Apps
I’ve been loving wearing my fitness trackers {I have the Garmin Vivofit & the Fitbit Charge}. I’ve had one of them on since the day I got the first one. Honestly sometimes they really piss me off because I thought I was a lot more active than apparently I really am, but that’s exactly why I also continue to wear one – it’s great encouragement and a constant reminder to get up and move just a little bit more. It’s made me realize how important just a daily walk around the block is when I don’t have time for anything else. Those steps add up!
While I love scrolling through the numbers on my wrist and analyzing the data in my app, sometimes all that information still seems to be a bit lacking. Ok, so I know my average number of steps and can see how my sleep is from day to day, but what does all that really mean? Move more? Sleep more? All of the above?
That’s where the app AddApp comes in – it analyzes your habits for you. It meshes information together and spits out an understandable, tangible insight. Not only does it take data from certain fitness trackers, but also works with other apps like Apple Health, MapMyRun, Runkeeper, Strava and more.
Once you’ve added the services you want to sync, the app eats up all the data and spits it out in nice little succinct “insights”, such as the number of steps you average, how many hours of sleep you tend to get, and how many calories you’re burning from activities. It will also analyze the data a bit more and send you little notes and tidbits, like you haven’t logged any steps for awhile, you haven’t been recording nutrition information, or that you had a particularly low number of hours of sleep one night.
Having the data rolled up into succinct little bites of information is super helpful {alhtough I certainly didn’t need my phone to tell me I didn’t get enough sleep on a particular night – I knew that without any technology clueing me in!}. It’s yet another reminder to get up, get moving, and take care of yourself.
Download AddApp and start getting your insights so you can make sense of all the data you have at your disposal.
This post is sponsored by FitFluential on behalf of AddApp.
Review
As promised on Instagram, I’ve been putting two fitness trackers to the test. The Fitbit Charge and the Garmin Vivofit.
Before I get down to business, I thought I’d review the Fitbit Charge on it’s own first. {You can read my review of the Vivofit here.}
Just for the record, I received this Fitbit from VerizonWireless & Fitfluential. Without further ramblings, here are the details:
Fitbit Charge Review
*The Charge is one of many Fitbits available. This one displays information directly on the band as well as through an app, and does not have interchangable wrists bands. This is the one I have –>> Fitbit Charge, small, slate $125.
Pros
Displays information directly on the wrist band. Pushing a button reveals time, steps taken, calories burned, miles covered, and flights of stairs climbed,
Numbers are lit {aka you can see them in the dark}
Syncs to app wirelessly through Bluetooth quickly
Tracks sleep according to number of wake ups and number of restless minutes. I find this method of reporting information more useful than other versions. {Although one time I sat reading a book so long it thought I was asleep. Oops.}
Tracks “active minutes”. Let’s you get an idea how much was “exercise” vs daily movement {to some extent}.
App is user-friendly, attractive, and full of information. I really, really like the Fitbit app. You can see trends, averages, integrate with MyFitnessPal, etc. It also has different challenges you can do to help with motivation & interact with friends.
Cons
Wide wristband. It doesn’t appear super bulky {although it’s wide} but I do notice it a lot. The part of the wristband that isn’t flexible {the technology part} takes up a good amount of the band, making it not move or sit super well on my smaller wrist.
Comes sized, with one band. Some trackers come with multiple wristbands in the same box, including the Flex. This one doesn’t – you have to pick a size upfront. This may not matter to most, but it means I can’t share with my husband.
Limited color selection. Similar to above, you get what you get. You can’t swap out sizes or colors. I’m not a fan of the odd blue color {aka “slate”} I have, and there isn’t a big selection of other colors anyway. Maybe this will change down the road? {Anybody know??}
Have to push button on side of wristband to view display. I’d rather just see the number staring back at my face, or at least be able to choose which reading shows up first instead of clicking through.
Battery needs charging. This goes somewhere between pro and con, really. The Charge needs to be plugged in to charge the battery, meaning you have to take it off to do so {and not count steps}. However, it charges quickly and the battery lasts awhile – at least a week/week and a half. If you charge it while you’re sitting anyways, you don’t miss much.
