14 DAY TRIAL // Fitbit used to be king of the hill, and their fitness trackers were regarded to be among the best on the market, but that’s hardly the case anymore. And one of the reasons for it is the poor support for various devices out there.
You would think that a fitness tracker that uses Bluetooth to connect to phones for synchronization and notification should not be a headache. The Bluetooth protocol has been around for a very long time, so simple stuff, like pairing two devices or getting notifications on the watch, should be easy.
One of the most significant problems for Fitbit right now is that connecting to phones seems to be a hit and miss for many users. Some report that it works just fine, others can’t even get their devices paired. The big part in the middle of the pile are users that don’t receive notifications.
But it’s just a fitness tracker
If you want to believe that Fitbit makes fitness trackers and not smartwatches, that's your prerogative, and I would have to agree. This means that notifications for a new text message or calls are not exactly the focus of the tracker. But Fitbit does provide those features, and users will most likely use them. They’re not going to wear both a watch and a fitness tracker.
Case in point, I was trying to set up the new Fitbit Ionic with my Google Pixel XL, and it took a lot of patience. I really tried because I want to test the new watch and I was willing to keep at it. I got it to pair with the device eventually, but that’s about the extent of the interactions, with the exception changing the clock face.
The setup went OK until I was prompted to install a new firmware. The installation process crashed too many times to count, but after numerous restarts and after I did a hard reset on the watch, the firmware upgrade was finished.
But then the phone would not pair with the watch. The pairing code was issued, I entered it on the phone, and the process hanged until I was prompted to restart the Bluetooth on the phone. I tried again and again until it finally paired.
I even received a test notification from Whatsapp, and I was contented that it worked. After that, no other notifications arrived. In fact, the app on the phone shows that it’s been 50 minutes since the last sync. The app has all the permissions, and all options are enabled, so it’s not a problem on the user’s part.
Pixel XL is a reference device
What baffles me is that Pixel XL is a REFERENCE device. It’s not some Chinese knock-off or some unknown brand. It should work out of the box. Just like the official Fitbit website says it does. I checked, and all of these problems shouldn’t exist.
I’m also not the only one to have problems with notifications and pairing. The official forum has quite a few threads with people that have various devices and that encounter similar problems. Many of them are already considering sending the watch back.
It’s also worth mentioning that Blaze had similar issues with phones such as Galaxy S8, Note 8, and even iOS 11. In the case of Samsung, Fitbit said that they did everything they could on their end and that a patch of the makers of the phone.
As of now, I’m still trying to set up Wi-Fi connectivity again, but I still can’t make it to sync with the phone and the official app keeps telling me to restart the Bluetooth. I did, and it's not working.
