Fitness tracker recommendations?

CoreyLust wrote: »

Maxematics wrote: »

CoreyLust wrote: »

Maxematics wrote: »

CoreyLust wrote: »

I've been using these things since they first came out. I can recommend the Garmin Fenix 5 for accuracy - assuming you set it up correctly. Fitbits are a monumental waste of type. They horribly over calculate your calorie burn.

This isn't true at all. Many users here have Fitbits and they have been accurate enough for them, myself included. There have also been reports of fitness trackers, specifically Fitbit, over/underestimating by ~ 200 calories which isn't too bad considering all of the variables.

No fitness tracker will be 100% accurate because that's highly improbable but those who claim that a fitness tracker is horribly off usually did not use the device properly and blame the device when it comes down to user error. Examples include:

• people who take the TDEE given by Fitbit and eat that on top of their MFP/other site's calculated calories.
• people who take exercise calories from Fitbit, manually add them to MFP/other site's calculated calories, and eat all of them back when calories burned during exercise on Fitbit are gross, not net (they include your BMR).
• people who don't weigh their food so they are actually eating much more than they think.

For people who can interpret data properly, understand how to use the technology, and are honest about their calorie intake, fitness trackers can be a useful tool. They are not perfect nor are they mandatory but they can really help someone understand how physical activity, even walking, can affect their TDEE.

Most places in the diet world shout from the rooftops how women must eat 1200 calories to lose weight. I used to buy into that mentality before I started using my Fitbit and joined MFP. I'm 5'3", 109 pounds, and I maintain on 2000 to 2300 calories per day on average. I would have been starving myself and it would have taken a much longer period of adjustment in realizing how much I need to eat without the help of my fitness tracker.

Fit bit was sued for 35 million and lost in a class action suit over their inaccuracy. Nuff said. Oh and I know exactly how this stuff works. But thanks for implying that myself and anyone else who accurately comment on a particular tracker being in accurate have no idea what we're doing when setting one up.

If you know exactly how this stuff works, why are you bringing up a lawsuit that has little to nothing to do with the OP's post?

The huge lawsuit against Fitbit was about how its PurePulse sensors on the Charge HR and Surge are not always consistent/accurate during intense physical activity; the lawsuit had nothing to do with inaccuracies over TDEE, steps, sleep, etc. A smaller class action suit over the accuracy of the sleep tracker was filed in 2015 by two people, reopened in 2019, and is limited to the Flex, One, and Ultra; three Fitbit models that are no longer on the market.

To elaborate, the PurePulse tracker used by Fitbit HR models would catch up to some users actual HR over time but was found by some to not provide their exact HR in real time either being higher than their actual HR or lower. This was claimed to be potentially dangerous to those whose HR reached a higher peak than intended. One person in the lawsuit with a heart condition said his chest strap and Fitbit differed by 10 to 20bpm. Most people are aware that a chest strap has a higher percent chance of being accurate over a wrist strap when it comes to heart rate. Those with medical conditions should know that a fitness tracker is not a replacement for a medical grade HR tracking device. Fitbit is not the only fitness tracker that had some inaccuracies over the heart rate; other wrist-based HR sensors had the same inaccuracies sometimes. Keyword being sometimes.

However, again, this really doesn't concern the OP unless they specifically need a tracker to monitor their HR and if they did, I would think they'd be consulting with their doctor first. For day to day activities, exercise, calorie and sleep tracking, I have found my Fitbit to be accurate and so have many others. Maybe it's just me but I wouldn't expect a fitness tracker to be 100% accurate to the point where I'd file a lawsuit over it. There are many variables at play in the human body for any tracker to be 100% accurate but most people have found that it's close enough, gives them decent insight of their TDEE and activity levels, and have easily adjusted to any minor discrepancies. I still maintain my stance that those who claim the TDEE calculations of Fitbit are grossly, horribly off boils down to user error rather than device error.

I don't think you have read the ops post properly. You are also providing information that is quite far from the ops question. If you aren't getting accurate calorie burn information from your fitness tracker then what is the point in having it. You keep bringing up tdee. If your using your fitness tracker to give you insight into your calorie burn and its inaccurate. Thats hopeless. Some of the fitbits I tested were calculating tea to be twice as much as it actually was. My garmin is spot on and they've been in the game alot longer than fit bit. Fitbits have only been around for the last 5 years or so. They are cheap and nasty inaccurate fitness trackers.

Yeah, and my Garmin underestimates my TDEE by a good 25-30%, as compared with nearly 4 years of careful logging data.

All the lawsuits and vendor preferences aside: These devices measure certain things (altitude, heart rate, speed, various body movements, etc.) that are proxies for exercise effort. They don't measure calories. They use the things they do measure, along with results from research studies, to produce statistical estimates of a person's calorie expenditure. As with any statistical estimates, well-designed devices/algorithms are going to produce a result that's close for most people (those near the mean, more or less); off somewhat (high or low) for a few; and quite far off for a very, very few.

That said, that potential TDEE inaccuracy doesn't render a device useless.

I love my Garmin. It tracks my rowing distance, calculates pace/speed, maps the course, correlates all of that with my heart rate, and more. It's a great fitness tracker, as in it helps me with improving my exercise effectiveness and fitness.

It's somewhat bemusing to me, after using HRMs and speed/pace GPS (earlier Garmins) for many years to track my activities, to see the rise of mass-market "Fitness Trackers" and - especially here on MFP - see people say they're useless if they don't get all-day calories accurate. May be true for some, but even there I see folks say the steps goals and competitions encourage them to move more (that's a plus, right?). For me, the fact that it's wrong on all-day calories is of not the slightest concern. (MFP is similarly wrong, BTW - it's not the devices, it's me. A few of the TDEE calculators do a bit better . . . again, for me. MFP is also close, for most people.)

OP, Fitbit or Garmin (and some other reputable brands) are likely to be close on all-day calorie burn for you. If they're not, you'll soon be able to use your real-world weight-change results, and know how much to adjust intake to get the right level for you. It'll be fine.

I like my Garmin (I have a Vivoactive 3). I think the devices that let you tell them what exercise you're doing (running vs. weight training, or whatever) have more potential to estimate exercise calories more accurately, but I don't know whether they're effectively exploiting that potential in their algorithms yet. FWIW, one thing I like about mine is that it looks like an old-school watch, and being an old-school woman (age 63 ), I've always worn a wristwatch. (You may want something sleeker, but the VA3 isn't a commando-style knobby blob.)

I appreciate not having to have my phone with me all the time (I'm a rower, and don't normally take it out on the water, so it's good that the watch stores extensive data and loads it to the app/cloud when I get back on land). It wasn't a feature I thought I wanted, but I was really surprised that I do like how it gives me notifications from my phone, including texts. During times when I have my phone on silent, it'll give me a little wrist-buzz and the phone number or text message, so it gives me more ability to silence my phone in social situations without missing urgent contacts. (I wear it all the time.)

I do find that I need to use a chest belt when rowing (which I expected): There's just too much arm movement/flexion, and the wrist-based HRM intermittently loses contact and mis-measures. For other things - biking, walking, etc. - I haven't noticed any pattern of problems.

If you make a list of the features you feel you need, and use tech review and vendor sites to get details, you should be able to zero in on a device that will work well for you. I'd stick with major manufacturers with a decent rep for service and support, vs. cheapos.

Best wishes!