Heart rate monitor advice

A recent news article said that most companies that make them are planning on gradually getting out of the business, because all of them are notoriously inaccurate. My husband has tried one, and I know others as well. Have yet to run into someone who really liked them, someone who didn't have issues with them, and someone who thought they were all that accurate. Save your money, use MFP's food/exercise log...which is probably much more accurate.

But if you really want to waste your money, Consumer Reports like the Polar brand.

Link to that article?

Your assessment that MFP's database is more accurate is contrary to pretty much every thread and post here on the subject.

Here's the link to the article. No, MFP's database isn't perfect, but it's free. That's what I meant when I said she should just save her money and use the free app.

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/fitness-bands-slick-marketing-suspect-150047229.html

That article isn't about heart rate monitors, it's about fitbit type activity trackers. Apples and oranges.

I have a Polar heart rate monitor, I think it's a FT4,, a very basic one. It is the chest band type with a watch where you read your data. No bluetooth or any other connection to a PC or smart phone, but it does connect somehow to some of the equipment at my gym, so I can do the cardio programs and it uses the heart rate from my monitor rather than from the handles. At the end of your workout, you can use the buttons on the watch to scroll through and see your average heart rate, calories burned and duration of workout.

I think some of the more sophisticated ones that Polar has use a different method for calculating calories that is supposed to be more accurate to your individual fitness. I am pretty confident what it's telling me is pretty close, so I am OK with this one for now.

When I first got it, I logged the info onto their website fitness tracker, but I decided to just use MFP instead and skip that step I use the calories that it tells me rather than what MFP calculates, you can just override it when entering it.

A recent news article said that most companies that make them are planning on gradually getting out of the business, because all of them are notoriously inaccurate. My husband has tried one, and I know others as well. Have yet to run into someone who really liked them, someone who didn't have issues with them, and someone who thought they were all that accurate. Save your money, use MFP's food/exercise log...which is probably much more accurate.

But if you really want to waste your money, Consumer Reports like the Polar brand.

Link to that article?

Your assessment that MFP's database is more accurate is contrary to pretty much every thread and post here on the subject.

Here's the link to the article. No, MFP's database isn't perfect, but it's free. That's what I meant when I said she should just save her money and use the free app.

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/fitness-bands-slick-marketing-suspect-150047229.html

That article isn't about heart rate monitors....

Did you post the wrong link?

A recent news article said that most companies that make them are planning on gradually getting out of the business, because all of them are notoriously inaccurate. My husband has tried one, and I know others as well. Have yet to run into someone who really liked them, someone who didn't have issues with them, and someone who thought they were all that accurate. Save your money, use MFP's food/exercise log...which is probably much more accurate.

But if you really want to waste your money, Consumer Reports like the Polar brand.

PERSONALLY, i'D IGNORE THIS... I LOVE MY POLAR FT4. It matches fairly well with machines at gym... and lets me count things like grass cutting with more accuracy

HRMs are not designed to track calorie burns on things like grass cutting. They are for steady state cardio only.

I love my HRT it might not be 100% accurate with my activity but it is close. MPF tends to give more calories than I actually burn. Also as you gain or lose weight you have to update your HRM to get a more accurate estimate of calories burned. I have one at work and one for home I love them. If money is a issue see if you can get a used one on Amazon or Ebay.

Polar FT4 and FT40 are great and don't need to conecting to a computer or the internet! HRMs are the most accurate way to track calories burned. Just make sure you get one with a chest strap and not the ones that track through the wrist. They aren't nearly as accurate and aren't constant.

I used and FT1 and moved to an FT7. It does good for cardio and I use it for strength training anyway. It is a point of reference, not the ultimate solution, but much better than MFP guessing what I personally do. All the MFP numbers are approximations of some or many people. I'll stick with the HRM method and at least I'm consistent. MFP is great for tracking calories of foods, that's about it.

I just recently had a HRM and it really opened my eyes of how much i was not burning!....i thought i was burning quite a bit more than what it tells me;)

A recent news article said that most companies that make them are planning on gradually getting out of the business, because all of them are notoriously inaccurate. My husband has tried one, and I know others as well. Have yet to run into someone who really liked them, someone who didn't have issues with them, and someone who thought they were all that accurate. Save your money, use MFP's food/exercise log...which is probably much more accurate.

But if you really want to waste your money, Consumer Reports like the Polar brand.

I loved my HRM (unfortunately lost the strap and never replaced it) and I know several others who love their's. The MFP database has always been pretty darned close to my HRM, though, so if it's accurate then so is my HRM.

The problem with the database is that much of my cardio exercise is walking or jogging and there are a lot of hills. If I put "walking 4 mph" into the database, it assume a flat surface and therefore records fewer calories due to the hill. My HRM would account for the hill.

A recent news article said that most companies that make them are planning on gradually getting out of the business, because all of them are notoriously inaccurate. My husband has tried one, and I know others as well. Have yet to run into someone who really liked them, someone who didn't have issues with them, and someone who thought they were all that accurate. Save your money, use MFP's food/exercise log...which is probably much more accurate.

But if you really want to waste your money, Consumer Reports like the Polar brand.

PERSONALLY, i'D IGNORE THIS... I LOVE MY POLAR FT4. It matches fairly well with machines at gym... and lets me count things like grass cutting with more accuracy

HRMs are not designed to track calorie burns on things like grass cutting. They are for steady state cardio only.

what's the difference between pushing a lawn mower around in circles and up and down a hill and using a computer generated incline/resistance/ speed on a cardio machine at the gym, or jogging through a neighborhood? For that matter trimming hedges gets my heart rate up and keeps it in the zone for the duration. I could those calories burned as cardio.. heart rate in the zone, burning oxygen...therefore burning calories.

I'd advise Beets BLU HRM, I've chosen it for a perfect combination of cost and accuracy of parameters, though of course you should remember that much depends on the application here. I'm using it with my favorite smartphone exercise tracking app and I must say it works just great for me.