New activity tracker recording fewer steps than my phone

kiela64

I lost my trusty old Misfit Flash in the summer. I did a bunch of research on different trackers and ended up replacing it with the Misfit Shine 2, thinking it would work the same but with a few useful to me added features.

I’ve had it several days and it’s been.....interesting. In the summer I used to get 8-12 thousand steps when I went to my active job, even when I had my 3h shift it would be pretty high. Now I don’t even hit 5. That said I’m still on a reduced schedule due to concussion recovery, but I’d expected maybe 6-7, not 2-4.

What’s been most noticeable is the difference my phone tracks at least another 500 steps more, despite not being on me as often, it’s in my locker at work and not on my body at home when I do chores.

I’m a little confused whether my new tracker sucks (nooooooo!) or if I’m picking the wrong wearing location or if I’m just walking less than I think or if my old one was overestimating or if my phone is over sensitive and tracking too much 🤷🏻‍♀️

I remember reading here somewhere that sedentary is under 4000 steps per day. I swear I don’t feel sedentary traveling to work and being on my feet walking around for hours! But I have 2,800 steps for Wednesday (wore on my wrist) & 4,900 steps for today (wore on chest clip) for similar amount of work/travel. For both days my phone has ~5,500 steps - and again it was not on my body during work hours, only for my travel (walking to transit and taking transit, walking to stops etc).

These are really different numbers from when I had a very similar device before and I’d appreciate some insight as to whether I should try to send it back or not 😐

shadow2soul

I have tried a few different trackers. Misfit is one of the ones I discovered would miss steps. I could do 100 step tests and it would only get 60-80 of them (Jawbone was even worse). I have tried Misfit Ray and Flash. I have done the same type of tests with Fitbit, Garmin and Samsung. None of them missed a step.
I am not sure if it’s the sensitivity of Misfit devices (trying to prevent false steps), but over the course of a day it adds up to a lot of missed steps.

kiela64

shadow2soul wrote: »

I have tried a few different trackers. Misfit is one of the ones I discovered would miss steps. I could do 100 step tests and it would only get 60-80 of them (Jawbone was even worse). I have tried Misfit Ray and Flash. I have done the same type of tests with Fitbit, Garmin and Samsung. None of them missed a step.
I am not sure if it’s the sensitivity of Misfit devices (trying to prevent false steps), but over the course of a day it adds up to a lot of missed steps.

It’s weird because I thought Misfit was good, as the flash I had before was really reliable 😞 darn. I don’t think I can return it because it’s been used, it’s seeming to say it needs to be unopened in the box to be returnable. Money wasted.

Duck_Puddle

Something to consider...

How/why are you using the device? Meaning, are you using it to gauge your level of activity and encourage you to move more often? Are you using it as a help to estimate TDEE? Are you using it because you need a 100% accurate count of the number of steps you take in a day?

I wear two trackers every day and have worn more at various points. The step counts NEVER match - they can be off by thousands from each other. Some do better counting certain things (like steps when pushing a shopping cart), some do better not counting certain things (like not counting “steps” from the movement of something like stirring a pot).

A 12k step day for my Fitbit might show register as a 24k step day for my Polar and a 9k step day on my Garmin (and different numbers for different devices from the same brands). But that same type of day on a different day will register about the same on each device. So looking specifically at that device-I can gauge whether today is more or less active than usual and/or how much I need to move to consider myself active enough-even though the step count won’t match another device and may or may not match reality.

The other thing is that if you’re using the device as an aid to estimate TDEE-despite the wildly different step counts, all my devices produce roughly the same TDEE. So my Polar is programmed to consider a 24k step day to be about the same overall energy expenditure as my Garmin considers a 9k step day to be. So I’m going to assume that a misfit step is probably not equivalent to a phone step or a fitbit step (in terms of calories burned).

Where you wear a device will also have considerable impact on the number of steps it counts. I have a fitbit one that is designed to be worn clipped close to the body. It has the lowest step count of all (again sometimes by thousands) but also produces roughly the same TDEE.

I wear a tracker to have a way to quantify how much movement I’m doing and to help me estimate my TDEE (and to earn a health insurance incentive). Any one of my trackers will do that for me. I don’t care what my specific step count is. I care that I’m moving - and want to know if my day was lazy or crazy.

I’m assuming my actual step count is somewhere between 7000 and 16000 today (the low and high counts from my trackers). And my TDEE is probably about 2150 (all my trackers produced a number within 100 of that - even though the step counts are so very different)

I’m not sure exactly what your goals are with the Misfit, but I’d give it a solid try for a week or two-wearing it consistently in the place it is designed to be worn, and see if it is consistent compared to itself. And see if the TDEE it’s estimating is reasonable.

kiela64

Duck_Puddle wrote: »

Something to consider...

How/why are you using the device? Meaning, are you using it to gauge your level of activity and encourage you to move more often? Are you using it as a help to estimate TDEE? Are you using it because you need a 100% accurate count of the number of steps you take in a day?

I wear two trackers every day and have worn more at various points. The step counts NEVER match - they can be off by thousands from each other. Some do better counting certain things (like steps when pushing a shopping cart), some do better not counting certain things (like not counting “steps” from the movement of something like stirring a pot).

A 12k step day for my Fitbit might show register as a 24k step day for my Polar and a 9k step day on my Garmin (and different numbers for different devices from the same brands). But that same type of day on a different day will register about the same on each device. So looking specifically at that device-I can gauge whether today is more or less active than usual and/or how much I need to move to consider myself active enough-even though the step count won’t match another device and may or may not match reality.

