This handy little device looks like a watch with a colorful twist reminiscent of Swatch watches, which were popular in the '80s. But it has a purpose so much greater, and it’s one that just might change your life.
Fitbits have become all the rage in America. That’s because these trusty trackers can tell you more about your current state of health than you can.
This all begins with step tracking. A personal trainer of sorts, your Fitbit will tell you exactly how many steps you take in a day. And it becomes a game of sorts.
At first, you’ll regard it as a simple piece of data. But as you get into the groove, you’ll look down at these numbers time and time again, pushing yourself to get to the golden number.
How Many Steps?
So just what is the golden number?
That number 10,000 steps, a figure that has become the standard of walking goals. This translates to a hefty 5 miles (roughly), which most people don’t reach until they’ve been called to action.
"The initial surge and popularity of the 10,000 steps thing emerged when the first pedometers came out," Walter R. Thompson, Regents' Professor of Kinesiology and Health at Georgia University, tells Today. "Most Americans are in the 2,000 to 2,500 steps a day position," he adds.
According to Thompson, this step count was coined in the 1960s when a Japanese man created a pedometer entitled the “manpo-kei.” This name literally means “10,000 steps meter.” And experts think that this fueled our current 10,000-step obsession.
But when you begin tracking steps with Fitbit, you learn that it can seem darned near impossible to reach this number. You walk, and walk, and walk…only to find that you’ve reached perhaps half of that. Eventually, many people find that they need to add an actual walk for exercise once or twice a day to meet this goal. And it becomes a lifestyle, which fuels weight loss.
But that’s not all that Fitbit does.
Tracking Sleep Patterns and More
It can track your sleep. When you wear it at night, it tells you how much sleep you have logged. Then when you click on this section of the app, it will give you the full time that you slept in general. So, for example, if you’ve slept 7 hours and 57 minutes, it will give you this figure.
It will tell you how many times you woke up and how often you were restless or awake…and when. So if you were restless 21 times, it will reveal this. This may mean that you turned over or did something else that was not considered to be fully restful. Then it ranks your general sleep quality, which you can regularly review in the sleep log associated with the app.
You can use the Fitbit app to track your food intake. This is helpful for weight loss because the Fitbit will tell you how many calories you’ve burned in a day. By tracking food and calories, users can see whether or not they’re taking in the correct amount of calories needed (or not needed) to translate to weight loss.
Fitbit also tracks water intake. A simple click of a button allows you to add water that you’ve consumed. And it keeps you working toward the app’s goal of 64 ounces daily.
Further, you can track exercise through Fitbit. This makes exercise even more fun because a simple click (on some devices) or visit to the app will show exactly how many calories are being burned in a workout. Then you can review your workout later to see how you did in terms of heart rate and overall calories burned. And you can scroll through the app to compare calories burned in workouts throughout the week. It also keeps a record of when you’ve worked out, making it easy to determine how many workouts you’ve completed each week.
Fitbit Challenges
The Fitbit also issues challenges. You can pick a number of options, from daily goals to “Weekend Warrior” challenges. And you can bring your friends in on the action by adding them as friends on the app and following their progress. For example, in the “Weekend Warrior” challenge, you compete against friends to see who meets their personal daily step goal. Up to 10 friends can be a part of the process, making it a fun competition with overall health in mind.
One of the most interesting of Fitbit’s capabilities is the heart rate feature. Whereas we once had to wear straps on the chest to monitor heart rate, it is now much easier with this device. In fact, it tracks your heart rate on your arm or wrist, depending how high up on your arm you wear it. That said, it’s easier to wear it higher up on the arm during a workout because it won’t slip and lose track of the count.
Fitbit has even been used to solve criminal cases -- and not always in the favor of the accuser. According to NBC News, one woman’s accusation of criminal assault was disproved by her device. The woman claimed that she was pulled out of bed and then sexually assaulted. But her Fitbit showed that she was awake and walking around at the time of the accusation, which proved her claim was false.
The devices have also saved lives by revealing heart conditions. According to She Knows, one teen learned through a Fitbit that her resting heart rate had increased from 84 to more than 200 beats per minute. This helped doctors to find an underlying – and potentially fatal -- heart condition.
"The doctors said that if I hadn't phoned for an ambulance when I did and if I wasn't wearing my Fitbit to track my heart rate, I could have suffered a heart attack/cardiac arrest and could have died," the teen, named Sarah-Jayne, tells She Knows. "As soon as I got to hospital, they hooked me on all these machines and did some blood tests, and they have found an issue with my heart. Apparently one pathway from one chamber to the heart from the other was misfiring,g and instead of the chambers beating one after another like it normally should, they were beating at the exact same time, which was causing my heart rate to increase."
So next time you’re on a health kick, remember these handy little devices. In truth, they make setting a goal of living a healthy lifestyle more fun. You, too, will find yourself discussing those cherished 10,000 steps with your friends.