Do you need an activity tracker to lose weight?

Nope. Not at all necessary. But I find my Fitbit to be very motivational.

It's not essential or required but like others have said, they can be motivating.

When my husband's small company was acquired by a much larger international company years ago, our insurance plans changed for the better and one of the available incentives to qualify for a lower premium was a million step challenge (company provided pedometers). While it was eye opening to see just how little I walked during the day when I started, my biggest problem was that I wore dresses all the time to work and a lot on the weekends (south TX - a loose fitting dress was usually cooler than a t-shirt and shorts) so the clip on pedometer just didn't really work. The company changed their wellness/healthy living partner a few years ago and we could sync wearable trackers thru the new partner instead of having to manually log steps from a clip on pedometer so we switched to Fitbit (first Flexes, now Charges). I use mine to track steps, sync with MFP for my exercise calories (mainly walking and light jogging), and review my sleep patterns. I usually eat back at least half my exercise calories and I've lost almost 8 pounds in two months.

No you do not need one. They possibly can help to motivate you though. Good Luck

I find it motivating so I'm really sad I can't find my sensor looking into buying a new one now.

sadiepie05 wrote: »

I was wondering if activity trackers really help with losing weight? Are they just for fun or an important tool? I'm a fairly active woman that needs (wants) to lose around 30lbs.

Long time MFP and fitness tracker user. One of my goals is a minimum of 10,000 steps daily so a pedometer of some type is necessary. No you do not need to use a fitness tracker to lose weight but they can be great motivators. I have a drawer full of them including a basic pedometers, Runtastic, Misfit, Jawbone and FitBit Charge HR as well as returned a Garmin. I now use Apple Watch. There are pluses and minuses to each especially the apps. If you highly value privacy and complete control of your data, Apple Watch is the way to go. The Activity and Exercise apps are a bit different than other trackers. All except the basics can feed into MFP although I don't but I do allow MFP to send calories in only to Apple Health. If you choose to use a fitness tracker, do a bit of research to find one that meets your needs.

My experience: Runtastic is clunky but their app is very nice. Misfit is a sweet little device but the app has a lot of problems often not syncing calories properly. Garmin was nice but quit working after 3 weeks and had one of the worst customer service issues ever! FitBit Charge HR isn't aesthetically pleasing but quickly became the most liked. The app is nice too except for sharing which gives a selfie instead of a map. Of note, Jawbone is getting out of the wearables so that will likely affect their usefulness at some time. By far the one I like the best is Apple Watch but it is not strictly just a fitness tracker.

They aren't necessary, but they absolutely helped me with my 30# weight loss a couple years ago. I learned important things: I'm not as sedentary as I think I am. So I could have been eating more. Which is why I'd failed every other time I'd tried to calorie count. Once I was eating an appropriate amount of food, I could stick with it, and I lost 30#.

I gained back a little over ten of those while taking care of my MIL through her ovarian cancer battle, but I'm back on the wagon again and my Fitbit is my most trusted companion on this journey.

sadiepie05 wrote: »

queenliz99 wrote: »

Activity trackers are for fun and you don't need one to lose weight. A calorie deficit is needed to lose weight.

http://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10257474/starting-out-restarting-basics-inside/p1

Right, but do they help with a more accurate CICO?

Not necessarily, but maybe. Yes, I realize that's pretty noncommittal.

If it's set up correctly, used appropriately (or more importantly, not used when it's not supposed to be used), and is a "good" unit to begin with, it'll might help. If not, then it'll likely hinder your weight loss/gain/maintenance goal.