Tracking steps 🏃🏼‍♀️

SuperMotivated56

Any advice on how to accurately track my steps/distance walked with my iPhone, while walking on the treadmill? 💭.
I don’t have an Apple Watch or Fitbit.

lorrpb

Put your phone in your pocket or get a phone holder like the Buddy Pouch.

Evamutt

I got the "Map My Walk" app on my phone. It works great. I turn it on & put phone in my pocket at gym. I can compare to what gym equipment says

DancingMoosie

Doesn't the treadmill calculate distance?

SuperMotivated56

I hadn’t come across something like the buddy pouch - I’ll see if I can get something like that where I live (New Zealand).
DancingMoose, my treadmill does calculate distance, but this naturally doesn’t reflect on my phone, which I use to track my progress (it’s quite a motivating factor for me during the day too, to see my step/distance progress.) 🏃🏼‍♀️

jwoolman5

I find that the iPhone built in tracker in the Health app doesn't pay attention to walk in place steps or stair climbing for me (iPhone SE, iOS 12). Actually, it's very iffy on regular walking also.... Kind of useless software for me.

Maybe that's its problem with the treadmill also. Try Walker Lite, a free iPhone app that picks up walk in place steps nicely if you walk fast enough (don't have to exert too much, but too slow doesn't work) if you put it on the most sensitive setting as well as stair climbing steps. Maybe it will also work for a treadmill. It should, really, since it works for walk in place.

Walker Lite is really nice. I have it set to show how many steps so far today as a badge on its homepage icon. It lists and graphs steps for various intervals (weekly, monthly, yearly).

SuperMotivated56

Thank you jwoolman5 for the advice. I’ve searched “Walker lite” on the App Store, but can’t seem to find it. Any ideas 💭

Duck_Puddle

An option (depending on whether or not your phone is compatible) would be to use Fitbit MobileTrack. This would essentially allow you to use the Fitbit system for tracking steps, weight, competitions with other Fitbit users (if you wanted), maybe even link to mfp (if you wanted), but using your phone as your step counting device instead of a Fitbit.

Here’s a link to the Fitbit site with more info on this (and a way to see if your phone would work).

https://help.fitbit.com/articles/en_US/Help_article/1875#Definition

This wouldn’t necessarily show only your distance/steps on the TM though. So it might not be what you’re looking for.

jwoolman5

The developer for Walker Lite is Naoya Araki. When I checked the iPhone App Store for updates to Walker Lite, I was taken to something called Walker - Pedometer M7-M13 with a paw print on the icon. (Walker Lite has a shadow image of a walking woman). So that might be the replacement for Walker Lite. Looks like it's at least two years old, though. Looks as if it has all the easy to read variations on statistics displays that I like.

It says the new one is compatible with iOS 13, so if I update to that, maybe my beloved Walker Lite won't work any more. We shall see. I haven't tried the new app, but I sure hope it also picks up walk in place at the most sensitive setting because that's an important measure of activity for me. Would be a pain to have to go back to keeping track of time instead.

Otherwise, I would just try every free pedometer app I can find to see what works for me and what doesn't....

But meanwhile, I must keep faith in the developer of Walker Lite! It was so well done. Probably just decided to have one app that was free with in-app purchases for more bells and whistles, rather than Walker Lite and the paid version.

SuperMotivated56

Thank you both so much for your help. I have found and downloaded the app (with the 🐾) and I’ll see how it goes - can’t wait to get on the treadmill and try it out. 😁

Lolinloggen

SuperMotivated56 wrote: »

I hadn’t come across something like the buddy pouch - I’ll see if I can get something like that where I live (New Zealand).
DancingMoose, my treadmill does calculate distance, but this naturally doesn’t reflect on my phone, which I use to track my progress (it’s quite a motivating factor for me during the day too, to see my step/distance progress.) 🏃🏼‍♀️

They are available in NZ It is where I bought mine

jwoolman5

SuperMotivated- don't forget to report back if Walker works to pick up the treadmill steps!

I tried the Fitbit Mobile Track and it doesn't pick up much for me (iPhone SE, iOS 12). Just as bad as the iPhone built in software for Health. It reports about 630 steps when Misfit says 1900 and Walker says 2700 (mostly walk in place so far today). Even Misfit picks up some fast sidestep walk in place. So Walker Lite is still the only app on my phone that pays good attention to everything ...

Misfit is a separate device, but Fitbit Mobile Track and Walker both use the same accelerometer built into the phone. Doesn't give me much confidence in Fitbit's software.

SuperMotivated56

Jwoolman5, I’m pleased to report that it tracked more accurately this morning than anything else that I’ve tried. It actually slightly over-estimated, compared to the treadmill. Just looking at distance, treadmill said 12km, the app said 13km, whereas the iPhone health tracker only showed 8.9km (I had my phone in a pocket).

jwoolman5

That's great news about Walker! It would be so sad to lose my old version in iOS upgrade, but it sounds as though the newer version is as sensitive as the old one. Thanks for the report.

By the way, the old Walker Lite easily communicates with the Health app as an intermediary to report its step counts to my food tracker (LoseIt) also, which is helpful. Health keeps track of the steps reported by Walker with no problem, and I can adjust for when my phone isn't on me by adding steps caught by Misfit.

I had Health syncing with MFP for a while, but the Walker steps never registered on MFP, just the ridiculously low counts from the Health software. Maybe the newer version can play nicely with MFP.

SuperMotivated56

Thanks for sharing your insights with me. It’s been a good learning curve for me and all helpful as I work towards my goals. 🏃🏼‍♀️