Gaps in Sleep Tracking

[ChicagoFatGuy]

I am having a problem with the Sense having gaps in the sleep tracking. It will show me asleep up until a certain time, stop tracking, then start again an hour or more later. When I add the in-between time manually it shows sleep mostly with a little restless. What is up with that? It is really annoying. I have the sleep tracker on normal. 

[pixel8mb]

Hi CFG, I have a similar question, although maybe not your exact issue. I got my Sense mainly for sleep tracking, I’ve used it for a week and love how it tracks sleep stages… except when I have an awake “gap” in the middle of the night. Twice I've been awake for about 2 hours, and instead of showing that time as an "Awake" period within that night’s sleep record I get two separate records, and the second record doesn't show Stages, just “restless,” “asleep,” and awake. I especially want to track my Deep and REM sleep, so those two nights are pretty much a loss for me. Shouldn’t the software be able to keep tracking stages even if there’s a 2-hour gap? Maybe the software could use "Sleep Mode" as a trigger to keep tracking through the night, and if two separate sleep records are necessary when there’s a gap, why can’t it continue to track the sleep stages for the second record? 

[Holly19]

You have to be asleep for at least 3 hours to get the information your asking about

[pixel8mb]

Thanks, Holly. It seems "at least 3 hours of sleep" does not apply to a night of sleep if there's an awake gap resulting in two sessions, one or both less than 3 hours. If that's part of the algorithm, it negates the functionality of tracking sleep stages for an interrupted night of sleep. I don't see why the software can't recognize and track a whole night of sleep that consists of two sessions with a gap in the middle, and I'm sure I'm not the only user who experiences that pattern at times who would appreciate the sleep Fitbit functionality improving to cover this. 

[SFOTyke]

Last Sunday, my App shows sleep from 22:32-01:59, a gap and then 03:27-07:44.

I ignored this, as I assumed it could have been triggered by DST reset.

However, it has happened twice since then,

Tuesday 22:08-01:02, a gap and then 02:54-07:32.

Last night shows 22:19-04:37, but then nothing and I didn't get up until after 07:30.

I had some similar issues with my previous Ionic, but the Sense seems to work differently and sleep gaps are too common.

The algorithm or whatever needs adjusting to be less sensitive and record everything from going to sleep, to waking up.

[pixel8mb]

Hi, I'm with you on gaps, seem a bit random on my records. A bit confusing when "Today" refers to last night's sleep, I keep records using screenshots of horizontal stages graphs and looking back I had two gaps around that time that seemed odd also. On Saturday night (Fitbit recorded on Sunday), a gap from 1015pm to 1220am, then recorded stages 143 to 512 am. The next night a gap from 330 to 444. Algorithm considers gap longer than a certain minimum as a gap rather than recording as awake, unfortunate because shorter sessions don't show stages.

[DougWeller]

Happens to me also. Now I do get up often at night usually, but even if I sleep 4 hours straight (or that's what my Sense says} I can get missing times and never get a full repor.t

[SFOTyke]

I had a another gap last night between 00:37 and 01:54.

That's three nights now in the past week.

There must be something different in the sensor, algorithm, App, etc.

I have progressed from the Force, through the Surge, the Ionic and now the Sense, and I've never had this persistent issue.

This is pretty useless as a sleep tracker now. 

[fulie]

Did anyone get resolution on this issue? One of my most used features for my FitBit Ionic was sleep tracking, and since having to return that due to a recall, the Sense has been totally inaccurate and inconsistent with sleep tracking. Any updates on anyone's issues noted here?

[SFOTyke]

I've heard nothing official, as of yet. However, to be fair, my Sense has recorded the past four nights without any breaks. I'll just keep monitoring the situation.

[fulie]

That's great- maybe all we need to do is voice concerns here and it works 🙂 I did read somewhere to set sleep to sensitive (I also read somewhere to make sure it wasn't set to sensitive) but I'm going to try the sensitive setting to see if that helps. Thanks for the reply!

[SFOTyke]

I'd been quiet for a while, as everything had been going OK. However, I had another gap from 00:26-01:32 last night, so there is still an issue.

[SFOTyke]

Went to bed around 22:00 last night. Got up around 2:00 for 1-2 minutes for a pee.

The Fitbit shows I slept for 3:23, and shows nothing recorded after 2:00, even though I didn't get up again until around 7:30.

I hate the inaccuracy of this sleep tracking application. It should at least record some details for these 5.5 hours, even if it cannot get all the details required for an in-depth analysis. 

[DougWeller]

This happens to me a lot. It also logs me as asleep when I was very much awake!

[pixel8mb]

Hi sleepers, I had agreed before with DougWeller and others about Fitbit recording sleep when I'm awake, but from what I've read by scientific experts, sometimes people think they’re awake when they’re in stage 1 “light” sleep, and I think I have that type of light sleep a lot. (Scientific studies using sleep wave recordings show when someone is woken up during stage 1 light sleep, they often report they were awake.)

To me this happens most often when I wake up in the middle of the night or very early in the morning, and in both cases it can feel like I stayed awake for a long time. But thinking back, I might realize I wasn’t solidly awake that long, and often in those cases, I’m glad the time didn't "count" as an awake gap, because I get a complete recording of sleep stages through the night without a gap. (If there’s a gap between two sleep sections, for me one of the sections is likely to be less than 3 hours, which won’t show sleep stages. For my purposes, I want amounts of Deep and REM to be recorded each night.) 

By the way I’ve been keeping my Fitbit on “Sleep” mode all the time, which seems to make a difference in recording fewer gaps for me. I’d guess it affects Fitbit’s recognizing awake vs light sleep, maybe making it more apt to lump time on the threshold between the two sleep types into surrounding periods of light sleep. That may not work for everyone, but for my purposes it’s better if it doesn’t tend to show as many gaps.

[SFOTyke]

I'm still having sporadic problems with the sleep tracking. This is my fourth Fitbit now (Force, Surge, Ionic and now Sense), but this sleep recording accuracy problems are really annoying me. When it's time to replace / upgrade, I need to look at other vendors.

Last Night: Recorded 22:00 - 07:17, which is 08:02 hours, so OK.

Night Before: Recorded 04:41 - 06:38, which is 01:46 hours - I went to bed around 22:00, so why was nothing recorded for the previous 7 hours?

Night Before That: Recorded 21:10 - 00:19 and 04:51 - 06:51 - So what happened to the 5 hours in-between. 

I signed up for the 6-month Premium offering last month, but I may not extend this when it comes time to pay. I don't seem to get much extra out it. All the additional data collected with the upgrade is not downloaded-able with the website provided by Fitbit. I tried to use the snore detection, but it drains 50% of the battery overnight, requiring the Sense to be charged on a daily basis.

[Sarahdem]

I chatted with customer service and they said to make sure your iOS and app are up to date all the time otherwise the sleep Information will be inaccurate. Seems ludicrous but we shall see tonight. 🤦‍:female_sign: 

[DougWeller]

That  makes sense, but  Fitbit shows me asleep in the middle of the day, and that never  happens (except after my cancer operations when I napped during the day for a few weeks). I don't doze of at all. 

[SFOTyke]

Thanks Sarahdem.

I checked the settings for iPhone iOS and the Fitbit App and both state I have the latest updates.

I'm not sure what last night's reading was, or will be, as I sit here about a foot away from my iPhone, where the Fitbit App shows "Wear your Fitbit to bed". I did, I still have it on my wrist and it is 83% charged. This sometimes happens temporarily in the morning and it later updates. Not sure why that is.

EDIT: It has just updated to 7:23, so last night the tracker worked.