liked that it tracked it.  Better than nothing.  Please consider adding this. 

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