About: Sleep Tracking

[EmersonFitbit]

Hello everyone!

Recently, I've seen a few different questions about sleep tracking. Because of this, I thought I'd create a short tutorial on how to properly track sleep, how sleep tracking may be done with each device, and what the results look like on the Dashboard. We'll also be sure to touch on manually logging sleep. Let's begin!

Sleep Tracking: Sleep tracking is used to help quantify the hours- and better understand the quality- of your sleep. There are a number of different ways you can track your sleep, the easiest of which being using the sleep tracking functionality on your tracker itself, if possible (please note that neither the Fitbit Zip nor the Fitbit Ultra support sleep tracking). Finally, while the majority of users fall under the 'normal' category, we also have the sensitive sleep option for the users that do not. Be sure to take a look at our article, and set your sensitivity accordingly!

Flex- To enter sleep mode using your Flex, try rapidly tapping your device's display for a few seconds, or until you feel a vibration and a light pattern (simultaneously). @RickyFitbit provides a step-by-step in this post!

Fitbit One- To enter sleep mode one the Fitbit One, simply press and hold the button on the device for about 2.5 seconds, which is when you feel a vibration and your device's display turns into a stop watch. That stopwatch represents the amount of time in bed thus far.

Fitbit Force- Similar to the Fitbit One, you'll be pressing and holding the physical button on the device for about 2.5 seconds, which is when you would feel the vibration and your device's display turns into a stop watch. As of a October 2014, Force tracks sleep automatically! Simply wear your device to bed- when your tracker syncs with your account, you will be able to view your sleep stats on the dashboard.

Fitbit Charge, Charge HR, and Surge- Similar to the Fitbit Force, you Charge will allow you to track sleep automatically.  Simply wear your device to bed! An alternative option would be to press and hold the button on the device before and after sleep, similar to Force and Fitbit One.

Remember, it's important to put the device into sleep mode as you're getting into bed, and take it out of sleep mode once you're waking up. After your first sync since post wake-up, you will see a sleep quality graph on your Dashboard (MAC/PS/iOS device, Android device, or Windows Phone). Here's a few examples of the same graph using different platforms:

(Website Dashboard)

(iOS)

(Android)

(Windows Phone)

Now that we've covered tracking sleep with your device, we can cover what happens if you forget to log your sleep!

Manually Sleep Tracking- This method can be used for when users forget to track their sleep at night. The process uses the following steps:

1. Go to your sleep log page.
2. Enter the time you went to bed on the previous day. 
3. Enter the time you left bed the day of.
4. Select 'Log Sleep'

Afterwards, you should be all set! Your graph will appear as it would with tracker sleep recording across all platforms. Be sure to reach out with any and all questions!

Important notes:

• After syncing, you'll see your sleep graph with three different sleep states (asleep, restless, and awake😞      

      -Asleep: When your body is completely at rest and unmoving.

      -Restless: This state indicates that your body transitioned from a very restful position with little movement to movement, such as turning over in bed. This doesn't necessarily mean that you were fully awake or cognizant of your movements, but it may indicate that you were not getting the most restful sleep possible at that time.

      -Awake: As the name of the state implies, this would indicate that you were moving so much that restful sleep would not be possible.

• We use these three states of sleep to calculate your sleep efficiency, which is the most prominently displayed number on the sleep tile/graph. To learn more about the sleep states and sleep efficiency, check out this help article regarding sleep!

• Each platform is different. As such, manually logging sleep on different devices use different processes. Check out this article for iOS sleep help, this article for Android sleep help, and this article for Windows devices. 
•  You may have noticed a differenced in the graphs above, particularly in the Dashboard  graph versus the mobile app. This discrepancy can be attributed to different versions of the website. 

[EdsonFitbit]

Welcome @Trishn93. It's great to see you around. To get the time to fall asleep with the Fitbit Charge HR it is necessary placing the tracker in exercise mode. All other stats will show up automatically when using the autodetect mode. This could be a great suggestion to be placed in the Feature Request board. Once any update is available it will be communicated as soon as possible.

Have a nice day. 

[Yelsel]

Hi

Sleep tracking.  How does Fitbit Flex know - and therefore record - when you are asleep as opposed to just lying there trying to get to sleep?  For example, I know I was awake for an hour last night 'cos I was listening to a radio programme (and can tell you what it was about!) but I wasn't moving much and the fitbit recorded this as sleep...

Thanks

[EdsonFitbit]

Thanks for joining us @Yelsel. The Fitbit Flex actually didn't have this feature until today. You can update the firmware to the most recent version to enjoy the auto detect sleep. Regarding your question, if you’re not moving but not asleep for over an hour, algorithms assume that sleep has begun. In this case you can delete the sleep record from your Sleep Tab. For more information you can check out the Sleep Tracking FAQ's.

Catch you later. 

