Fitbit - Charge 2

I had a Fitbit charge 2 for about 6 years and loved it until google took over and screwed up the compatibility and syncing. I now have a garmin fenix 7. MASSIVE step up. The battery doesn’t last as long, I use to get a week with 8hrs of tracking, now I’m charging every couple of days but that could be because I have all the bells and whistles turned on which aren’t needed. If you’re a data nerd and want more info than you ever thought was possible, then seriously look at garmin. I just have the free topo maps on it at the moment and pay no subscription. And quality seems good enough to navigate by. I haven’t tried it out in the bush yet, but to be honest i wouldn’t rely on it for navigating and would stick with map and compass or phone app where I can zoom in and out so much easier. It is geared towards running, but hiking, alpine are all options in there as activities. I love that it’s ocean proof too and can even track sailing.

What Fitbit are you wearing? I am wearing a Sense. I tried a Sense 2 but was disappointed to learn it doesn't track my laps so gave it to my husband. Am back to Sense. Wondering what other Fitbit tracks laps? My Charge 2, 4 both died in a couple of years and they both tracked laps for me.

Only ever used an Apple Watch, had a Fitbit charge 2 before that but that always needed phone to be connected for GPS etc. I think the Apple Watch is very accurate

I just got the Garmin Forerunner 165, still testing the various features. Have been using multiple Fitbit Charge devices (charge hr, charge 2, charge 4) for past few years. I gotta say that the Garmin watch looks like a serious health monitoring device compared to my Fitbits. The plethora of information it provides is awesome. I do hear that sleep monitoring is quite bad on all Garmins but apart for that, the Heart rate is tracking is quite good, gps is accurate. I am super impressed with how accurately it measures the number of floors ascended and descended, quite useless metric, but still love the pin point accuracy. Personally I have never wanted notifications on my watch, i carry my phone all the time so I can easily manage notifications there, also it's a pain keeping bluetooth on all the time on phone to receive notifications on the watch. So, if you need a health tracking device, Garmin watches are the ways to go. I can't talk much about Samsung, since I haven't used them. Also check out youtube reviews by - The Quantified Scientist. It may help you find a suitable device.

I was hoping to get some feedback on this. I have a Charge 2 which I don’t hate but I can’t get to keep track of workouts like it used to (is that user error or no longer a functionality post Google). I got an Apple SE delivered yesterday so I guess I’m going that route but open to feedback. I think I mainly want to see what workouts I’ve done over the last few weeks.

I recently got a Garmin Vivosmart 5 to replace my Fitbit Charge I had for many years. Can’t believe I just made the switch, personally, the Garmin blows the Fitbit out of the water!

Ya, I went through 2 fitbit charges before giving up and buying a pixel watch.

My wife and I had six different charge devices over the years. They all die just after the warranty! I really like the product but they don't last. Incidentally, the last one I bought I got the two year warranty. The product died after the first year and was replaced and then the replacement died 3 months after the warranty. Unless you want to buy one every year or so... don't but the fitbit Charge.

you are probably right and tends to be the end result. You are generally better off sticking with the more well known brands. Ignoring blood pressure your cheapest option for what you want is fitbit charge - but does include a screen - but reasonably small.

