heart rate monitor vs pedometer

funnygrrl

hi there,

i have been looking around lately for heart rate monitors... needless to say, they can be pricey. but then a pedometer caught my eye, that showed it tracked calories... so i'm wondering, what's the difference? is the heart monitor a fair bit more accurate? any advice would be greatly appreciated

thanks
liz

CoachNatalie

Hi Liz,

I'm no expert, but I did just buy the mentioned items. My pedometer was $5 at Walmart and it only measures steps and miles/km traversed. Steps are measured by stride and if you want to use this one for running, you have to recalibrate your stride to get an accurate measurement.

I also purchased a HRM by Sportline there for $45ish bucks. I'm not a fan of the band, but this watch has a number of useful features, including touch detected heart rate (without having to have the chest strap on), stop watch, lap timer, alarm, secret ninja star and spy camera. Okay maybe slightly exaggerated. But I'm pretty happy with my first purchase(s). Hope it helps a bit.

funnygrrl

Hi Liz,

I'm no expert, but I did just buy the mentioned items. My pedometer was $5 at Walmart and it only measures steps and miles/km traversed. Steps are measured by stride and if you want to use this one for running, you have to recalibrate your stride to get an accurate measurement.

I also purchased a HRM by Sportline there for $45ish bucks. I'm not a fan of the band, but this watch has a number of useful features, including touch detected heart rate (without having to have the chest strap on), stop watch, lap timer, alarm, secret ninja star and spy camera. Okay maybe slightly exaggerated. But I'm pretty happy with my first purchase(s). Hope it helps a bit.

thanks, that does help.

which did you prefer?

MercuryBlue

My pedometer measures calories but it's more of a 'guess' based on averages than anything else. A HRM will actually take your heart rate and factor that in along with your age, sex, weight, etc. to come up with a far more accurate estimate about how many calories you're burning.

I bought a HRM a few months ago and LOVE it. Mine is a Polar F6, and it's AWESOME.

TCASMEY

I like to balance the use of both. I used to wear my HRM all day and every time I had 10 minutes I would hit the button and walk and walk. Now I only wear my HRM when I am doing a structured work-out. I have a pedometer on my shoes that I wear all the time. I use that to gauge my daily activity and try to get a higher number than the day before. I know the calorie burn on the pedometer is not correct at all because I usually have over 25,000 steps and the pedometer says I only burned around 300 calories. They can both be useful depending on what your goals are.