Reasons Why fitbits are Awesome

I haven't had an activity tracker in several years, so I was excited when I found out that I could get one from my husband's employee wellness program. I am hooked! Besides the convenient step counter feature, I have found several other reasons why fitbits are awesome.

1. Sleep tracker - if you choose to sleep with your band on, you can log into your fitbit dashboard and see how much sleep you got, how many times you were restless or awake throughout the night, and subtle encouragement about getting enough rest.

2. Estimated Caloric Burn - I was confused at first when I woke up one morning after sleeping for the first 5 hours of the day to see that I had already burned 300 calories. Huh? It took me a second to realize that from the personal information you provide when you setup your device that it is calculated your baseline metabolic calorie burn. That is, the amount of calories your body burns while going through daily metabolic processes when it is at rest.

3. Total Active Minutes - You can see on your fitbit dashboard how many total active minutes you are each day. When I ask my clients if they were active since I saw them last, they often tell me something like, "Oh yeah, I deep cleaned the house on Saturday and mowed the yard on Sunday." I harp about getting in organized, planned physical activity outside of activities of daily living (ADLs). This allows me to track my clients activity to see if their gardening and active cooking actually qualifies as titbit-certified "active" minutes.

4. You can signal to your fitbit by holding down the display button on the band to begin a workout. This can help you determine how intense your workout is based on how many steps you took per minute compared to other days. 

5. If you have a "fancier" fitbit (Charge HR), it will display your heart rate and which creates more accurate data than without. I don't have this particular model, but I do appreciate the option.


Are you inspired yet? I smell a TrainKC fitbit promotion coming in the near future!