Garmin Connect - what am I doing wrong?

moonangel12

Is there still a MFP glitch? Or are my settings not right? I can’t get GC and MFP to link together for some reason. When I had a FitBit it would track everything, the Garmin has been hit or miss, but it hasn’t transferred anything for weeks, maybe months. I found a setting via GC that had my info locked, but I partially unlocked it for MFP, but still no luck. What else can I try? Not sure what I am missing... I am thinking some setting somewhere that I haven’t yet found.

Lietchi

Have you linked the accounts on both sides, MFP and Garmin Connect?

I remember it being tricky to add MFP on Garmin Connect, but aside from that I haven't had any issues.

moonangel12

I have gone through both, both say they are connected. I found one setting via GC where I had communication “locked” for anything outside of GC and changed it to communicate with linked apps. Thought for sure that was the magic button. Closed both out, still no luck.

ETA: I don’t mind adding exercise in manually, but want to set my profile to sedentary and have it auto adjust for activity level for better accuracy each day (mainly the days when I am not doing much of any th ing).

tmghealthy

Hi moonangel,
At least some of the weeks-of-no-updates btwn Garmin and third parties like Fitbit or MFP were probably due to the ransomware attack that hit Garmin ~ July 23rd. The app, website, and all their other services (including GPS products in marine and aviation fields) were unusable. The return of functionality happened in stages, and interaction with third party software was later on the list. One thing I would probably try is to remove the account links on both sides (disconnect them from each other totally), then add each back to the other, if that makes sense, now that it is fully restored.

moonangel12

I finally got it connected! Yay!

I have what feels like a beginner question, but how does the calorie calculations work for steps? I changed my level to sedentary since I have drastically different days in terms of activity level and as of today I am at nearly 12000 steps but no adjustment outside of my morning run (4.25 miles). If it doesn’t automatically adjust I probably will just switch it back to lightly active because it was working well enough, just trying for better accuracy.

Duck_Puddle

The adjustment is based on Garmin’s estimate of your TDEE compared to MFP’s estimate of your TDEE.

You can see the details of the calculation by clicking on the steps line in your diary (then click again) or click the “I” by the adjustment if you’re on the web.

This is what it looks like in my diary:



This is the calculation:



My adjustment is a negative amount because I didn’t burn as much as mfp expected me to burn during the day (even including my run).

moonangel12

This is what mine is showing right now - it has stayed at zero for steps adjustment all day...



ETA: this is with me changing my activity level to “not very active” this morning... I would think that 12k steps, even including the run, would have showed something.

Duck_Puddle

moonangel12 wrote: »

This is what mine is showing right now - it has stayed at zero for steps adjustment all day...



ETA: this is with me changing my activity level to “not very active” this morning... I would think that 12k steps, even including the run, would have showed something.

When you click on the line with the steps, then click on the writing on the next screen-what does it show on the last page (it will look like my second picture)?

moonangel12

Duck_Puddle wrote: »

moonangel12 wrote: »

This is what mine is showing right now - it has stayed at zero for steps adjustment all day...



ETA: this is with me changing my activity level to “not very active” this morning... I would think that 12k steps, even including the run, would have showed something.

When you click on the line with the steps, then click on the writing on the next screen-what does it show on the last page (it will look like my second picture)?

I tried clicking on it yesterday and it didn’t do anything but it worked this morning! And THAT’s the setting I have been looking for! It says negative calorie adjustments have been disabled, but when I follow the steps for where to find it I am not seeing it... I know I have seen it in the past, I spent longer than I would like to admit looking for it yesterday because I assumed that was the issue but never found it. Even with “click this then this” instructions I still don’t see it. Maybe I have to access it via PC.

Lietchi

Maybe not necessarily on PC, but you do need to go to the website via your browser instead of using the app.

PS: exercise will seemingly lower the calories you get from your steps: Garmin sends over gross exercise calories instead of net, so those 'BMR calories' included in your exercise burn are subtracted from your step calories when MFP compares total calorie burn with Garmin. So definitely a good idea to allow negative calorie adjustments.

Duck_Puddle

Yes. The settings for negative adjustments are only on the web and not in the app. You can use your phone browser.

And as for why you’re seeing a 0 even with 12k steps-because a good portion of those steps are from your run - and the run is accounted for in the workout entry. So you’ll need to burn enough calories to be over and above the sedentary setting PLUS the run in order to see a positive adjustment.

Im averaging 20k steps a day right now and I’m still sedentary (according to mfp) Because nearly all of those steps are from my runs.

Note-I am not set as sedentary on mfp because I’m working some number voodoo to correct for my Garmin vastly overestimating my TDEE. I’m only sharing that because I have large negative adjustments with my current setting - which isn’t “normal” for sedentary. I would have smaller or no negative adjustments if I were set to sedentary on mfp.

moonangel12

I knew there was an option somewhere but could.not.find it! Didn’t think to log in via web browser.

I think my run was about half of my step count for the day...

This is mainly experimental on my part, my old settings were doing OK, just wasn’t sure how accurate it was for me, especially going in to winter activity levels and possible maintenance (although I hunker down in summer as well so who knows).