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Wednesday 12 September 2018

How to Restart Fitbit

I have been using a fitbit for over two years now, and every now and again it simply stops working. While the wearable itself usually works quite well, the Fitbit software is buggy and an altogether annoying piece of kit with some very, very unhelpful error messages, like "Unfortunately, fitbit has stopped". No! Really?! I do think that engineers need to give us a bit more of a clue as to where to seek a solution from when they think up the wording for error messages!

Worse, the staff 'help' available on the fitbit community site is generally less than helpful. For example, one member was having trouble synchronising their fitbit with their Samsung Galaxy phone - one of the most popular Android phones - and was told that their phone is not compatible with fitbit. Not compatible after they had been using fitbit for two years without difficulty. Hmm. I certainly was not told when I purchased my fitbit that it was not compatible with my phone.

Often there does not appear to be any rhyme or reason to failures, but the fitbit community users usually find a work around (please note that help usually comes from users, not from fitbit staff). I have collected a few ideas here for those who are being driven mad by synchronisation problems.

Some ideas for when fitbit stops synchronising with your phone:
  1. Turn off bluetooth
  2. Click the "Sync now" icon in the synchronise menu above the battery icon at the top right
  3. When you get a message asking for permission to turn on bluetooth, click "OK"
  4. If that doesn't work, restart your phone
  5. Check bluetooth is still turned off
  6. Click the "Sync now" icon in the synchronise menu above the battery icon at the top right
  7. When you get a message asking for permission to turn on bluetooth, click "OK".

Some ideas to restart fitbit when it stops synchronising with your phone:
  1. Put your fitbit on to the charge cable. While connected, press the small button on the cable 3 times, once every two seconds, then
  2. Turn off Bluetooth on your phone
  3. Go to Bluetooth settings and delete your Alta's bluetooth listing
  4. Shut down & restart your phone
  5. Turn on bluetooth again, and scan for new bluetooth connections
  6. Add your fitbit when it is found.
  7. Try fitbit again.
If that doesn't work and you are getting the dreaded message above:
  1. Close your Fitbit app
  2. Go to your phone settings
  3. Go to the App manager
  4. In the downloaded apps list, look for the Fitbit app
  5. Clear the app cache
  6. Clear the data
  7. Then "Force Stop" the app
  8. Restart your phone
  9. Go to the App manager
  10. In the downloaded apps list, look for the Fitbit app
  11. Go in and check where the data is stored. If it is on internal storage, try getting the app to store on an external memory card (that worked for me)
  12. Close out
  13. Restart the phone
  14. Retry the app.
Hopefully that might help someone retain their sanity.


Sam

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