Heart rate zones: more of them, all editable/customizable

[branning]

The heart rate zone feature is great, but the user-editable heart rate "zone" is not useful at all. The common heart-rate training protocols include up to 5 heart rate zones, and the beginning and end all need to be editable according to the individual's own maximum heart rate.

Ideally, these would also have editable names.

Zone	HR begin	HR end
Z1 light	100	130
Z2 easy	130	140
Z3 aero	140	150
Z4 anaerobic	150	160
Z5 VO2max	160	190

Moderator edit: added labels

[dude]

I have to mess with my age to get anything like the right max, and then the thresholds aren't really right. You should allow inputting 5 zones, either as plain numbers, or as %ages of heart rate reserve, the difference between resting heart rate and max. Age based max really does not cut it, it only works on average, and no-one is average.

[emqua]

I agree. I would like to be able to customize the HR zones. Input all my zones and also my rate of burn.  Used the bike feature on surge and it calculated 5 cal/min burn.  Not accurate as I burn 6.8 cal/min in zone1, 7.5 cal/min in zone 2, 9.0 cal/min in zone 3, 9.4 cal/mn in zone 4 and 10.9 cal/min in zone 5. Can not even do my own calculations since the only info I get is min in fat burn, cardio and peak.

[Vandeskog]

I think this is a really good and necessary suggestion (and should obviously be adopted for the Surge as well as the Charge HR). It is established that the variations within age groups, even with the newer, morse precise formulas for estimating max HR, are so significant that it is highly recommended to do a test to establish your individual maximum heart rate. For those of us who have done this, it is quite frustrating to not be able to set that as parameter and have the hear rate zones adjusted accordingly by our Fitbit device. Providing this feature, while maintaining the option to stick with the automatically calculated zones, would significantly increase the user-friendliness and the accuracy of the devices.

[hymer]

 please fix this

[LucyAP]

I like this idea a lot @branning, I think that can be really helpful. Thanks for sharing your idea on the Feature Request Board!

Hopefully this will be implemented in the future, so keep voting!

[blb4]

Hi Lucy, I have voted for this feature months ago and this request is already made a year ago. I hope Fitbit is not waiting for implementations of this functionality until enough (and what's enough?) votes are collected as it is really a shame Fitbit is using this very simple and stupid rule as 220 - age. This rule is a - very safe - starting point for people not have any clue about their heart rate but everybody who is a bit interested in heart rate and fitness knows this rule doesn't make ANY sense. Every company active in this (HR) field who takes their customers and fitness/sports activities a bit serious must offer customisable Heart rate zones.

P.S. Nothing personal against you Lucy, but it's a bit frustrating I don't see any move from Fitbit in this direction in the 10 months I'm using my Charge HR.

[gmoog]

Hello,

In addition to custom heart rate, there is such a thing as the Karvonen formula. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heart_rate contains a reference to the formula.

Compared to the classic and limited 220-age formula, the Karvonen formula accounts for the Resting Heart Rate in determining the various heart rate zones. It thus introduce the concept of heart capacity (consider 2 persons of 20 years old, one with a resting heart rate of 30 bpm the other of 80 bpm, the person with 30 bpm Rest heart rate has more capacity (roughly 220-20-30=170) and can train harder than the other one (220-20-80=120)) which will be reflected by the Karvonen formula.

Accounting for the resting heart rate thanks to the Karvonen formula is more flexible. It allows to adpat the heart rate zones to ones capacity making it more interesting even from a liability standpoint (less risk to over train now that each individual capacity is accoutned for) while keeping the flexibility brought by a heart rate formula.

Hope this get read and implemented. Best to all of you

[rah5]

I just started using the chargeHR this week.  I bought the ChargeHR for the HR feature.   The HR features seem almost an afterthought in the implementation of the firmware and the phone application. I hope that their will be a future firmware/app update that will allow for this and not require the purchase of a new fitbit model.

