Fitbit Charge HR

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  • glassgallm
    glassgallm Posts: 276 Member
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    I've had my charge for a few days now and am very happy to not be wearing a chest strap during running or indoor workouts. I wore my Garmin (very old) watch with chest strap HR with the Charge during a workout and there was a slight discrepancy in the heart rate between the 2, but not big enough to concern me. So far so good!
  • zoramin
    zoramin Posts: 1 Member
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    Ordered mine last Thursday, and just got the notification last night it shipped. I am so excited! I had a Force but had to send it back with the recall, so I've been in withdrawal. But not too much longer!
  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member
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    jdhcm2006 wrote: »
    jdhcm2006 wrote: »
    The right side is from my Vivofit w/ HRM strap and the left is with my Charge HR. Clearly there is a disconnect. I know the vivofit is more accurate bc this was a hard cardio workout (it was an Insanity Max 30 workout). I'm going to give the Charge HR a few more tries and if I can't get it to give me an accurate reading while working out, I'm going to return it. The Charge HR gives a fine reading while I'm not doing anything, but it struggles while I'm working out.

    w6fnxa46axdi.jpg

    Wrist based HR monitor is not going to compare with the chest strap for a workout, and insanity is a WORKOUT! It will however give you a more accurate calorie burn through a full day of activities. Sounds silly, but wear the Vivofit for insanity and then the Charge for the rest of the day? Yeah - as I write that I am shaking my head no...

    Yeah. I'm going to do another attempt tomorrow with another Insanity workout, but I'm going to try to wear it higher up my wrist to see how it compares to my vivofit. I was hoping that the HR would be a good fit, b/c there are times with the garmin tech drives me a little batty.

    Well, the Vivofit did have an issue too, your HR never got up to 243.

    So, that calls in to question the issue of inflated HR because of static. Next time you see those differences, press your shirt against the strap and see if the HR comes down very quickly.

    The dry winter air and poly clothes are great for creating static, and that is great for causing inflated HR readings.

    Static won't effect the Fitbit method of reading HR. And 20-40 inflated sounds about right.
  • salparadise13
    salparadise13 Posts: 2 Member
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    I've had a Charge HR since Monday and I'm very impressed. HRM seems to be very accurate during normal daily use and pretty darn accurate when working out. I'd definitely suggest wearing it at least 2-3 fingers width up your wrist when working out. I've only used it running on a treadmill and using an elliptical, and I'm sure that doing a workout that involves much more movement would hinder the accuracy of the HRM, but probably not substantially and there are no large drops in heart rate on any of my graphs. If it has a 10% margin for error during those types of workouts, that's good enough for me. The fitbit's calorie burn is actually lower than that of the elliptical when I'm using the machines heart rate monitor which is likely because the machine doesn't know my height, weight, age, etc. Love it and would recommend to anyone.

    I am curious as to what you are comparing it to for accuracy?

    Polar FT4 with chest strap. Had that for a few years and loved it, but wanted to know more of a full days calorie burn. Worn both for a workout (elliptical) and the calories burnt were pretty in line when completed. Insanity and high movement workouts are likely not going to get as good or even comparable result when using the Charge, since it will spit out more inaccuracies based on movement. I haven't had the chance to try that type of workout out yet, but will give more feedback when I do. Fitbit claims they have an algorithm in place when used during intense workouts that will give you a somewhat accurate average, but it's unlikely to give a perfect count of caloric burn. Charge HR seems to be more useful for all-day caloric burn along with lower intensity workouts and with that, I'm satisfied.
  • jdhcm2006
    jdhcm2006 Posts: 2,254 Member
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    I've had a Charge HR since Monday and I'm very impressed. HRM seems to be very accurate during normal daily use and pretty darn accurate when working out. I'd definitely suggest wearing it at least 2-3 fingers width up your wrist when working out. I've only used it running on a treadmill and using an elliptical, and I'm sure that doing a workout that involves much more movement would hinder the accuracy of the HRM, but probably not substantially and there are no large drops in heart rate on any of my graphs. If it has a 10% margin for error during those types of workouts, that's good enough for me. The fitbit's calorie burn is actually lower than that of the elliptical when I'm using the machines heart rate monitor which is likely because the machine doesn't know my height, weight, age, etc. Love it and would recommend to anyone.

    I am curious as to what you are comparing it to for accuracy?

