Kayaking App for Fitbit Sense

[blen]

I've recently become enthusiastic about kayaking and just bought a new Fitbit sense. The watch is a good smatwatch & landbased tracker. I would have thought because it is waterproof & tracks swimming why can't it track kayaking. Unfortunately due to it not being able to track kayaking/SUP i might have to sell this & buy a garmin.

Moderator Edit: Clarified subject

[YojanaFitbit]

Hi @blen, and thanks for taking the time to share this suggestion about adding Kayaking App for Fitbit Sense. We rely on feedback like yours to help us develop products and features that we know our community wants to see. If this suggestion receives votes from other customers and gains popularity, it will be shared internally with various teams at Fitbit. To learn more about how Fitbit decides which suggestions get developed, visit our FAQs.

You might be interested in this other suggestion: Add Canoeing/Kayaking/Paddle Boarding as an Exercise Shortcut.

Watch this space for status updates. In the meantime, try visiting Health & Wellness to talk with other members about all things health and fitness.

[SMElls]

YojanaFitbit, In addition to @blen idea, any of the Fitbit products that have GPS enablement (Versa 3) should be a target for a Kayak selection under the "exercise" options.  And super cool to save the activity and review the route tracked Kayaking. This would be a high value add and a direct marketing feature (target) against Garmin watches.  Garmin has this, Fitbit needs to catch up.

[gotcha.h]

Dear Fitbit,

I see requests for kayaking, canoeing, stand up paddle boarding and other watersports going back to 2015. And every time you send the same comment.

There are no 3rd party apps to take over this functionality.

Also yesterday I tried to see if I could track my sup route with the "walking" exercise, but it came back to me with a 52 min workout (correct), a beautiful map of the route I took (correct) and a distance of 0,19km (hugely incorrect!). Tracking via swimming also doesn't work as it only tracks for indoor swimming.

Since people have been requesting to track watersports for over 6 years now, maybe it is time to take some action and get this development going?

[DCW62]

I agree with @gotcha.h .  You've got to get Kayaking exercise functionality.  

[gpoul]

I cannot agree more with with @gotcha.h . It has been long long time that our voice is ignored. SUP is statistically the fastest growing in popularity sport in the world. How is t possible the best activity tracker not to include this sport profile or alternatively support a compatible third party app? I am afraid you are sending people to other makers who have already included these sports profiles.

[SunsetRunner]

Hear, hear to everyone else crying out for water sport/kayaking exercise app support. It can't be that hard - Garmin have it on their watches and aren't they the parent company now?  

Fitbit, if you can't be bothered supporting exercise options that people want, at the very least, let us easily EDIT the exercises available.  Or give us a generic "water sports" that turns on the GPS and does all the other measurements that a Fitbit already does.  Honestly, it can't be that hard.

I'm actually questioning why I'm bothering to write this, but I suppose hopeful thinking?

[Yezy]

I too have become terribly disappointed that this high priced, supposedly high end fitness tracker, does not track any paddle sports. What's more, the fact that we have to indulge this increasingly out of touch company by "voting" for features...I'm about done with fitbit. I'll be looking at Garmin for my next device.

[JGSPaddle]

I totally agree with the many others who have posted, that Fitbit has to get with the program and add a kayaking and paddle boarding exercise. Just in case they haven't figured it out, it's hard to get steps in with the confinement of a kayak. Oh and have you tried to walk on a paddle board and not fall in? I find it most embarrassing posting my 'trip map' from my watch to Facebook or Instagram showing my route and a distance of .13mi. Then my wife comments online that it's too bad I don't have a Garmin because we really went 5.2mi. So I guess as Fitbit can't address this we should all switch to Garmin's. Fitbit says "If this suggestion receives votes from other customers and gains popularity, it will be shared internally with various teams at Fitbit". Seems to me there is a ton of interested expressed here - time for a 'team' to get active or face a migration to Garmin.

[Yezy]

I am with you 100%! I too have experienced the befuddling result of trying
to track my paddle by putting the versa into a walk/hike tracking mode and
have the GPS map indicate the actual path but the resulting distance as
some nonsense number. If FitBit wants to consider itself "the premier"
fitness tracker of sports smart watches, they really have to up their game.
I'm starting to develop Garmin envy!

Yezy

[johnnykro]

yes, please add watersports/kayaking!

[JGSPaddle]

I sure wish Fitbit would listen or at least acknowledge the requests here in the community. I'm still being embarrassed by my wife whose GARMIN can do paddle boarding and kayaking/canoeing. Yesterday I went for a 4 mile kayak and the Fitbit said yet again .16 mile - seems to always be .16mil no matter how far I paddle. And what was really funny is I went through an elevation change of 584 feet. Sort of hard to do when paddling on a lake wouldn't you think? This is my 3rd Fitbit and the last - can see a switch to Garmin for sure.

[Supercharlie]

JGSPaddle I have had the same experience and I need a kayaking watch. Which Garmin does your wife track kayaking with successfully? If you care about kayaking you can still get a Fitbit but you will need to buy a second different brand watch for your kayaking (or just buy one that works for everything you do). Fitbit will probably never put this feature in as it has been requested for almost 6 years, since Feb 2016! Their official "answer" to the request is manually log the exercise (with no real data). The other option is to choose "run" which gives completely fictitious results. We are probably too small of a community for Fitbit to care about. 

[JGSPaddle]

My wife has the Garmin Venu. It gives a perfect map and set of stats that look realistic. We use it on our paddle boards and kayaks.

Sent from my iPhone

[FlegmaticMan]

Still no signs of a kayak app (I'm sad).

[JGSPaddle]

Must be time to change to Garmin to get what I desperately want - the summer
will be over and so will kayaking and SUP activities. Just not in the budget
yet. I was hoping when I got notification of a Fitbit software update that
maybe they'd come through for us - NOT

[GirlKayak]

Got my Fitbit this April 2022 and unbelievable that it does not include water sports ( aside from swimming). I kayak frequently and considering it probably makes up a third of my exercise- I am really missing out on logging any data. I now wish I hadn’t been given this and instead received another brand which does  monitor kayaking/canoeing/ SUPs!

As a previous comment said- these must be one of the fastest growing activities and shame on Fitbit for not bothering to include it. Also Fitbit, don’t insult me and the community by replying with your useless default message of ‘listening to the community’ you sound like a politician who has no intention of keeping their promises. Give us  a choice of water-sports PLEASE!! And NOW, not in another 5 years time!!!! 

[Vetpaddles]

It's 2023 and still no water sports functions, i.e. kayaking. Let's get this done now! 

Let's go Fitbit! 

[DCW62]

I think I know why. 

While kayaking last year, my Sense started buzzing flashing, and vibrating, then died.  Waterproof?  maybe not. 

Out of warranty, so the best they could do was offer me a "discount" on the full price of another one - which brought the price to within a couple dollars of their christmas sale.  

Not Recommended for Kayaking or any other salt water activity!

[JGSPaddle]

I’ve had my Sense for a few years and it never comes off except to charge. We have a salt water pool, salt water hot tub and we snorkel daily in the Caribbean every year for 3 weeks. I,ve never had a problem with it not being waterproof. Maybe I’ve been lucky. Actually I might be glad if it dies so I can justify a Garmin so I finally can have stats for canoeing, kayaking, and paddle boarding that my wife keeps bragging about on her Garmin. Unless of course Fitbit gets their act together and figures out how to do it.