Make sleep score optional

Suggested idea is to have the sleep score optional ! 

We should be able to choose if we have the score or not , I hate feeling like I failed my sleep!

 

Moderator edit: updated subject for clarity

1,450 Comments
AZLivesUK
Jogger

Please please please make the sleep score optional.  It is really discouraging when you wake up and feel good about your sleep and then you get some silly score that makes no sense. I feel like I am back in school never measuring up quite good enough. I am going to stop wearing my Fitbit at night unless I need the alarm. 

Savcab
First Steps

Totally agree, sleep score is useless and should be optional 

NRLee
Jogger

No matter if I get 11 hours or 4 my sleep score us fair or poor. What gives? I don’t find it helpful at all. In fact,  I find it stressful. Every single time I look at it.  I just want to track my hours and type of sleep.  I don't need you to judge me on it.  Please make it an option and not a set feature and give your faithful clients a break. 

Crazyscientist
First Steps

I want my sleep average back!

please stop showing me the sleep score. Last thing I need is to wake up after a decent night of sleep and see a sleep score of 73, with doubts creeping in about that well rested feeling. please, either make it go away, or make it optional 

Runner0001
Recovery Runner

Hey savcab

Hey Crazyscientist

Welcome to the throng of the ignored. Please don't forget to review this wonderful piece of...software on Google Play or iTunes. Every one star helps. Also please review your device accordingly.

AUD2
First Steps

I have not read most of the 1030+ comments (42 pages!) posted since July 2019, but judging from my own experience and feedback from randomly selected pages, we are asking to make the sleep score optional and have the ability to see the week’s avg sleep duration. So i wonder: why has Fitbit not implemented this yet? Jow many more comments are needed before action is taken? 

if there are tools/solutions that i don’t know about to get tide of the sleep score or make it optional, PLS let me know. If no such solutions are yet available, i urge Fitbit to take action on the customer feedback provided so far. Thanks!

carolyn917
First Steps

As a 70 year old woman who has used Fitbit for years, I find the Sleep Score to be a bullying, millennial driven, competitive invasion of my privacy.  Before I was FORCED to look at what someone else thinks of my night's sleep I was very positive about the sleep feature.  I checked my benchmarks and was usually very satisfied with the information I gathered.  Now even a good nights sleep comes out with a score of FAIR.  Is your algorithm using 20- something year old developers as the model?  Either way, now someone else is TELLING me and I find it invasive and  creepy.  I no longer recommend the Versa to anyone, and I'm within days of ditching it until this feature is made optional.

 

Cara F. 

Runner0001
Recovery Runner

Hey aud2,

If you have an Android you can go to Alpha Pi Kappa mirror dot com and get version 2.78 and never update again. There are numerous YouTube videos teaching the rest.

If you have an iPhone, my sympathies. There's supposedly a way but it involves sacrificing a pig at the vernal equinox...wait, that's to change the ringtone. Anyway, it's supposedly possible. Again YouTube it.

Runner0001
Recovery Runner

I don't have high hopes of this being fixed. In another discussion here, people have been asking for a simple alert added for those who exercise with a Fitbit to know when they reach peak rate/max heart rate. It's been going for FIVE YEARS! Talk about an easy thing to do. Fitbit simply doesn't care what we want or what we think.

SunsetRunner
Not applicable

I suspect that the reason why Fitbit isn't responding is due to Google looking to purchase Fitbit. So we might need to wait until an offer is made and see what Google will do...we might need to switch to Google Fit. Time will tell. So I would say hold tight and see what happens once Google takes over Fitbit. It seems Google is trying to compete with Garmin and Apple for the lion's share of the market! https://qz.com/1737155/what-google-buying-fitbit-says-about-the-future-of-wearables/

AUD2
First Steps
Oh.. got it! Thanks for helping me adjust my expectations. That’s really too bad that they are unresponsive to customer feedback..