Here's some ideas:

There should be at least four or five customizable heart rates zones.  Allowing the customizable zones would alleviate the need to worry about whether you are using the outdated 220 method, Phil Maffetone's 180 method, or the myriad of other methods as folks that care could customize the zones as needed.

There should be many more configurable alerts for heart rate zones - like:

- each zone should include optional and customizable vibrate/sound alerts for each range

- allowing voice alerts when heart rate zone changes would be useful (you already have option to have voice alerts at various distances).  Saying your in zone 1, 2, 3,4, or 5 should be straight forward.

- allow heart rate to be said at specific intervals (i.e. every 30 seconds it would say heart rate xxx bpm.)

There heart rate watch display options could include:

- If the display/OLEDs allowed it, you could even display the heart rate zones in different colors (for those of us that are not color blind) for simple visual indicate of zone regarless of whether it's the time, heart rate, distance, etc being displayed. 

- Being able to have the heart rate displayed all the time or having the auto feature configurable to show the heart rate instead of time would be a natural feature when in exercise mode.

[Dave526]

Enble users to view the Charge HR calculated values for each of the 3 heart rate zones:  For example:

Fat Burn: 89

Cardio: 124

Peak: 150

Right now I can find no way to view those values on the phone or Web app.  I know they are available because the graphs and statistics use those values in their displays.

[Taylor5846]

I'll add my vote for this feature.  Not just for the adjustable max heart rate, but also because the ranges should take your resting heart rate into account.  I tend to prefer Karvonen formula: Zone 1 starts at ((MaxHR-RestingHR)*.6) + RestingHR) and goes to ((MaxHR- RestingHR)*.7) + RestingHR).

[AngiH]

Please let me input my own max heart rate. Thank you.

[phlipp]

I agree, please add the ability to select one's own value. One option that may help is to use or allow choice of a more up to date overall equation, eg Tanaka et al (2001) [http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11153730] or Gellish et al (2007) [http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17468581]. But athletes or people with health issues may still need to be well outside the predicted value. I am no athlete and never have been, but at the gym I could only exercise at a wimpy level if I were to stick to the 220 - age equation - and can still converse happily at nearly my supposed MHR. 

[Ultramarathoner]

I support the idea of adjustable heart rate ranges. This is necessary because of the diversity of individuals who use Fitbit. I have applied all the tricks that I can to adapt the Fitbit calculations (reduced my age by 14 years to raise my max HR, reduced my height by 11 cm to reset the BMR, and entered my stride length to get correct distance estimates), but the HR zones still don't work for me because my resting heart rate is low. I can walk very briskly and not get anywhere close to fat-burning mode.

Those who are unfit maybe should be advised to consult their physician regarding their target zones. Those who are serious athletes and have low resting heart rates may want to set up their zones using percent of heart rate reserves which uses both resting heart rate and maximum heart rate as inputs. If anyone is interested, I suggest-

Fat Burning Mode= Resting Heart Rate + (0.2 to 0.5)*(Max Heart Rate - Resting Heart Rate)

Aerobic Cardio Mode= Resting HR + (0.5 to 0.8)*(Max HR - Resting HR)

Anaerobic Peak Mode= Resting HR + (0.8 to 1.0)*(Max HR-Resting HR)

[blb4]

Met vriendelijke groet,

Bernard Bierhaus

[RunRachelleRun]

Agreed. Time to allow us to enter our own zones. My lab-tested max is 200 at age 42, not 178. 

[d_thomas02]

I agree, we need to be able to edit our heart rate zones.

Some have mentioned 'tricking' FitBit by change your age to get the correct max heart rate. Changing just your age to fix your max HR will throw off the BMR calculation used to calculate your exercise burns. Use the Mifflin-St Jeor equation to calculate your correct BMR:

BMR = 9.99*weightKg + 6.25*heightCm - 4.92*ageYears + s

where s is +5 for males and -161 for femal

And then, using your correct BMR and theortical age (to get the correct max HR) refigure your theortical height:

TheoreticalHeightCm = (BMR - 9.99*weightKg + 4.92*TheoreticalAgeYears - s) / 6.25

You will also need to manually enter your actual stride length for walking and running so FitBit doesn't use your theortical height to estimate these lengths.

