Option to turn off step count (or add "Driving Mode") to avoid erroneous steps/floors

[MacWade]

I just got home yesterday from a driving 6 hours in my car and I checked my Fitbit. I was really suprised to see it had given me almost 8,000 steps, 3.24 miles, 134 floors, & way more calories thank I burned while I was sitting in my car.  I looked on the forum to see how to easily delete the steps, miles, floors, and calories so my data would be accurate.  The only way people are fixing it is by manually logging the activity "Automobile or light truck (not a semi) driving" and entering in the duration.  I think that is a cumbersome way to fix the issue everytime I drive because I have to make sure I write down what time I get into and out of my car so I know the start time and duration.  And how does it automatically know the calories burned when everyone burns calories when they are sedentary at different rates.

I think they should add a "Drive Mode" feature that when turned on it won't add steps, distance, floors, & will only add calories burned equal to you sitting in a chair.

You could access the "Drive Mode" either on your Fitbit One or on your phone app to turn it on/off.  If you have a Fitbit One you could press the button till the "Drive Mode" icon appears then hold the button down for 2 seconds to turn it on or off.

On the phone apps you would just go to your device under "Account" and there you could turn it on or off.

You could also have the option to give you an alert when you unlock the phone that reminds you that it is in "Drive Mode" so you don't forget to turn it off when you get to your destination.  It would also be cool if you could use Siri to turn it on by saying "Turn on Fitbit Drive Mode" or "Turn off Fitbit Drive Mode".

[Donna80]

Perhaps they could just fix the arm movements / steps detection. I get a whole load of steps logged when I clean my teeth or wash my face.

[Alison2016]

I get steps recorded while driving, riding horses and other stuff where I'm not walking. Makes the whole step tracker a joke if I can't delete them. I know we've been asking for the horseback one since 2015 and see thats now been locked.....so not holding my breath but AT LEAST let us delete steps .

[Odyssey13]

Hi @Alison2016

The ability to replace steps with an activity has been around since before 2015, but here is a thread you might wish to read - click

[Ton]

Meet Charge 3!!!

Now you can even make contactless payments now, never mind all those steps still counted while you're sleeping or driving...

I just can't believe their technology is advancing so much, and yet it's not capable to add a stupid on/off switch to avoid those stupid steps...

[Malgosia.]

I think my question says it all. 

I hate that the only solution is a third party app that you would have to manually log in each time you are getting in and out of the car,  motorcycle,  riding lawn mower,  etc. Even when driving slowly through residential streets,  it logged my activity as a bike ride.  I can see when those steps are logged so I can figure out about how much I should take off in my head but I wish the app allowed me to delete steps at certain times. This has been happening to me on the Versa by the way. 

[ocalvete]

Hi team, 

First I want to say Thanks for your product, so far I am happy.

Part of my work is driving on an exploration site, for example, a farm or any type of road without pavement.

I have noticed my IONIC is counting steps while driving, so my hands and arms are vibrating while driving on those roads.

You guys can develop a firmware to cancel those miscounting steps while driving and the accelerometer detects that movement.

Appreciate if you guys can help me with this.

Thanks, 

Oscar

[Lilbiddy]

If they can develop a driving mode I would be happy to see it available in the exercise shortcuts on my charge 2. It would still register heart rate but ignore movement. 

[Azmh]

Please add a “Pause” option.

Thank you

[rslrsl]

It is rather annoying that while sleeping and driving the step count goes up. I can stop doing jumping jacks in my sleep but I can't stop driving to work. Would it be possible to add a button to the FitBit UI that will just stop step tracking until turned back on? I know there is a way to log a driving activity to overwrite the steps used but this is tedious.

Thanks for your time.

[AlexandraFitbit]

Hi @rslrsl! Thanks for your suggestion, I moved it to this similar post so you can add your vote to it. Please keep sharing your ideas. 

[Sborden]

This needs to be done and soon, these postings go all the way back to 2014. Get it together FitBit Devs, its not that difficult, i work with Developers on a daily basis and it does not take this long

[Birddog171]

As a new customer,  I pitched a similar idea to customer support. After some back and forth, they directed me to this forum to upvote this suggestion and comment. I was shocked to discover that such a well presented suggestion, with 2332 votes and over 800 comments has been ignored for over 4 years...

It is easy to see why this company continues to lose market share in a category they invented. I presented them with several different solutions to this issue and they tell me to take it off while driving. This feature suggestion has averaged more than 1 vote a day since being posted more than 4 years ago and still not resolved...why did they send me here again?

Sincerely, 

Vote# 2333

[SetxSpyder]

Just bought the Versa...had it one day and already conquered 20,000 steps and 200 floors!!! Wow FITBIT... what an accomplishment!

seriously... I took a ride on my motorcycle today and this was the result.  This REALLY skews the results of all the stats and calculations.... especially when I see no way to delete them.   I put in a Driving activity but cant see where that subtracted the floors and the steps.

Come on.. for such a nice device.. if its going to be fooled.. give us an opton to turn tracking off when we are doing an activity that we KNOW is going to mess up all metrics of our workout .... I bought this as a health device.. and dont intend to ride my motorcycle without it but this needs addressing!  (and no I dont want to use a third party app to accomplish it) 

[Ton]

My opinion? At this point I think no one is reading here beside us customers. The moderators who faintly replied in the past have no power to do anything, even to push the problem to the levels which count. Thus, this is a dead thread with no hope after 4 and a half years for a satisfactory response. Shame on them...

