EDA and body responses, what does it do?

[t.parker]

So far I have no idea. I have enabled cEDA in the app in the Stress Management section. It does drain battery faster but there is a warning about it. Anyway, I'm trying to understand the purpose of using cEDA as it's a big feature and selling point for Sense 2. So far I'm only confused.

I have enabled the cEDA and since then it detected a few body responses (I don't quite understand what it is despite reading Fitbit blog). Now, the app asked me to identify my mood by selecting one of several icons. It's no different from using the EDA app on Sense but I guess it's now automated and all-day. That would be ok if only I could see something more than binary output of measuring (body response or nothing). I don't think this feature is what some people expect it to be (some kind of ringing alarm when one gets stressed). I counted that it could be an answer to Garmin's Body Battery feature but it isn't.

The notifications for responses are coming quite late so that won't be any help during a moments of stress. I believe it's more for looking back at the data in retrospect and think what was going on but that doesn't seem to be very useful. Here's example. I have received notification at 22:19 while the response has been identified 10 minutes before:

Notification came at 22:19

 And that's pretty much it.

So my question is how the cEDA feature should help? Am I missing something here? I'm not quite convinced it's worth to sacrifice battery for logging smileys (there is no even field to describe anything like "had argument with boss"), to input something meaningful.

Moderator edit: clarified subject.

[t.parker]

@denmike2 you didn't miss anything. This is mere mood logging for your own use. There is nothing smart about it. It doesn't find patterns in body responses etc. The notifications to log your mood are quite annoying and intrusive and sometimes happen when they shouldn't (like during sleep).

What I would expect from that feature? The watch won't resolve problems causing stress (won't pay my mortgage or drive car for me in morning traffic 😂) but it could at least detect patterns (something like Gamin Insights does). It isn't as important to me to log every single body response and focus on small details. More important is to look at the bigger picture and I'd rather get notification of detecting pattern, for example: "we detected higher number of body responses on Wednesdays mornings". Then I could think what I do every Wednesday morning that causes some stress. It is much better to recall something regular. Instead, the watch buzzes when body responses are detected (with 10min delay) giving a very narrow time window and asking about the mood (calm, sad, frustrated and just a few more). There is no way to place it within any context (usually more matters what happened rather than how it made me feel but that cannot be described) and number of mood tags is very limited (no way to provide custom moods). Eventually, user ends up with turning off the feature at all.

The viewing of the data isn't too helpful either. If I log moods I would like to be able to look for patterns myself (if the feature isn't smart enough to do it for me). I would like to see when I was frustrated or sad (and contexr would be helpful). Instead, viewing is very simplified (typical for Fitbit) and provides no useful insight into body responses.

When capturing body responses, I can't find anything that grades response level. Simply, if any kind of stress is detected I want to know how significant it is (similar to what Garmin does) and there is no way to do it.

This is very underdeveloped feature made only to have a selling point for the Sense 2. I see no reason of using it as it doesn't help with anything. Without custom tags and descriptive context the meaning of responses is too limited to be useful. Also, it is kind of dumb. Most of the times the notifications were coming when nothing was going on so I tagged it as "calm" so the watch told me to take a walk (responded to it as a negative response).

The reviews seem to praise that feature but I suspect the reviewers didn't really try to fully use it. Probably got a few notifications, that worked, so it's a cool feature. They didn't seem to dive into "what it's supposed to help me with and how" territory so don't get fooled by reviews.

[rbittman]

I fully agree with t.Parker’s points. I have nothing to add except that I tried to find use for that cEDA feature for almost a month before giving up and returning the watch. The cEDA feature was touted as the main advantage of the device and I just didn’t agree. I’ve moved on to the Apple Watch, which I find to be both accurate and enjoyable. I’d be happy to get another fitbit one day, if they decide to put effort into it and listen to the thoughtful comments here. 

[Killroy-TM]

Totally agree the cEDA feature is useless and an annoyance for me so since turning it off saves battery drain, it is off.

After having the Sense 2 for 30 days and deciding I am not interested in the cEDA, in addition I get AFib notifications no detailed sleep score because the watch didn't sit right on the wrist, plus couple with the dumbing down of the smartwatch features, now surprisingly discounting the Sense 2 by $100, I initiated a return today and the Sense 2 will go back.

Since I need a replacement for the Versa 2 and its almost dead battery I decided on the original Sense and it will be here tomorrow. Wife has a Charge 5 and wasn't too bothered with the lack of the physical button that decide it for me.

I have no trust in Google and any promised firmware updates or features to arrive anytime soon, the last watch created by Fitbit seems to be the way to go. If the Sense 2 eventually turns out to be the watch we all expected it to be, there is always time to purchase it again.

[Angela_Marie]

Very similar experiences- I was calm and responseless when my cat almost pulled out my dog's eyeball, yet my body sent signals of distress to my Fitbit when I was doing yoga... Granted, my knees hurt, but still. Most days I'm cool as a cucumber, guess I should lay off the yoga??🤣