    Polar FT4 with chest strap. Had that for a few years and loved it, but wanted to know more of a full days calorie burn. Worn both for a workout (elliptical) and the calories burnt were pretty in line when completed. Insanity and high movement workouts are likely not going to get as good or even comparable result when using the Charge, since it will spit out more inaccuracies based on movement. I haven't had the chance to try that type of workout out yet, but will give more feedback when I do. Fitbit claims they have an algorithm in place when used during intense workouts that will give you a somewhat accurate average, but it's unlikely to give a perfect count of caloric burn. Charge HR seems to be more useful for all-day caloric burn along with lower intensity workouts and with that, I'm satisfied.

    I'm not asking for a perfect count, but something more in line with a traditional strap HRM would be nice. 100+ calorie difference is a big deal IMO.
  • jdhcm2006
    jdhcm2006 Posts: 2,254 Member
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    I used both my Charge HR and my Vivofit today for another Insanity Max 30 workout. This time I made sure it was 3 fingers up my wrist and I slowed myself down during the workout. Multiple times when I checked the HR it couldn't get a reading, but here are the side by side comparison. I'll be happy to take suggestions on how to get a more accurate reading on the HR while doing an intense workout. It works perfectly fine when I'm just going about my day, but it's really letting me down during my intense workouts.

    inccl89hgijl.jpg
  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member
    edited January 2015
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    You really got your HR up to 193?
    Last one was 243.

    Again, static electricity problems is a known inflater of seen HR by HRM.

    People that are out of shape usually don't have the muscular strength and endurance to push it that high.
    People that are in shape usually don't either, because they can go so much harder at lower HR.

    Just questioning if the Garmin HR stap was providing accurate figures to really be comparing to.
    My first spring time rides with dry air and flapping poly shirt causes elevated of 30-40 or more if I forget to use Static Guard and/or start sweating enough.

    Obviously the Fitbit is missing it too, and you are correctly applying the suggestions given to aid in it being more accurate.
    have you spun it upside down so it can see the vessels on underside of arm better?
  • jdhcm2006
    jdhcm2006 Posts: 2,254 Member
    edited January 2015
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    heybales wrote: »
    You really got your HR up to 193?
    Last one was 243.

    Again, static electricity problems is a known inflater of seen HR by HRM.

    People that are out of shape usually don't have the muscular strength and endurance to push it that high.
    People that are in shape usually don't either, because they can go so much harder at lower HR.

    Just questioning if the Garmin HR stap was providing accurate figures to really be comparing to.
    My first spring time rides with dry air and flapping poly shirt causes elevated of 30-40 or more if I forget to use Static Guard and/or start sweating enough.

    Obviously the Fitbit is missing it too, and you are correctly applying the suggestions given to aid in it being more accurate.
    have you spun it upside down so it can see the vessels on underside of arm better?

    I believe I did get my HR up to 193. The 190s is not out of the question for someone in their 20s. My Vivofit gives me figures in line with my old Polar watch. So I'm more inclined to believe it over the HR. The 243 was due to me going too hard. I've vomited before during Insanity. And I was almost at that level during that workout.

    The workout I'm using right now, is go as hard as you can for 30 minutes, maybe it's too intense for the HR. I'll see how the two compare during my spin class and report back.

    If the HR would even hit the 170s, I'd be more inclined to begin to believe its readings. I try to keep my HR in the 170s during Insanity, sometimes I miss that goal b/c I'm focused on the workout and not the watch.

    Next time I do Insanity, I'll put it on the inner lining of my wrist to see how it reads. Thanks for that suggestion.

    Update:

    I did some cardio work in my room for about 3-4 minutes (basically dancing around my room like a loon to Canned Heat by Jamiroquai). I did a manual heart rate test (took number of beats for 10 seconds and multiplied by 6 as recommend by heart.org). My manual test gave me 210 and the HR gave me 138.
  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member
    edited January 2015
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    Ya, you don't have a good arm for the method then.

    And I was going to mention spin can be problematic too, with the device higher up arm. But normal arm position in spin encourages it to drop down to wrist, so now no HR seen.

