Real-time streaming access to Fitbit Data

[FionaYRobot]

Does Fitbit provide real-time streaming access to sensor data (heart rate, accelerometer, temperature, and any other available biometrics) for immediate analysis and intervention? Which API or SDK supports this? We need sub-3-second latency with data streaming at 1-second intervals or faster for elderly health monitoring applications that trigger real-time alerts. We're open to any Fitbit model that supports this capability.

[Gondwana]

It can be done using the Device API for the sensor data exposed in that API. However, you would need to write your own comms suff, and it isn't easy. In addition, the Device API isn't supported for the most recent Fitbit OS watches (there is a third-party workaround, but that adds another layer of difficulty).

[FionaYRobot]

Hi, thank you. My students have background in AI programming. It should be fine to us, as long as it's possible.

There are different Fitbit smartwatches. Which one is the best option in our situation?

[Gondwana]

Probably the original Sense (but not Sense 2, because the SDK for Sense 2 was never released).Those may be very hard to obtain now.

I'm not sure that AI programming will be very relevant because you'll need to do a lot of fairly low-level comms coding.

Before spending any money, study the API to see what you can and can't get, and how you'll have to do the comms. There's also a few projects here that demonstrate sensor data streaming.

I think there are also some lingering reliability problems with Fitbit comms, so it may not be possible to stream data for long periods without user intervention. Or maybe I just write bad code.

[FionaYRobot]

Thank you. We'll take a look at these.