Sent from my iPhone
AUD2
First Steps
Thanks for your feedback. I have an iphone so i better start looking for a pig to sacrifice! 😉


Sent from my iPhone
DALwpg
Base Runner
Now this is clever. Thank you.
You hoo! Fitbit- anybody home???

Sent from my iPhone
Runner0001
Recovery Runner

Update:

One, two, Fitbit changed on you

 

Three, four, Here's a lousy sleep score

 

Five, six, They'll never, ever fix

 

Seven, eight, They've sealed their fate

 

Nine, ten, Now I’ll buy a Garmin

 

[ Do I have nothing better to do? ]

SunsetRunner
Not applicable

Here's a list of who's who in terms of Fitbit interest. I find it interesting that Nike isn't making an offer since Google already has its own tracker. And Apple would be just as good based on what the iWatch is doing, but I would be concerned with the cost to upgrade if they continue to build ono the Fitbit model. I might be looking at Garmin...that way, I could not only track my steps, but I would also be able to use it for my yardages on the golf course. https://www.fool.com/investing/2019/09/25/3-companies-that-could-acquire-fitbit.aspx

cyp7
Jogger

So this blog here is just for us users to chat, unless we post about a competitor in a positive way and that will be deleted. So we know this gets monitored. 

The algorithm for sleep score is a simple one where the more you sleep, the better your score. It’s a pretty high school freshman algorithm because whoever actually wrote the firmware to detect deep vs REM vs light sleep did a nice job. Then as “user” we get to select our target sleep goal. A legitimate algorithm would use the 30 day average across the three sleep stages with the target goal factored in to determine if overall sleep goal was achieved. 

Whoever wrote the math for the sleep score, as it currently is, wrote a very juvenile algorithm. In fact, it’s so basic and juvenile that I Bet the firmware devs are furious that some intern who’s the kid of some exec got to code such a substantial change to the dashboard that is simultaneously so hated. 

So hang in there, bloggers, b/c if you stay anywhere long enough you’ll see change. And the intern who wrote the sleep score code is back in college and when holiday sales are down, FitBit execs will have the next intern go through all these blogs to find out why. Won’t they be surprised. 

DALwpg
Base Runner
Well cyp7 The execs will be nowhere near as surprised as we are if they ever do something about it. Thousands of posts over several months and as you correctly point out all we get is lists moved to a new stream under new headings created to mask the significance of the complaints, posts deleted if they hit too close to the truth in too sharp language for the Tender sensitivities of moderators, and senior management and executives who seem to be oblivious to the significance of the complaints of their customers.

Fitbit users more eloquent than I and with far more significant sleep problems have spoken Passionately about the problems the sleep score causes them. No response.
Users have provided logical arguments, they have pleaded, and no response.

Users have complained about the new imposed dashboard. The impacts are not what the sleep score is doing to people with sleep problems But the new dashboard is quite simply subpar and substandard. As one user with a sense of humour said it was an upgrade that was really a downgrade. And it was imposed of that with no choice.

And that seems to be the problem users have no choice as far as fitted is concerned. We shall impose and you shall use. And if we can get away with that you shall pay.

What a sad state.

Sent from my iPhone
Runner0001
Recovery Runner

cyp7

Two flaws in that logic

One is we've had the sleep score for awhile now and there is no correlation between time asleep and the score. It's just a randomly assigned number--no algorithm is needed or used.

 

Two is we have zero control over whether we get more deep sleep or more light sleep or less awake time. Setting an unattainable goal is detrimental to the human psyche. I might as well try to be taller.

MsMagma
First Steps

The sleep score is ridiculous and useless. I got a glorious 10+ hour night of sleep and received a score lower than an 8 hour night, while percentages in each sleep stage were almost identical between the two nights. I can only assume that Fitbit believes that I slept too much.

 

Like every other human, I find seeing my average sleep for the week on the main sleep screen to be much more valuable than a meaningless, seemingly arbitrary number over which we have no control.

 

I got a 3 hour 13 minute night of sleep last night and scored an improbable 76 (!!!!), while I've scored lower for almost 7 hour nights.