    And indeed, as young woman, HR can get higher.
    That should be a part of the calorie burn calculation too on Vivofit, if it allows changing what the HRmax stat is, I think they do. It should be about 5 more than maxHR you've seen if short workout that got you there, or about 10 more if it was seen after a longer workout.
    Not sure if Charge HR allows changing that important stat, totally forgot to check out if they allow it - which they should.
  • iamateachermom
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    I love my new charge hr! It is awesome to see what my heart rate is all the time! You can set it to just tap it twice and it shows your heart rate. I was reading to clean it after you sweat a lot, so I definitely wouldn't wear in the shower. I've gotten my heart rate up to 123 so far. And it shows my resting heart rate as the same I knew it was. It seems quite accurate. It also vibrate when you hit 10,000 steps. I love having all of the information right there on my wrist
  • Wills820
    Wills820 Posts: 32 Member
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    Just switched from UP24 to Charge HR and it seems that the Charge is giving me a much higher calorie burn than the UP was. As a result, my calorie adjustment in myfitnesspal is much higher. I'm afraid of over eating my calorie goals. Anybody else having this experience?
  • jdhcm2006
    jdhcm2006 Posts: 2,254 Member
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    I love my new charge hr! It is awesome to see what my heart rate is all the time! You can set it to just tap it twice and it shows your heart rate. I was reading to clean it after you sweat a lot, so I definitely wouldn't wear in the shower. I've gotten my heart rate up to 123 so far. And it shows my resting heart rate as the same I knew it was. It seems quite accurate. It also vibrate when you hit 10,000 steps. I love having all of the information right there on my wrist

    Don't take it in the shower. It's only splash proof, not water proof.
  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member
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    Wills820 wrote: »
    Just switched from UP24 to Charge HR and it seems that the Charge is giving me a much higher calorie burn than the UP was. As a result, my calorie adjustment in myfitnesspal is much higher. I'm afraid of over eating my calorie goals. Anybody else having this experience?

    So now with HRM being used in exercise, you have a much better potential estimate of calorie burn.

    And it's higher than prior device showed.

    Other way of viewing it - prior device was reading low. Were you afraid of under eating too much?
  • dougpconnell219
    dougpconnell219 Posts: 566 Member
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    Has anyone tried to wear the hr backwards (with the sensor on the inside of the wrist)?

    I wonder what that would do. There are larger blood vessels there...
  • Wills820
    Wills820 Posts: 32 Member
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    heybales wrote: »
    Wills820 wrote: »
    Just switched from UP24 to Charge HR and it seems that the Charge is giving me a much higher calorie burn than the UP was. As a result, my calorie adjustment in myfitnesspal is much higher. I'm afraid of over eating my calorie goals. Anybody else having this experience?

    So now with HRM being used in exercise, you have a much better potential estimate of calorie burn.

    And it's higher than prior device showed.

    Other way of viewing it - prior device was reading low. Were you afraid of under eating too much?

    To be fair, I've always worn a HRM and would make sure my exercise was logged with that information. I find it hard to believe I was undereating but I guess it's possible?
  • db2100
    db2100 Posts: 23
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    fizzleh wrote: »
    I didn't get a notification even though I signed up for one with different emails but still got nothing.

    Ordered mine yesterday but there seems to be a backlog of orders now as it states it ships in 1-2 weeks :neutral_face:

    I got an email the other day, should be with me on Tuesday, as I paid for the next day shipping. I was a bit annoyed as well, as I did sign up for the notification, if I didn't see them post on Facebook, I wouldn't have got mine so quickly :)
  • dougpconnell219
    dougpconnell219 Posts: 566 Member
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    Today was my first day with the hr. I am kind of concerned that it is giving me a huge calorie adjustment. I never got an adjustment with the regular charge...
  • jkslater3
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    So I got my Charge HR a couple days ago and in my first day, which included a few trips up some stairs and about 1 mile of low intensity walking it claims I've burned over 4,000 calories. I find this very hard to believe. I have the device on my non dominant arm and set it to "dominant" mid day when I sensed that it was over estimating my caloric output. Any thoughts?
  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member
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    jkslater3 wrote: »
    So I got my Charge HR a couple days ago and in my first day, which included a few trips up some stairs and about 1 mile of low intensity walking it claims I've burned over 4,000 calories. I find this very hard to believe. I have the device on my non dominant arm and set it to "dominant" mid day when I sensed that it was over estimating my caloric output. Any thoughts?

    Depends on your base metabolism, and your mass you are moving around.
    Looking at daily graph of calorie burn, what is the burn per 5 minutes during the non-moving time?

    And how far did the Fitbit think you walked, especially during the time you know you walked about 1 mile.
    If the stride length is off a bit, it may have thought you walked farther and burned more.