The other thing is that if you’re using the device as an aid to estimate TDEE-despite the wildly different step counts, all my devices produce roughly the same TDEE. So my Polar is programmed to consider a 24k step day to be about the same overall energy expenditure as my Garmin considers a 9k step day to be. So I’m going to assume that a misfit step is probably not equivalent to a phone step or a fitbit step (in terms of calories burned).

Where you wear a device will also have considerable impact on the number of steps it counts. I have a fitbit one that is designed to be worn clipped close to the body. It has the lowest step count of all (again sometimes by thousands) but also produces roughly the same TDEE.

I wear a tracker to have a way to quantify how much movement I’m doing and to help me estimate my TDEE (and to earn a health insurance incentive). Any one of my trackers will do that for me. I don’t care what my specific step count is. I care that I’m moving - and want to know if my day was lazy or crazy.

I’m assuming my actual step count is somewhere between 7000 and 16000 today (the low and high counts from my trackers). And my TDEE is probably about 2150 (all my trackers produced a number within 100 of that - even though the step counts are so very different)

I’m not sure exactly what your goals are with the Misfit, but I’d give it a solid try for a week or two-wearing it consistently in the place it is designed to be worn, and see if it is consistent compared to itself. And see if the TDEE it’s estimating is reasonable.

Thank you!!

Both my old & new ones are designed to be able to be worn in different locations. I mostly wore my old one clipped to my waistband or in my pocket (you select a setting in the app for wearing location). But as I lost it that way, I tried my wrist and my bra strap as they seem more secure. As the wrist day had less than 1/2 the steps of a similar day with the bra strap location I’m thinking that’s not a good measure for me then. I am constantly pushing a cart and carrying objects so maybe that accounts for that issue?

My phone doesn’t guess at TDEE or calories burned. It just has a little spot where it says steps and stairs.

I’m using it to to gauge activity level because now I’m going back to work it varies widely and otherwise my calorie goals were too stationary to account for it. Back in the summer I had a lot of trouble with this before I started wearing my Flash and it made a lot more sense. Basically I was sedentary on most days I didn’t work, and lightly to very active depending on how long my shift was, whether the elevator was broken, etc.

So my calorie goals for the days need to reflect this or there are problems: at one point I was losing too fast at almost 3lb/week, then another I was overeating because I tried to guess a higher calorie goal and gaining, etc. The old flash accounted for it exactly when compared with my calorie intake so I considered it to be accurate. I guess being the same brand doesn’t make it basically the same thing and I’ll have to see it over time to find out if the adjustments are accurate or not 😐

I was also using it because it claimed it was supposed to be able to estimate laps swum but it didn’t work and I’m thinking there’s something wrong with how I swim or with the device that it’s not catching it. 🤷🏻‍♀️

cmriverside

This is a little off-topic but I just want to share my experience.

I've never used a tracking device other than an old-school pedometer every now and then.

I lost 70+ pounds in 2007-08 and have kept it off by just tracking food and using an estimate for my purposeful exercise. I weigh myself daily and make the majority of my own meals, but I do eat out and sometimes forget to log some things. I've kept the weight off for over ten years now.

I'm trying to say that the anxiety you're causing yourself over this is misplaced. The devices aren't a magical fix, it's still about your own old-fashioned data collection over time and weighing yourself or using clothing or a measuring tape. It's not an exact science, and close enough is good enough as long as there are multiple data collection points.

kiela64

cmriverside wrote: »

This is a little off-topic but I just want to share my experience.

I've never used a tracking device other than an old-school pedometer every now and then.

I lost 70+ pounds in 2007-08 and have kept it off by just tracking food and using an estimate for my purposeful exercise. I weigh myself daily and make the majority of my own meals, but I do eat out and sometimes forget to log some things. I've kept the weight off for over ten years now.

I'm trying to say that the anxiety you're causing yourself over this is misplaced. The devices aren't a magical fix, it's still about your own old-fashioned data collection over time and weighing yourself or using clothing or a measuring tape. It's not an exact science, and close enough is good enough as long as there are multiple data collection points.

Thank you, you’re right: even if it’s not the same as the other one, eventually I will get the data to make it work. I had hoped it would just replace what I lost and not have an adjustment period (part of why I didn’t go with another brand). I could have gotten something cheaper for that effect and I’m a little bummed about that. Oh well. Just having it recorded in my diary is enough that it’s already fun and motivating, and that’s the real point. So it’s doing that job well. 🙂 thanks for the reality check.

It’s so easy to get overly caught up in the details. I’ve lost ~45lbs in the summer but winter is turning out to be an entirely different game. I feel like a total noob and if I lose one of my routines it’ll all fall down (as it started to while I was recovering from my concussion & daylight savings time ended 😐 and I went back up quite a bit). But now I’m more engaged and motivated, my energy is picking back up a bit, and I’m reminding myself of things I enjoy like swimming. And that’s really the big picture ❤️

CarvedTones

I wore a fitness watch full time until I lost. For a while I was using MMW to post purposeful exercise walks, like 6 or 8 miles at 4+ mph. Out of curiosity, sometimes I checked the watch before starting on the walk and then checked both when done and they were always almost dead on. I think cadence/stride has a lot to do with that. These steps were not in the gray area of maybe walking maybe not.