fitness bands I feel are more for health based reasons as generally their hr and gps isn't great for activity (fitness bands are like amzfit band, huawei band, fitbit charge etc). They have started to increase smart functionality and are getting closerto a smartwatch. Smartwatches are more for either companion to your phone (enabling phone features on your watch) - wear os on android or apple watch on iPhone - they can replicate a lot of what the fitness watches offer but its via 3rd party - so not an complete eco system. Then you get yoru fitness brands - garmin, coros, polar and suunto - where their focus is health, fitness and training metrics and analytics - the bonus of these wattches is long battery life and sport specific metrics. And there are the others which are a sort of cross between wear os/apple watch and the fitness watches - huawei , amazfit, xiaomi etc (and loads of chineese branded watches in this category) - these watches can provide great value for money, however health, fitness and training metrics can be much more hit and miss than the fitness watches. As to which is best for you would depend on your focus and what you want a smartwatch to do - yours post seem to be all health based - its worth noting that no watch is a medical device and while some components may have a form of medical approval (fda etc be advised that the type of medical approval sign off doesn't make them a medical device its just confirming they can provide to a specific level - which isn't necessary a medical level that hospitals etc can use). From a health perspective any all of these watches can work for you including fitness bands - just depend on the level of detail and what features you want. Personally I would suggest a fitbit charge for you or alternatively the pixel watch 3 (assuming you have an android). Why fitbit - they give a fair amount of depth to their health metrics and they provide an easy to understand level of insight to their data (note if you want stress detail and sleep score detail you will need a sub). PS - this will provide you with most of the stuff you wanted plus up to 7 day battery life. If you wanted all those features (except blood pressure) in a very classy package you could look at a withings - however I feel they are a bit hit and miss on some of their results, and while you do get a cut out screen note you will have to consume most of your data with the app. So why would you get a watch for health features: Sleep - I pefer one that focuses on recovery as duration is generally fairly accurate for most, sleep stages to a degree is a waste of time (no watch can accurate distinguish between light & rem - even sleep clinics struggle) - thus how a sleep aids your body in recharging makes sense to me - this is a focus for oura, garmin, whoop, polar and to a degree fitbit - garmin is the best at incorporating sleep into other features. Stress - the impact to your body's ANS - can be useful driver with other metrics to show how your body is reacting to various inputs (i.e. high stress during sleep can suggest you coming down with an illness/injury/over training - incorporating this into other metrics like training readiness can help you reduce training and instead maybe take a recovery day enabling your body to recover/have more energy to fight an illness - effectively reducing the chance of injury/illness. This is great summary by garmin of what each health metric is and what it offers and why you might want to track it. Not all garmins have all these features but most do, and most of the other watches have similar features but not to the same level of detail. [https://www.garmin.com/en-GB/garmin-technology/health-science/](https://www.garmin.com/en-GB/garmin-technology/health-science/)

I have used a Fitbit Charge as my smartwatch for years. I think I'm on my third one and I only need to charge it about once a week. And with this latest one I got, it now has navigation and texting, two things I was missing in the past. It's smaller than even the 41mm Pixel and has everything I need. I'm with you ... just can't give up the battery life for a pixel watch.

Fitbit is fitness tracker. All the other options you mentioned are way more expensive smart watches. I still think Fitbit is good for general health tracking. Plus I really like sleep tracking and found Fitbit Charge comfortable to wear in bed compared to watches.

Why not just stick with the Fitbit Charge? My Fitbit also measured the little things. But it also picked up on too much. Garmin prefers to count little steps as "accidents" such as typing on a keyboard. If you are using it to win a challenge, then Fitbit might be better for you. But if you want it for running or workout suggestions, then Garmin is better.

Yes I left Fitbit when they got rid of Fitbit Bingo :(

I've been using one for the better part of 2 months now. Same use situation kinda. I use it for time, timers, and sleep tracking. I had a fitbit charge before it that was great until it died. I wasn't going to drop another $100-140 for a watch to last a little over a year again. The watch pro 2 is awesome if you are willing to accept it's compromises. On the latest firmware, it duplicates notifications for me. It can and will disconnect from your phone if you go out of range or close the companion app. It likes for you to leave that in the background and have the connection notification in your notification shade (on Android at least, I am unsure of iPhone behavior). Neither of those are that big of a deal to me. What annoys me is when you set timers; you cannot leave the timer screen. The crown can accidentally stop the timer if it catches on clothes while you're moving around. I wear long sleeve rash guards at work and when it's raining; the wet rash guard sleeves will interact with the touchscreen and stop my timers, because again you can't leave the timer screen. I've already given feedback about how I'd love to have them modify the timer software's behavior. You *should* be able to send it to the background and go to the home screen. But as of right now it isn't designed that way. I've found a few screens where it remains on 24 hr time despite me setting it for 12 hr. Basically, it's got issues that can be patched with updates. I charge it once a week (a full 7 days). The battery life is AMAZING. I've only found one review that accurately describes the watch pro 2. It's a middle ground between fitness tracker and smartwatch. My Fitbit did not let me customize anything besides a watchface; it didn't do phone calls. It did last as long between charges. With the watch pro 2 you can have 4 "widget" screens in addition to the watchface. They have 4 spots per screen and they have widgets for each corner or a larger widget that takes two spaces (top or bottom). It has a "app menu" for anything you can't find a widget for. I don't regret buying mine. For the price point it's phenomenal.