Fitbit Flex users

I'm not sure about the swimming, but I wear mine the shower. You might lose it during flag football if you have people who are bad about not grabbing at limbs and they snag your wrist. (My 4 year old son lunged at me when I was trying to lift him out of a paddle boat and I nearly had mine fall in the lake.) The plus side is the replacement bands are cheap and come in many colors, including bright red. So if it fell on a field, you should be able to find it immediately. If it becomes truly lost, FitBit does have a lost fitbit program so if someone turns it in to them, they can tell it's yours and send it to you.

I take mine off for charging, when I'm washing dishes, or giving my son a bath. Otherwise it's on all the time.

It's not going to track swimming. It only does steps-based activities. It might do ok with flag football, assuming that's mostly running around. It's not going to track anything with resistance (weights, incline, etc) or a vehicle (bike, etc), either.

Fitbit Flex isn't an HRM

You make a profile with weight, height, sex etc. You pick a goal - I do what most do - the 10K steps a day, so the lights on it are based on how far along in the goal I am during the day. It calculates your steps and calories burned - obviously not as a heart rate monitor would do - but you can get a TDEE number based on your previous 30 days numbers, as well as your caloric intake. It'll tell you distance, active minutes and if you set the sleep mode, how efficient your sleep is - it shows you when you wake up, and how long it took you to fall asleep. You can also use it as an alarm, and it'll vibrate and buzz - no obnoxious noise.

I sync mine here, but log all my food and exercise on here and let it cross over to Fitbit, mostly because I was on here first. It's not a HRM, but wearing it on your wrist 24/7 is much easier and more realistic than wearing a chest strap 24/7 and a watch with beeping noises. I do have my HRM and use it for particular exercises but for overall day to day tracking of my numbers, I go by my Flex. I've had it for 13 months and have about doubled my daily steps, I hit 10K almost every day, I hit 15K twice this week (each mile is approx 2K). I find when I'm downstairs cooking, I do laps back and forth instead of sitting in front of the tv. It makes me take longer routes to where I'm going just to reach my numbers, so that's a good thing. I love it

I am pretty new to this but started using the Fitbit Flex. My sister in law is a very strong athlete (runs Ironman) and told me to get The Basis watch. It costs twice what the Fitbit does but seems a bit more accurate. It does HR, steps, daily calories burned, sleep pattern (including time spent in REM, light and deep) and quite a bit more. You can check out the website here:

http://www.mybasis.com/

Not knocking the FItbit because I really liked that one as well but this one is a watch as well.

I am pretty new to this but started using the Fitbit Flex. My sister in law is a very strong athlete (runs Ironman) and told me to get The Basis watch. It costs twice what the Fitbit does but seems a bit more accurate. It does HR, steps, daily calories burned, sleep pattern (including time spent in REM, light and deep) and quite a bit more. You can check out the website here:

http://www.mybasis.com/

Not knocking the FItbit because I really liked that one as well but this one is a watch as well.

It's been a while since I looked at the Basis but I think it doesn't do much more than the Fitbits. The Fitbit Flex doesn't tell time but the other model Fitbits do. The Basis has a spot HR check but they admit it's nothing like the continuous monitoring that a chest strap HRM does.

The Withings Pulse is another, similar option, for under $100. Though with that one you initiate the spot pulse check by holding it to your finger rather than it taking spot readings from your wrist on its own schedule.