So while I'm a 5'10, 208 lb (94.5 kg), 56 yr old man in order to trick FitBit into giving my my correct max heart rate without messing up my calorie burn I'm theoritically a 5'2", 208 lb, 30 year old man with a 2'5" walking stride and 3'10" jogging stride.

Extreme work-arounds like this are unexpected for an otherwise quality product.

[Amamda]

I think there should be a way we could change our own heart rate zones, all 3 zones not just high and low. I had a V02 test done and my heart rate zones are different from calculating them by age. It would help while exercising to know what zone I'm truly in for the goals I'm trying to achieve.

Thanks,

Amanda

[mfoti1]

How about you start with redisning the fitbit one holder.  It is a known issue. The plastic tip starts to slip off. In fact I have already lost one tip. Have had the One since October of 2014. I have gone thru 4 holders. It seems unreasonable that I should have to crazy glue this piece on repeatedly.

[Amamda]

Mfoti1 you should add a new post for this comment so they can see it. You're under my HR one which has nothing to do with your issue.

[LWalther]

Dear Fitbit team,

the Charge HR ist really good in monitoring the heart rates at rest or activities of daily live / mild exercise. But if if comes to very intense exercise, high heart rates and lots of sweat (HIIT, Freeletics etc.) the heart rate is very often counted way too low or is not counted at all. I was never able to exceed a heartrate above 120-140 bpm even if I work my HR up to 200 no matter how I wear my Fitbit Charge HR.

In my perception this is a problem that seems to be commonly noticed in the community.

I understand that these might be natural limitations of the optical purepulse technology.

Therefore I suggest an additional device like a heart belt or impedance scanning which is optimized for high intensitiy workouts involving lots of wrist moving and that can be integrated with the app easily.

I would buy this additional advice for my training sessions without hesitation.

It could also be a good addition if you want to monitor your heart  rate while exercising but only own a fitbit device that doesn't have a pulse monitoring built in.

Kind regards

L.Walther

Moderator Edit: Labels

[WCRower]

Another vote/request for being able to set custom heart rate zones.  I know the 220-age has been used as a "standard", but it was derived looking at a group of younger men, diverges from more nuanced formulas after the age of 40, and is pretty useless for women over 60 like me.   (And yes I've been tested so I know my actual MHR is much higher.)  Yes, I still get the data, but it's very distracting to have all that color coding and have to make the mental adjustments.  

[WCRower]

Another vote/request for being able to set custom heart rate zones.  I know the 220-age has been used as a "standard", but it was derived looking at a group of younger men, diverges from more nuanced formulas after the age of 40, and is pretty useless for women over 60 like me.   (And yes I've been tested so I know my actual MHR is much higher.)  Yes, I still get the data, but it's very distracting to have all that color coding and have to make the mental adjustments.  

EDIT TO ADD - also agree with the request for custom labels.  

[neztur]

I agree, there should be the option to monitor your custom heart zones instead of the app default zones.

[pcraenme]

After 10 months I still don't see any movement of Fitbit on this. In the meanwhile its competitors have introduced new products that have more features at similar price levels. E.g. Garmin just announced the VivoActive HR which both support fully customizable HR zones and max HR setting. So Fitbit, any news on supporting this in the near future? The Fitbit Surge has both HR and GPS on board, but cannot be used as a serious sports watch because of the lacking HR zones. If not, I am afraid I have to switch to Garmin soon.

[MaxQuant]

Totally need this...there are various standards for HR zones (Karvonen,Zoladz etc) and should be able to adopt whichever suits the user...customize ranges for 1,2,3 most important for me. Charge HR.