Using two trackers on the same account

[FitEmma76]

I recently upgraded from a One to a Surge. The step count on the Surge is undercounting and woefully inaccurate (sometimes by 30%). I have tried all configurations of dominant/non-dominant setting/wearing and can't get it to track accurately. Ho hum, I bought it for the GPS/heart rate monitor etc so I'm prepared to suck it up.

My One tracks steps very accurately. Therefore, I would like to wear this for most of the day, and swap for my Surge when exercising. All seems like it should be straightforward and indeed, outlined on the official FitBit pages: 

"For example, if the tracker you wore to the office counted 8000 steps and the tracker you wore during your evening run counted 9000, the total number of steps on your dashboard is 17,000."

So, the problem. Let's say I wear my One to the office and it counts 8000 steps. I exercise both from work and from home so need to transport my Surge to and from work. Therefore, my Surge is in my bag as I walk to the office, counting whatever steps it can pick up. I will have radically different step counts on the two devices - for the walk to the office, say 8000 on the One and 1500 on the Surge. 

FitBit says:

"If your account has multiple trackers and you forget to take one off before putting on another, rest assured we’ll reconcile the overlapping data to present the most accurate information possible on your dashboard."

Given that, like most people I assume, I cannot isolate individual tracker use completely, how is this reconciled? Is it averaged? Does the app make a call on which is the likely to be the correct total?

The solution touted is to synch between tracker changes:

"For best results, do not wear more than one tracker at a time and sync each tracker before taking it off and putting on another."

But I will synch both trackers as soon as I turn on my phone Bluetooth, uploading both 8000 steps (One) and 1500 steps (Surge). I simply cannot stop my Surge counting when I'm wearing the One (I can, of course, stop my One counting when I'm wearing the Surge, as that is a straightforward swap with no need to transport my One anywhere, assuming my runs return to my start point).

Why is there not a feature to ignore data from one tracker for a given time period? It must be a cinch to add this feature - "We have two datasets - which of these trackers was worn between 8am and 2pm?" As this couldn't ever lead to an overcount, I don't see the issue with adding this. Or, to turn off data upload from one of the trackers when synching?

Am I missing something?

[Kristen1973]

I have had the same problem and have lost many steps because of it.  I recently bought an Alta to wear most of the time and plan to use my Charge HR for workouts.  The other day I wore my Alta for most of the day and had not synced my phone for several hours.  I took a walk and reached 10,000 steps on my Alta.   On the way back into the house, I grabbed my gym bag (which held my Charge HR) from the car and took it inside.  Once inside I attempted to sync my data and it reverted to 5,800 steps.  It took the data from the HR instead of my Alta! 

[FitEmma76]

Oh, that's exactly what i was worried would happen. Was the value the average of the two trackers?

[Kristen1973]

No, it was really odd.  It kept the active minutes from the Alta (from my 30 minute walk) and kept the walk detected by SmartTrack, but took the steps from the HR. (So when you look at my walk it said I walked for 30 minutes and took 51 steps (the distance from the driveway to the house!)   My steps basically went back to what they were earlier in the day.  I lost about

4,200 steps.

I've lost steps in the house too, just by picking up the HR and taking it the outlet to charge.  For some reason, the HR steps override the Alta.

I called custome service and they have said to sync before I change devices, but that doesn't help in instances when I have the HR in my gym bag or moving it to charge it.   

[SunsetRunner]

Agree. I get fed up waiting for my phone to sync with my zip stored in a cupboard and only used for dirty construction work.

I now depair it and just have my surge syncing, then pair the zip back up when using that. Not ideal.

Fitbit.. any update to freeze a devise would be great?

[Rich_Laue]

I don't worry anymore about my phone and syncing when sourcing. The server seems to know what it is doing, albeit sometimes it doesnt consolidate for 6-8 hours, and after several syncs.

Once the tracker i was wearing with 9K of steps died, no charger. I had a second tracker in the car that i switched to. Ten hours later, the next day, when i got home at 6 am, charged and synced. Only the 4K from the second tracker showed for yesterday. At about 4pm and a sync, the 13K showed up for the day before.

I havent done much testing when two trackers detect steps. Others tell me they have and it uses the tracker with the most steps.

Fitbit could have done what other companies have and require the user to choose which tracker they want to switch to, but i think it is pretty neat that it is automatwith Fitbit.

[SunsetRunner]

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@FitEmma76 wrote:

Am I missing something?

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shutdown the Surge when not using it.

[Rich_Laue]

@SunsetRunner that is a great suggestion, when the Surge is shutdown it can not count steps.

The shutdown is easily done from the settings menu right on the tracker.

[Ta331ca]

trying to sync two surges on one account.

[Rich_Laue]

Welcome to the community @Ta331ca before you'll be able to sync a second tracker it will need to be attached to your fitbit account.. Currently fitbit will allow multiple trackers a as long as they are of different models so adding two of the same model can not be done. 

[nrobidoux]

Do they have plans to change this? Luckily Amazon hadn't begin processing my second order. Wanted to get a pretty comprehensive monitoring 24/7/365 and the charger position prevents charging and monitoring simultaneously.

Hoped to have 2 Charge 2s. 😕

[nrobidoux]

Is the problem that two of the same devices can't be linked because there is no way to identify the individual devices? 

My intention was to wear one half the week and the other the other half. Would the longer time periods help "avoid confusion"?

[Rich_Laue]

Actually all tracker a have a unique id, the thing is it never occurred to Fitbit that somebody might want to buy two of the same trakers. 

This is why two or more people in the same household each can have the same tracker model. 

There also has not been much interest shown in the feature request for this option. 

[nrobidoux]

Where can you submit feature requests? I did a Google search and ended up on a legal page saying (summed up): "You can submit something but... we're not necessarily going to look at it. If we do and decide to develop it, don't expect any money."

I get the second part.... not really the first.

[Rich_Laue]

You can submit feature requests in the feature suggestion board, this is where the developers look for user suggestions. 

Remember to do a search first, since having two of the same suggestion defeats the purpose of voting. 

I notice that this suggestion already exists https://community.fitbit.com/t5/Feature-Suggestions/Two-of-the-same-model-tracker/idi-p/842806 for you to add a comment and vote. 

Yes it is true that not all of these suggestions will be added, some physically can not be done while others might not have enough interest. 

Their have been a lot of the suggestion that have made it into the tracker, stopwatch, countdown timer, thevCharge2 just got pause during events and the ability to turn of notifications from the watch, to name a few that pop in my mind.