NBR: Fitbit

SnShne322

Tell me about your fitbit. It seems like something I might be interested in.  I'm especially fascinated by the sleep tracker.  Have you found yourself to be more active after getting your fitbit?

booneybear

I bought one last weekend and I am returning it this weekend.  It doesn't track the things I want it to track and it is just one more thing to have to worry about and I don't want to have to sync my data to the app.  I don't want to have to do anything.  And I can't get mine to reset at midnight no matter what I do.  I have spent enough time on it and I am officially giving up. 

I can't wait to get my $$ back.    

SnShne322

booneybear said:

I bought one last weekend and I am returning it this weekend.  It doesn't track the things I want it to track and it is just one more thing to have to worry about and I don't want to have to sync my data to the app.  I don't want to have to do anything.  And I can't get mine to reset at midnight no matter what I do.  I have spent enough time on it and I am officially giving up. 

I can't wait to get my $$ back.    

I doesn't automatically sync? You have to do it manually?

booneybear

SnShne322 said:

booneybear said:

I bought one last weekend and I am returning it this weekend.  It doesn't track the things I want it to track and it is just one more thing to have to worry about and I don't want to have to sync my data to the app.  I don't want to have to do anything.  And I can't get mine to reset at midnight no matter what I do.  I have spent enough time on it and I am officially giving up. 

I can't wait to get my $$ back.    

I doesn't automatically sync? You have to do it manually?

I don't really know.  The damn thing doesn't even come with any instructions.  I hate it.

fabk

Thats too bad @booneybear.
I love mine. I should say though that l wear it on my ankle (bracelet tucked into sock). I am constantly carrying a baby, pushing a buggy/stroller or handling a dog leash. So it wasn't tracking my steps like it should. Now it works awesome.
I am constantly moving now thanks to the accountability of the fitbit. I am not a competetive person with others but am constantly trying to beat myself.

The sleep tracker is neat but l am not using it right now. It just makes me sad.

SnShne322

fabk said:

Thats too bad @booneybear. I love mine. I should say though that l wear it on my ankle (bracelet tucked into sock). I am constantly carrying a baby, pushing a buggy/stroller or handling a dog leash. So it wasn't tracking my steps like it should. Now it works awesome. I am constantly moving now thanks to the accountability of the fitbit. I am not a competetive person with others but am constantly trying to beat myself. The sleep tracker is neat but l am not using it right now. It just makes me sad.

I'm fascinated by the sleep tracker because I'm historically a poor sleeper.  I think it could be interesting to know exactly what I'm doing at night.

Kate&Mark

I have a Fitbit One and I love it. You have to set up an online account, but after you do that it should automatically sync. I also have it syncing to the app so I can look at things while I'm not at the computer.

For me, I like seeing how active I really am and where things are lacking. Like fabk said, it's good for accountability. I've never tried the sleep tracker aspect, though!

sfgiantsjo

I have the fitbit flex and love it! It automatically syncs when you open the app, so that part doesn't bother me at all. I am definitely more active, and that is directly related to the fitbit. Mostly because it literally put how much of a sloth I am directly in my face. Also, it made being more active a game of sorts. I have a goal and I want to reach it, I can "compete" with my husband. 

I do use the sleep tracker. You need to turn that mode on and off when you go to bed or wake up. Or, you can just enter the "event" manually on the app, which is what I do. 

You can also enter in the food you eat, and track calories and such.

Pros:

Put it on and forget it. I only charge it about once a week.

Increases my activity levels

It has been super easy to use for me, I actually like the simplicity

Waterproof, wear it in the shower

Social aspects, I like friending people on fitbit, and cheering them on. 

The mobile app is easy and simple, and the website is super thorough. 

The silent alarm - you can set these for anything, to remind you of stuff, to wake you up, whatever, and it vibrates on your arm instead of beeping.

Cons:

It isn't scientifically accurate. If you wear it on your wrist it is going to track washing your hair as "steps". I don't mind this. It does know the difference between active and non active minutes. When you're really walking, it counts that as active, everything else doesn't get counted. So I take that into consideration.

The sleep tracker is also not perfect.  It only tracks movement, so there's only so accurate it can be.

Overall, I am very happy with it. If you go into it knowing you're not going to get super scientific results,  but that you will get a better idea of what you actually DO during the day, you'll probably love it, too. And if not, you can always take it back, like Booney. Although, I think hers must be broken or something. I've never had the issues she is having. That would really suck, and I can see why that would make her hate the thing.

jason&robin

I have a fitbit One and I love it. I got it in January and I've used it every day since. I am motivated by competition so it has definitely worked at getting me more active. I wear it on my bra so I really don't even notice that it's there. I used the sleep tracker for a while but I don't really use it anymore. I have the app that syncs it for me and I love following my friends and getting new badges.

MrsC7

@booneybear Which one do you have? I might buy it off of you for DH.

kpow

I got a flex for Xmas. It totally died after a month.

One Sweet Shannon

I love my Flex.  It definitely inspires me to move more -- I had no idea how little I was moving during the day.  I work a desk job (and from home, so I don't even have the parking lot walk to and from my office).  Now I schedule time to walk in the morning before breakfast, and a couple more times throughout the day.  My energy is so much higher, and my stress has become more manageable. Plus, I've been enjoying audiobooks while walking and going through a ton of them.

I also use the sleep tracker.  I have a sleeping disorder, so it's interesting to see my sleep times and when I was restless during the night.  I've been making adjustments to my sleep times and activities before bed to try to improve my sleep.  I'm curious to see how my next sleep appointment goes.

I also find the food tracker helpful.  Well, the food tracker actually kind of sucks because a lot of the foods that I try to enter aren't in it or aren't accurate (may be out of date, or simply entered incorrectly by a user), but I check the entries and add my own as needed.  Fitbit calculates your calories based on BMR and TDEE, so the more you move and more calories you burn, it will automatically increase your daily allowance.  I was eating fewer calories than it recommended, but not losing weight.  I've started eating closer to what Fitbit says (jumping from like 1300-1500 to 1700-2200 depending on the day), and the scale is moving downward.  These are calculations one can do on her own, but I like not having to think about it. I prefer to let Fitbit do the work and make adjustments on a daily basis according to how active I've been that day. Plus I find it helpful seeing my totals for things like Protein, Fiber, Sodium, much easier to track.

Oh, and the silent alarms!  I LOVE this feature.  I've only had mine less than a month, so I'm still setting a backup alarm until I have more confidence that I won't sleep through the vibration.  But I haven't had that problem yet.  The vibration is so gentle and not obnoxious like an audible alarm.

I like that I can manually add my other cardio and resistance training activities.  I've added bicycling and a zumba warmup they had before my charity walk last weekend.  It will overwrite the steps for that timeframe, (and calories burned if you've added them into the activity record) so it's not double counted.

I don't use the app (I don't have a smartphone, never needed one because I always have my ipod touch with me, but now I either have to get a smartphone or upgrade to the latest generation Touch, because mine doesn't support the Fitbit app.)  I just use the website.  It has a lot of the same features as Sparkpeople or MFP (and those both can sync with fitbit), but I like the Fitbit site.  It's simpler and cleaner.  I like the logging tools and I love the dashboard view.