Fitbit elliptical step count

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lmgoff232
lmgoff232 Posts: 277 Member
in Fitness and Exercise
I have a Fitbit Charge 4 that I wear all the time. When I do my elliptical, I start the Elliptical activity on my watch, and end it when I am done. I have noticed that my step count after the elliptical is way low. As an example, today I did about 1.25 miles. My elliptical has a 20" stride length, so that should have been equivalent to about 3960 steps, however my fitbit only counted 2165. My elliptical does have moving arms that I use, and my band is tight to my wrist. I have tried lossening it a notch to see if that helps but I get the same result. I have heard trying an ankle, but my watch won't fit my ankle, and it is still a fairly smooth stride.

So my question is: Is the calorie burn accurate enough given I started/stopped the activity setting on the watch, or should I be doing manual adjustments of some kind? Is there a way to override the step count for the activity? I do have my fitbit enabled to sync, and tend to eat back some to all of my exercise calories so want to make sure I am not under eating.

Replies

  • robertw486
    robertw486 Posts: 2,388 Member
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    Hard to say. A lot of wearable devices can be a hassle with certain exercise types, either over or under estimating things.

    Does your elliptical have a known good mileage calculation or other data? If so you could just delete the activity under Fitbit and log it manually, or make the appropriate adjustment. But that might not be worth it unless you routinely walk farther. Walking doesn't burn a lot of calories, so even if the Fitbit is off by that percentage on a regular basis, the error in calories isn't all that great.

    There is a generally accepted formula for walking (flat ground)

    weight x distance (miles) x .3 = net calorie burn
  • lmgoff232
    lmgoff232 Posts: 277 Member
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    @robertw486 Thanks! Used the formula, and yeah, not that much difference in the calculated calories so I think I will let it go for now. It just drives me crazy when doing step competitions for work knowing I had more but they aren't recorded, lol.
  • Justin_7272
    Justin_7272 Posts: 341 Member
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    If your FitBit has a heart rate monitor when you have an activity set (such as Elliptical) it should monitor your heart rate during that period then determine your calorie burned based off that, as opposed to steps. Generally I would consider HRM much more reliable than step count to determine calories burned.
  • yirara
    yirara Posts: 9,420 Member
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    Justin_7272 wrote: »
    If your FitBit has a heart rate monitor when you have an activity set (such as Elliptical) it should monitor your heart rate during that period then determine your calorie burned based off that, as opposed to steps. Generally I would consider HRM much more reliable than step count to determine calories burned.

    Not really. If you're unfit your HR shoots up more while the same exercise done the same between a fit and a less fit person doesn't burn a different amount of calories. Also, if you're unfit your HR will remain elevated for longer afterwards while you might just be sitting about, adding to the calorie count. Finally, this could potentially be a good metric, but only if you've set a correct HR max, which, for many people is not simply 220-age. And you can only test this if you're really fit and willing to go all out. Which you can only when you're fit enough.
  • Justin_7272
    Justin_7272 Posts: 341 Member
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    yirara wrote: »
    Justin_7272 wrote: »
    If your FitBit has a heart rate monitor when you have an activity set (such as Elliptical) it should monitor your heart rate during that period then determine your calorie burned based off that, as opposed to steps. Generally I would consider HRM much more reliable than step count to determine calories burned.

    Not really. If you're unfit your HR shoots up more while the same exercise done the same between a fit and a less fit person doesn't burn a different amount of calories. Also, if you're unfit your HR will remain elevated for longer afterwards while you might just be sitting about, adding to the calorie count. Finally, this could potentially be a good metric, but only if you've set a correct HR max, which, for many people is not simply 220-age. And you can only test this if you're really fit and willing to go all out. Which you can only when you're fit enough.

    To address everything...
    Your FitBit should have age, weight, etc., which should lead to a different calorie burn based on those metrics.
    Your FitBit HR during your workout session will track your HR to determined calories burned during that session, not after (as you suggested).
    Finally, my point was HRM is better to track calories burned during an exercise session, vs. trying to log steps burned during a workout session such as using an elliptical, to determine caloric burn.
    So yeah, really.
  • lmgoff232
    lmgoff232 Posts: 277 Member
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    Thanks Justin and yirara for your input. Between the low step counts and possible inflated burn from HR, hopefully they wash out :smile: I still have enough to loose and a big enough deficit that I am continuing to make progress anyways. Will keep going as is for now, but definitely keep these in mind as something to consider if I stall (and hopefully figure out a solution one of these days!)
  • Onamissionforfit
    Onamissionforfit Posts: 90 Member
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    lmgoff232 wrote: »
    I have a Fitbit Charge 4 that I wear all the time. When I do my elliptical, I start the Elliptical activity on my watch, and end it when I am done. I have noticed that my step count after the elliptical is way low. As an example, today I did about 1.25 miles. My elliptical has a 20" stride length, so that should have been equivalent to about 3960 steps, however my fitbit only counted 2165. My elliptical does have moving arms that I use, and my band is tight to my wrist. I have tried lossening it a notch to see if that helps but I get the same result. I have heard trying an ankle, but my watch won't fit my ankle, and it is still a fairly smooth stride.

    So my question is: Is the calorie burn accurate enough given I started/stopped the activity setting on the watch, or should I be doing manual adjustments of some kind? Is there a way to override the step count for the activity? I do have my fitbit enabled to sync, and tend to eat back some to all of my exercise calories so want to make sure I am not under eating.

  • Onamissionforfit
    Onamissionforfit Posts: 90 Member
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    I'm on Fitbit also. If the handles are metal on the equipment and you are holding it with the side you are wearing tracker it won't count all steps. Mine does that on treadmill so I have to hold on with one hand so my tracker counts right. For some reason holding on to metal messes with tracker and steps.
  • lmgoff232
    lmgoff232 Posts: 277 Member
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    @Onamissionforfit Thank you for the suggestion! It does have metal arms, so I will try wrapping it with fabric to see if that helps. My balance on it isn't great so the one arm will take more work, but will definitely give it a try if the fabric doesn't work 😀

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