[Rich_Laue]

Many times in the past moderators have said that they have brought up the concearned of the Fitbit users to the developers. My guess is that with some features, maybe all, there are powers above the developers that get involved with the decisions.

As pointed out, there are hundreds of features suggested on this board that have made it into Fitbit trackers. No one has ever said that every suggestion is going to make it into the product .I can see both pros and cons with this request.

In the past Fitbit has added suggestions with thousands of votes, and within a day we have a suggestion to have the newly added suggestion removed. 

[Tamfin]

I'm a truck driver and I just got my fitbit yesterday. I haven't had much time to use it so far, but I was wearing while driving today and it registered 4742 steps so far. I've only actually walked MAYBE 1000 so far and the rest were all bumps on the road. I like this product and I got it because I'm trying to get in better shape and lose weight, but unless I'm able to disable the step counter when I need to I'm not going to get accurate readings for anything.

[Antares981]

I would like that option too

[5ergio]

Guys, don’t hold your breath for a solution to this issue...

The One has the same problem and 4 years, 2346 Votes and 826 comments later it is still "Reviewed By Moderator", not even "Under Consideration".

Honestly this thing is ridiculous, and it does not have any real fix, you can just decide which statistic you want to screw.

If you do nothing, you add steps you didn't do. If you use DriveFit, you add activities you didn’t do that count for your Weekly Exercise Goals.

Oh yeah, you can still switch off your watch every time you drive, and switch it on when you arrive, but this takes forever, because they didn’t even think about implementing a switch off shortcut and you have to swipe to the Settings app, wait a few seconds for it to start, scroll all the way down to About, tap, scroll down again all the way to Shutdown and then tap. Why they had to bury this way a function that is so basic is beyond me.

[vlkirkpatrick]

I drive a school bus for a living and have been using DriveBit on my phone with my Charge HR. Today I upgraded to the Versa. It would be so awesome to be able to pause tracking while I drive the bus so I don't have a zillion miscounted steps. I don't want to turn it off. I use it as a watch as I drive my route to keep the bus on schedule, so turning it off would cause a problem for me. Please implement a pause feature.

[Karen0901]

I keep getting steps recorded when I am riding even with the tracker HR Charge 2 in my pocket, and when I go up hills they are being recorded, very annoying, could you use the logic that if there is no heart rate there should be no steps recorded? 

[LawrenceH]

Another vote for this option from me.  How this has gone unanswered for 4 years is incomprehensible.

Got my Charge 3 a couple of days ago and am on the verge of sending it back unless this feature can be added which is looking unlikely.  I get an additional 14k steps and 200 flights of stairs per day going to/from work.  Makes no difference if it's on my wrist or in my bag and there's no way of turning it off.  Logging into the website and doing stuff there isn't a solution, it's a bodge.  This could be fixed so simply, but them not doing so renders the device completely useless.

[MarcelBK]

Hey @Karen0901! Thank you for sharing your suggestion. Because your idea is very similar to this one I moved your suggestion here. Please do not forget to give kudos by clicking on the thumbs up button.

[SerendipityGCC]

It is a disgrace that this was flagged in 2014 and now in 2018 not that far off 2019 and its still not fixed.  I will be returning my fitbit and leaving reviews of my experience as without this fixed the device is totally unfit for purpose

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@MacWade wrote:

I just got home yesterday from a driving 6 hours in my car and I checked my Fitbit. I was really suprised to see it had given me almost 8,000 steps, 3.24 miles, 134 floors, & way more calories thank I burned while I was sitting in my car.  I looked on the forum to see how to easily delete the steps, miles, floors, and calories so my data would be accurate.  The only way people are fixing it is by manually logging the activity "Automobile or light truck (not a semi) driving" and entering in the duration.  I think that is a cumbersome way to fix the issue everytime I drive because I have to make sure I write down what time I get into and out of my car so I know the start time and duration.  And how does it automatically know the calories burned when everyone burns calories when they are sedentary at different rates.

I think they should add a "Drive Mode" feature that when turned on it won't add steps, distance, floors, & will only add calories burned equal to you sitting in a chair.

You could access the "Drive Mode" either on your Fitbit One or on your phone app to turn it on/off.  If you have a Fitbit One you could press the button till the "Drive Mode" icon appears then hold the button down for 2 seconds to turn it on or off.

On the phone apps you would just go to your device under "Account" and there you could turn it on or off.

You could also have the option to give you an alert when you unlock the phone that reminds you that it is in "Drive Mode" so you don't forget to turn it off when you get to your destination.  It would also be cool if you could use Siri to turn it on by saying "Turn on Fitbit Drive Mode" or "Turn off Fitbit Drive Mode".

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[Eremise]

The same occurs with a speed boat.

adds a lot of steps when I sit there doing nothing...

[vyshwanara]

Unfortunately i returned my fitbit as a 8 kn ride counted 50 stairs and 100 s of steps. I mean how difficult it can be to implement a pause mode with an exclusive icon in the watch. which will result in not counting steps and stairs. and then BMR based calorie spending can be added to the count , for the pause time. is it that difficult to implement ? that too when the demand is so huge.