Fitbit One Activity Tracker Review

The Fitbit One was a waistband clip model that was discontinued in the fall of 2017. Fitbit will continue to support the Fitbit One, but customers will need to purchase it from third-party providers. It was a great choice from the Fitbit family of activity trackers.

Fitbit's other waistband clip model is the Fitbit Zip, which has fewer features but doesn't require recharging. The Fitbit Flex 2 and Alta are wristband models, but the tracker can be removed and worn in many types of accessories, including third-party waistband clips. The Flex 2 has no number display, while the Alta does. Either of these would be a good choice if you want the advanced features of sleep tracking and automatic workout detection.

The Basics of Fitbit One

You can enjoy the Fitbit One whether you sync it with the phone app or you sync it wirelessly with your computer using a USB dongle.

What you get with Fitbit is an excellent tri-axis accelerometer pedometer that records steps, distance, calories, active minutes, and flights of stairs. You can also track your sleep quality, and you can set silent alarms for it to vibrate and awaken or alert you.

You can wear and use Fitbit One as a pedometer and view your steps, distance, stairs climbed, and calories burned throughout the day on the device display. It also has a flower indicator that shows how active you have been the past few hours. It grows as you move more.

Fitbit has a rechargeable battery that should last up to 14 days. You recharge it by plugging it into a charging cable (included) attached to a computer.

Wearing the Fitbit One

The Fitbit One comes with a replaceable silicone sleeve that has a belt clip. You can wear the Fitbit One on your waistband, carry it in a pocket, or clip it to your bra or neckline. The mechanism is accurate without worrying about position.

To track sleep quality, you slip the Fitbit out of its sleeve and into a wristband to wear at night. But it also works fine for most people just clipped to their nightgown or underwear at night.

Two Ways to Upload Your Data

As with all of the Fitbit models, you can set up your Fitbit One and sync it with either a phone app or by using a USB dongle attached to a Mac or PC that has the Fitbit Connect software installed. It will automatically upload your data whenever you are within 20 feet of that computer. With the phone app, you can sync regularly or on demand.

Fitbit Dashboard Features

You don't have to pay any ongoing subscription to track your data on the Fitbit Dashboard or the Fitbit App. You can view daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly totals and graphs for steps, distance, floors climbed, calories burned, active time, sleep quality, weight, and other health trackers. You can log activities that your Fitbit doesn't track, such as bicycling. You can see how you spent your day in percentages of sedentary time, lightly active, fairly active, and very active time.

Badges and Social

You earn badges for your daily and lifetime milestones for your number of steps, miles, and floors climbed. You can accept other Fitbit users as Friends and see their weekly totals and cheer them, and you can also engage in challenges.

Food Diary and Diet Plan

You can use the Fitbit Dashboard and the app as a food diary, logging foods from their database or your own custom foods. They have a Food Plan feature and a calories in/calories out gauge to help you track your diet. The calorie number you see on your Fitbit includes your basal metabolic rate, the calories you burn even at rest. It is meant to be used as part of a total daily calorie balance rather than showing only exercise calories burned.

Sleep Tracking and Silent Alarms

You can set up to eight vibrating silent alarms and manage them from the app or the Dashboard. While some of the more advanced Fitbit models, such as the Alta and Charge 2, automatically detect sleep, you have to start and stop the stopwatch function on the Fitbit One to record a sleep period. You see a graph of your sleep time and awakening times during the night. You get the total time in bed, time to fall asleep, times awakened, and actual sleep time. It doesn't track deep sleep vs. light sleep as some other trackers do. Compare sleep-tracking activity monitors.

Premium

For a fee, you can get in-depth reports and access to a trainer.

Playing with Other Apps

Fitbit shares data with an expanding list of other apps. These include Microsoft HealthVault, Endomondo, MapMyRun, and MyFitnessPal.

What It Doesn't Do

• Fitbit One does not automatically track specific workouts. You can use the stopwatch or enter it manually on the website or app to get the calorie count.
• It doesn't track your speed.
• It doesn't have inactivity alerts to signal you to move every hour.
• It doesn't integrate with a heart rate monitor.
• It's not waterproof, you shouldn't wear it swimming or immerse it in a bath.

Bottom Line on the Fitbit One

The Fitbit One was a good choice for those who like to wear a waistband pedometer rather than a fitness band.

If you don't care about the sleep tracking or stairs climbed, then the Fitbit Zip is also a good choice. If you prefer a wristband pedometer, the Fitbit Alta is a good choice, and you can buy an accessory clip to wear it on your waistband if you prefer. The Charge 2 and Alta HR have built-in heart rate detectors and must be worn on the wrist to collect that data. All of these models automatically track workouts. The Flex 2 is an option, but it lacks a display of your numbers. It is worth mentioning that Fitbit is planning to replace its Zip, Alta, and Flex 2 models with Fitbit Inspire.

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