Do you where a fitness tracker? Which kind? Have you tried the Fitbit Charge? {If you have a Fitbit find me at heather @ sideofsneakers . com!}
Tweet: Check out this @Fitbit review from @sideofsneakers #connectedlife http://ctt.ec/PY7pN+
Products
I never put much thought into wearing a fitness tracker. I had a basic FitBit briefly but it didn’t engage me enough to keep wearing it and I hated the color so I rarely actually put it on. I figured I was active enough and counting steps wasn’t really on priority list. Then I got the Garmin Vivofit {which I received through my partnership with Verizon Wireless & FitFluential – I don’t have to blog about it but I want to because it’s cool}.
I strapped it on and prepared to watch the steps start counting up, up, and up…
Only they didn’t. I’d have mornings and moments filled with lots of fun, activity, and steps, then I would barely cross over to my goal by the end of the day. Other days the number of steps I ended with was just abyssmal. It was a bit of a wakeup call – I know how bad sitting and not being active is, yet here I was pretty much being a lazy bum in denial. While I’m not perfect about it, sitting the actual number of steps I’ve taken at any given moment is definite motivation to get up and moving.
So about the Garmin Vivofit specifcally: here’s my basic list of Pros & Cons to make it easy for you to skim through. {Here’s the vivofit I have.}
Pros
No need to charge battery – it’s a watch battery that’s predicted to last about a year. This means you never have to take the tracker off, stop tracking activity to charge it, or remember to put it back on, and no charger to keep track of. This is a huge plus in my book.
Shows when you’ve been sitting too long – A red bar bar appears above your step count if you’ve been still for too long. For each 15 minutes you remain still, a shorter bar is added. Walking around for a minute doesn’t make it automatically disappear either – it takes a bit of movement. {I desperately want to make this a con because it drives me crazy, but it’s the entire point of wearing one – to move more.} I believe the Vivofit 2 beeps to alert you when the red bar appears.
Multiple displays – with the push of a button you can choose to show # of steps taken, # of steps left to reach your goal, miles traveled, calories burned, time, or date.
Color selection – I have basic black but I love the bright blue and purple. {There’s also others.}
Easy set up – you literally put it on and it works.{It comes with two sizes of wrist straps that you can interchange.} Besides that you can just download the Garmin Connect app and sync it wirelessly through Bluetooth, or it comes with a piece to plug into your computer to do the same.
Can automatically set & adjust your goal based on behavior. – I might not have known where to start otherwise.
Can get wet – can leave it on in the shower and swimming.
Can’t “force” it to take steps – I can’t shake my arm off like T swizzle and make it think I took a bunch of steps.
Cons
A little bulky – It’s a little bit on the big side for my preference, but I’m not sure there’s a smaller one out there that also has a display. {?} I find wearing it with the display side on my inner wrist {technically upside down} is more comfortable, especially when sleeping. This means I have to choose to look at it, meaning I might not notice that evil red bar telling me I’m being lazy.
Poor sleep tracking – the sleep tracker only records how much you move while sleeping, and if you set your normal wake/sleep times it defaults to them no matter when you push the sleep button. While the amount of movement tends to correlate with my quality of sleep {i.e. lots of movement when the toddler takes over my bed}, it’s not always a perfect indicator and it doesn’t give me any information on how to improve this.
App leaves much to be desired – after the first few days of looking at things, I pretty much ignore the app. It’s nice to go back and look at the bigger picture, but besides that it doesn’t do much for me personally.
No backlight – not really a big deal but it’d be nice to be able to see the numbers when I’m going to bed or setting it to the sleep option {when I’m in bed and it’s dark} instead of just guessing.
Doesn’t always seem to predict movement/non-movement right – maybe it’s just smarter than me, but sometimes when I’ve been crazy active it still gets a red bar and when I’ve been lying around it doesn’t. Hmm.
So that’s it all broken down, but I haven’t taken it off since the minute I put it on, if that tells you anything. 
Get it here –>> Garmin Vivofit Fitness Band, $89 **Currently 10% off at Verizon!**
Do you wear a fitness tracker? What kind and do you like it?
