Floors climbed

[rbittman]

I believe I read that Fitbit wrist trackers count floors using an altimeter. Is that right? I’d often suspected it actually used a barometer, because I can generate an enormous number of floors climbed on windy days. I can even simulate floors using a fan. So air pressure seemed to work. 

However, I’ve been testing the new Sense 2 re:floors, and it seems very accurate so far. I have a two story apartment, and I know how many times I climb floors. The rest of my town is basically flat, so any walks or runs occur with no elevation changes.

I wonder if they fixed how the Watch measures this? (Now if they’d only fix HR accuracy!).

Has anyone else tested floors climbed on the Sense 2?

[JohnnyRow]

According to the manuals, any models that track floors have altimeters.  But that is basically by definition as I understand it.

A barometer stays at the same place and tracks pressure changes there;  an altimeter changes elevations and detects elevation change by change in pressure.  As I understand, basically same instrument, just used differently.  And rapid changes in barometric pressure could lead to error readings in elevation.  I suppose the hope is that the pressure change from climbing stairs is more rapid that that from weather changes, but maybe not from slamming doors.

I assume there hi-tech, much more expensive altimeters that can avoid this issue, but i think they are beyond the reach of fitness devices such as Fitbit.

This is all just my understanding, and what I just got by googling "barometer vs altimeter".

Perhaps Sense 2 has improved on this.  I don't have it.  But it is listed in specs as 'altimeter', same as in all previous devices that have stair-tracking.

[Guy_]

Hi @rbittman  - the floors error on the Sense was due to a firmware update and can also be a watch issue.

Mine went from good to not good after an update.

However I'm not using it, except as a time piece currently, while testing a Versa 4, and it's has not counted any floors due to pressure changes.

So it would look like movement is required for it to randomly add floors that it was doing when worn.

In checking with the SimpleFloors app the pressure sensor is still working, so it's not broken.

The Versa 4 floor count (presumably Sense 2 as well) matches the trusty Versa original which has always been accurate.

And you are right, the HR on the Versa 4 (and presumably the Sense 2 as they use the same sensor) still shows incorrect HR, possibly even worse than the Sense 1 and needs fixing.

Though resting HR seems accurate which is good for sleep measurements and RHR.

[t.parker]

@rbittman we use the words "altimeter" and "barometer" interchangeably here, but it's a barometric altimeter. It measures the altitude by gauging the air pressure.

[rbittman]

Thank you everyone who corrected my use of “barometer.”  I didn’t know the difference with altimeter before. Interesting that a previous firmware change broke this feature in the devices. It does appear to work correctly on the Sense 2.

[JohnnyRow]

I would just like to add that although one user's experience seemed to be that a firmware update broke stairs climbed accuracy, that was one person's experience and conclusion, and not necessarily a universally accepted experience.

[Dopovo]

One (1) user???? 

[MarkMM]

My Versa 3 counted crazy floors right out of the box. I didn't have the experience where I felt it was fine before a Firmware update. 

[JerryHam]

My original Sense counted stairs fine for maybe 6 months. After that, I could get 200 flights of stairs walking around my kitchen. I just assumed that the sensor for pressure failed, but it could have been after a firmware update. I can't correlate whether it was, or was not right after a firmware update unfortunately - but it certainly could have been. For the following 12 months, it never did flights of stairs properly and is one of the reasons I ordered a Sense 2 since I wanted accurate stair flights counting back. (And I got really tired of the "slowly charging" message that was endemic to that darn watch - impossible to keep the pins clean enough for it to be happy charging).

[rbittman]

Interesting! That wasn’t exactly my experience. My Versa 3 (pre-Sense 2) counted floors indoors, sporadically. But it always counted fake floors when I’d walk on windy days. I experimented with blowing air on it from a fan and sure enough. It counted more floors. I have special badges due to all the “floors” I climbed!

In any case, I’ve had the Sense 2 about a week now and it’s counted floors perfectly so far.