Fitbit or HRM?

mrloserpunk
mrloserpunk Posts: 92 Member
in Introduce Yourself
I'm new to the community and a geek. I actually started getting interested in tracking intake and calorie burn after I found mfp and read an article on the fitbit flex. Today marks 10 days straight logging. I think i understand the differences between a hrm and step counter....the fitbit counting steps and using formula to calculate calorie burn while, the HRM gets is calories burn from heartbeats. It seems like the HRM is going to be much more accurate. Why even bother with a step counter then?

I guess it seems like having a pager and a smartphone? Am I missing something about the Fitbits that a ft7 isn't good at? Does it make sense to have both?

Replies

  • zentha1384
    zentha1384 Posts: 323 Member
    I keep myself set at sedentary and I try to count all calories I burned. I use a HRM for my actual workouts but I don't want to wear the chest strap all day so I use a step counter for my work day or running errands.

    The step counter I use is the Runtastic pedometer app. It links with MFP, there is a free version and the pro version is only a few bucks.
  • elisew34
    elisew34 Posts: 27
    I have both and use both. As above I use the HRM and chest strap (Polar FT4 ) when I'm running as I like to use my heart rate to judge my running, the fitbit One I clip to my bra every morning and can keep an eye on how many steps etc and I can kick myself up the backside if I'm not moving enough.
  • dreems23
    dreems23 Posts: 1
    New...but i want to reinvent myself in terms of health and fitness
  • getrealforme
    getrealforme Posts: 85
    I have the Jawbone UP, which is similiar to the Fitbit Flex. I love the way it syncs to MFP. It figures out your daily overall calorie burn and how many calories you should be eating to hit your goal. It is alot easier to wear a bracelet all day, to keep track of your overall calorie burn.
  • ChasingKatie
    ChasingKatie Posts: 331 Member
    I guess it depends on what type of activity you want to track. I have the ft40, I use it for weight training, boot camp classes, things like that. I also have the fitbit zip, I wear it daily to track my overall daily activity. I'm working towards 10k steps a day. Even if I go to the gym, I can be super sedentary the rest of the day. The fitbit pushes me to just be active in general.
  • onwarddownward
    onwarddownward Posts: 1,683 Member
    I just got the fitbit one, which I love! It encourages me to move more and it's game type environment is very cool. Then I bought the aria scale. It is so very cool.

    I wear a waterproof watch, because I'm a swimmer and didn't want a strap on each wrist (I have carpal and wear guards sometimes). I Love the One and the Aria is worth the money.

    I liked that it programmed with my ipad, since I don't have an iPhone.
  • shadow2soul
    shadow2soul Posts: 7,692 Member
    I have both.

    I have a fitbit zip to track my normal daily activity outside of exercise. It encourages me to be more active and I have it set so that on days where I'm a couch potato, it will deduct calories from MFP.

    My HRM on the other hand is strictly for cardio workouts. I use it for things like dancing, running, ect. Log the workouts on MFP and it overwrites whatever calorie burn my fitbit had for that time period.

    The combination gives me a better estimate of what I burn on a day to day basis than just one or the other.
  • acpgee
    acpgee Posts: 8,003 Member
    I had the same question myself but got the HRM first and am very glad I did. I had been relying on the calories burned given by cardio machines at the gym, and it seems like I was grossly over estimating. It's important for me because I eat back my exercise calories.

    My typical workout is 65 minutes on the elliptical trainer, targeting a minimum heart rate of 140. According to the HRM I burn around 530. According to the machine itself, around 780. The MFP database gives me 926.

    Might still buy a fitbit at some point to track daily activity. For the time being I am using the app runtastic to track walking, which uses the GPS to turn your phone into a pedometer.

    At the moment also using a free pedometer I got as part of a fitness challenge at work. It's an ECO C02 Pedometer and totally useless or defective. Today I have done a 65 minute workout on the elliptic (burning 530 according to the HRM) as well as almost 3 hours of leisurely walking (burning 794 according to runtastic, which is a number I trust because my nutritionist says 300 cals per hour is about right for walking, with adjustments for speed and body weight). The stupid pedometer says I only burned 52 calories today and only took 2140 steps. My elliptical workout alone is over 3600 seconds at a pace of around 2 steps per second.
  • mrloserpunk
    mrloserpunk Posts: 92 Member
    Thanks for all the responses so far. I'm really thinking at its best for me to start with the HRM. I work from home, and find myself more sedentary now than I have been my whole life. My daily workouts are my best chance to burn, and it sounds like the HRM is the best tool to help me maximize the burn.

    Obviously logging each day is another key component!
  • mrloserpunk
    mrloserpunk Posts: 92 Member
    I had the same question myself but got the HRM first and am very glad I did. I had been relying on the calories burned given by cardio machines at the gym, and it seems like I was grossly over estimating. It's important for me because I eat back my exercise calories.

    My typical workout is 65 minutes on the elliptical trainer, targeting a minimum heart rate of 140. According to the HRM I burn around 530. According to the machine itself, around 780. The MFP database gives me 926.

    That's exactly why I want the HRM. My treadmill tells me one number, and mfp another. I know the machine cant be right, cause it doesn't take into account my weight or any body information.
  • luckydays27
    luckydays27 Posts: 552 Member
    I have both. HRM is Polat FT60 which I use during fitness routine. I enter this into MFP for my exercise.

    I use the Fitbit One all day everyday. This determines my overall cal burn and syncs to MFP so I can determine how much I can eat. The exercise I enter in MFP overrides the same time on the fitbit so there is no doubling up on cals burned.

    I have a sedentary life (work from home at a desk for 10 hour days) with spurts of activity here and there. I needed something to count my cals burned everyday as sedentary is not really accurate every single day. The fitbit does that.

    I really cant imagine any better tools to use to make sure I make my goal of 500 cals deficient every day for a 1 lb weight loss. So far, so good.
  • acpgee
    acpgee Posts: 8,003 Member
    My cardio machine does take weight as an input, but seemed to be grossly overestimating by 30% of my HRM reading. Have since been told that programmers for these machines are told to use formulas that return the upper boundary of calories burned rather than the average of the range. It's good marketing.
  • Dlacenere
    Dlacenere Posts: 198 Member
    I have both but really have stopped using my HRM and just have been using the fitbit because the fitbit matched up well for my cardio and an HRM way overestimates on weightlifting, so I just let fitbit do it all now
  • JustAGirlyGeek
    JustAGirlyGeek Posts: 149 Member
    Fitbit is a great motivator (getting x amount of steps in a day, flights of stairs, etc). You can even friend people and have some friendly, healthy competition with them. I would look at the reviews of the Flex as some I have read said its not very accurate (yet). I love my Fitbit One.

    I also have a HRM to track more intense activity and get a more accurate calorie burn. Even those aren't 100% accurate but better than other devices. I love my Polar FT7. Got it off of Amazon for a decent price. Good luck!

    Edited to add... there is a new device that will be hitting the market soon too called Amiigo (http://amiigo.co/). Looking forward to trying that out too :) yes, I'm a gadget geek. LOL
  • HappyElizabeth
    HappyElizabeth Posts: 231 Member
    I have both, but pretty much just use the Fitbit One because it's given me the same numbers as the HRM and it's a heck of a lot more convenient. I find the Fitbit to be very accurate for all of the things that I do except cycling.

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