[GeeBee]

I just purchased a Charge. Thank you for your explanation on how to use sleep mode as it is different from my original Fitbit. Perhaps that is why my sleep patterns are not being tracked properly. I am often up during the night for health breaks. I find on some nights my Fitbit will record my sleep activity from before midnight until I wake up and then from the time I am up until morning. So it looks like I am only sleeping 2 to 3 hours a night. If I press the button before I go to sleep and then in the morning, will I get a more accurate report of my sleep activity. It will ignore my health breaks and record the entire night as one sleep activity until I turn it off in the morning. When I press and hold the button, will they be some type of signal that Charge has accepted the command: a buzz, vibrate, light?

Thanks for your assistance.

[ohiobetsy]

I'm disappointed that the Charge HR thinks I am asleep just because I am lying still.  I wanted to be able to track actual time asleep, not the time I'm lying in bed waiting to fall asleep, or back to sleep.  It thought I was asleep when we were at a movie too!  I assume there's no way around this but maybe I've missed something.

[EdsonFitbit]

Welcome aboard @GeeBee @ohiobetsy. Tracking sleep manually (pressing the button until vibrates) might work better for some users. It could be a good idea giving it a try and compare the results. If you have any suggestion they can be shared in the Feature Request board. We are constantly working to improve the Fitbit products and services and appreciate all the incoming feedback.

Keep up the super stepping. 

[ohiobetsy]

This was suggested to me some time ago and I have been doing it.  It works better than just letting the Fitbit decide when I am sleeping and does not assume I am asleep as soon as I lie down.  I would like to be able to better explore the awake vs. restless periods.  I read at least one other post in which someone did not like the fact that when one clicks for more information on sleep, you are presented only with a blue bar for sleep and red lines for awake or restless.  I do feel like an improvement could be made to the sleep efficiency calculation.  I think it would be better if it somehow took into account the duration of the sleep periods rather than just total time asleep vs. in bed.  To me, I feel like it must be better if one has longer periods of sleep rather than being restless/awake on an hourly basis (and some of my nights are like that).  I don't seem to vary much in my sleep efficiency (say 92-96%) so not sure it is really telling me much.

[jeanmaw]

Please tell me how to do the things in the tutorial...e.g.   how do I set it for sleep....I tap my Charge HR and nothing comes up except the regular info.  nothing for sleep.  In the a.m. I record sleep times on computer but it tells me it will appear after I sync............HOW DO I SYNC.........I press side button and it buzzes but does not sync......REally poor instructions.   Thinking of just returning this.

[ohiobetsy]

It might be helpful to download the manual in addition to looking at a tutorial but even that isn't foolproof,  I'm afraid.  If you have the dongle plugged into your laptop and have downloaded the software, it may sync automatically-mine does a lot of the time when I have my computer on, but not always.  I have no idea why.  If not, you will have to go to the Fitbit Connect that is now on your laptop.  That has a sync option but often it says it's failed and I try a couple of times.  But I'll go to the dashboard and see that it has synced-I can't explain that.  The only way to see sleep data is on the website-not on  your Fitbit.  It will log your sleep automatically but if you don't believe those results, you can "tell" it you are going to sleep by holding the button down until it vibrates when you go to bed.  That will show a stopwatch on the display when you start.  When you wake up, hold the button down again until it vibrates and (if you're not too sleepy and your eyes are focused) you'll see a finish line flag and the tally of time you were in bed.  But for more info (like how much you were awake or restless) you have to log into the website.  Good luck!  There are definite bugs and things that could be made to work more efficiently and I hope the programmers will get to them.

[EdsonFitbit]

Thanks for taking a break from stepping to visit the Community @jeanmaw. The Fitbit Charge HR will track your sleep automatically. Simply wear it to bed. When you wake up, sync it to see on your Dashboard last night's sleep stats.

Your tracker will automatically sync every 15 minutes if you are approximately 10-15 feet away from a plugged-in dongle or a supported mobile device. The dongle allows your tracker and computer to communicate between them and it looks like this.

If you want to force sync on a PC, which has the Fitbit software installed, please right click the Fitbit Connect icon (located next to the time) and then click "Sync Now".
 
To force sync via the mobile app, tap your tracker's icon at the top of the dashboard, then tap the square next to Sync Now. A "sync in progress" message will appear until the sync is complete. Your sleep data should look similar to the screen shot below

If it's necessary here is the link to reach out the sleep FAQ's.

Let me know how it goes. Hope to see you around more often. 

[ohiobetsy]

Thank you for reading and replying to my post.  If you had scrolled farther down the conversation, you would see that I originally was allowing the automatic sleep tracking but didn't like that the Fitbit decided I was sleeping if I was just very still for awhile. So someone suggested that I go to the manual tracking mode.  That's what I do for all my sleep and exercise now.  I don't have a mobile device paired to my Fitbit and since the person to whom I was replying specifically mentioned their computer, that was why I offered the help that I did.  They were having trouble finding their sleep data.  And, I don't find that syncing happens automatically every 10-15 minutes when I am wearing  my Fitbit and using my laptop.  Since the person was having trouble syncing, I just offered my related experiences.