 

It's such a bald-faced money grab by Fitbit to take away an easy to understand feature and replace it with something so ridiculous and opaque that we must pay a premium to "learn more" about. I suspect that all we'd get would be the same old tips like turning off screens to improve our sleep score. Not worth it, and an insult to your customers, Fitbit.

cyp7
Jogger

Nepotism is the reason for the juvenile Sleep Score. Some intern wrote a junk algorithm but the person is likely related to an executive so the users are stuck with junk. 

Sad. 

Dajjer
Base Runner

Well, I was in Dillards and they had a Fitbit like device called itouch. The wearables look like a Versa or charge, but they run between 30 to 60 bucks. they also sell them at Target, Walmart and Pennys. They look pretty functional with all the traditional stuff like heart beat, steps, sleep, gps etc. but the device's battery runs for between 21 days to 14 hours depending on the amount of functionality you use.  The app also seems basic as in bare bones.  No type of fitness community I could find anywhere on the net or in the app. . But the app developers have a "coming soon" page for their app that, when updated,  will come fairly close to what Fitbit has now.

 

I'm thinking of getting one and using my Fitbit zip, to keep my basic numbers going. When Fitbit gets its act together, I will  switch back. Taking a break from sleep scores should help ME get better at my sleep.

Runner0001
Recovery Runner

Dajjer,

Buy one. Try it out. I tried a couple of those from Amazon before purchasing my Fitbit. They don't work. The heart rate is as random as Fitbit's sleep score. At least with Fitbit it accurately monitors your heartrate.

 

If we keep at it, at some point Fitbit will be purchased by a company that does care about its customers, its stock price, and it's app. Until then, if you can't downgrade to an older version, get rid of the sleep tile altogether and use pencil and paper to keep track of your sleep. It's algorithms for what kind of sleep you're getting aren't accurate anyway and its phantom awake times with each twitch of my arm aren't really necessary. I don't have to be awake to move my arm no matter what Fitbit tells me.

 

For its price point, it's still the most accurate device for step counting and heartrate. And since I've already bought it....

cyp7
Jogger

Come on FitBit. Get rid of Sleep Score please. It doesn’t even correlate to my Sleep Goal. I can meet my own Sleep Goal and still see “Fair”. That’s not right. Push an update please. 

Dajjer
Base Runner

Runner0001

 

I've learned from my Doc that not even Fitbit is accurate with its data however it is consistent and I'm okay with that. My activity level is great but my sleep activity really sucks.  Fitbit had gotten my sleep hours up from 4 to 5, now I am trying to get up to 5.5 and then 6, etc.  However the sleep score has delayed my progress. Yes it is a psychological thing going on but, well there ya go.

 

The new device is kinda lame and sometimey  but as long as I can just log hours slept, I'm good. Besides the device is so cheap, I'll just skip a few lunches to make up for the cost.

 

As far as Fitbit updating the app, I don't think that is going to happen anytime soon. Its such an easy fix so that it's clear to me it is a conscience effort on their part to keep the sleep score there. And no, I don't think it has to do with Fitbit premium. That would have to be the worst PR job of all time, lay our a crummy product and then say "hey why not upgrade" . . . .  I don't think so.

 

Funny thing about it, Fitbit premium has some good exercise programs and I was considering getting it. But with the sleep score fiasco, no way, no how. The company is just far too unresponsive.

 

CLSche45
First Steps

I hate the sleep score so much. It doesn’t make any sense for one. Yesterday I got the same amount of sleep as today. Today I got more Rem and more deep. But somehow yesterday was average and today was poor.

 

I’m also a parent of an infant who gets up one time a night. I go to bed on time and get up on time. But because I get up that one time, my sleep score is never good. That’s dumb. I think it’s safe to assume many people using fitbits are type A personalities (because data.) well, type A personalities like to win. A contest that can never be won makes me want to stop using the Fitbit entirely. I have already looked into other smart watches and looked specifically for things that don’t tell me I failed at sleep when I got the correct amount of hours and went to bed on time.

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