Fitbit Flex Wireless Activity Tracker

Fitbit Flex is a slim, elegant activity and sleep tracker from Fitbit Incorporation. Fitbit is a company based in San Francisco California which specializes in health and fitness wearable innovation. Some of their products include Fitbit Flex wireless activity and sleep tracker, Fitbit Zip wireless activity tracker, Fitbit One Wireless activity tracker, Aria WiFi Smart Scale, Fitbit Force wireless activity and sleep tracker and many others.

Fitbit flex is a comfortable wearable that you can use to track steps taken, calories burned and distance covered all day long. While at night you can use it to track the quality of your sleep and at the same time wake you up in the morning by the vibrations of an embedded vibration motor. At the core of fitbit flex is fitbit's leading edge three axis Micro Electro Mechanical Sensor (MEMS) accelerometer which enables it to accurately track movements.  These movements are interpreted and processed by proprietary software installed on Flex to give meaningful statistical data.

Attractive features on the Wireless Fitbit Flex

• Wireless Stats Sync

Fitbit flex supports low energy Bluetooth 4.0 which allows you to wirelessly transfer stats data to your PC or Mac pre-installed with fitbit connect application if you are within reception range of the Bluetooth dongle inserted in the USB port of your PC. Fitbit Flex is able to sync stats data with most iOS and Android based Smartphones through Bluetooth. See your progress in real time on the fitbit dashboard all day long.

• Setting and having a go at your goal

With flex you choose which goal to track. Is it the the steps taken, calories burned? Or the distance to be covered? Challenge yourself and monitor your progress in real time. Flex is designed with five LED lights that light up to indicate your progress for the set goal. Each light represents 20% progress.

• Fitbit app

With the freely available fitbit app for iOS and Android smartphones, you have a host of tools available at your disposal. For instance, you can track, log and map out runs and workout routes using the Mobilerun feature. Food tools are my favorite. You can scan foodstuff barcodes and immediately build a nutritional profile from a database of over 350,000 foodstuffs and restaurants. So as you workout, you are able to check the calories burned against the calories consumed. This feature creates an incentive to push your workouts even further.

• Compatibility with 'traditional' apps

Fitbit is compatible with many health and fitness apps that we have got accustomed to. Apps like Run Keeper, Map My Fitness, Lose it, etc work well with fitbit. You are able to export data to these apps and apps like Lose It, also let you import their data into your fitbit dashboard, so you can access stats by either app.

Full tech specs of fitbit Flex

• Bluetooth 4.0 and NFC enabled

• Fitbit flex can aggregates minute data for the past 7 days and  daily data for the past 30 days. Regular syncing is advisable to avoid loss of valuable stats data since older stats are automatically deleted to free up memory space.

• Fitbit flex has a Lithium-polymer battery which lasts up to 5 days on a single charge. This might however change with the age of the battery.

• 3 axis MEMS sensor for tracking movements

• Vibration motor for waking you up in the morning

• Water resistant up to pressures equivalent to 1 Atmosphere or 10m of water.

• Wrist sizes: 140-176 mm and 161-209 mm, width: 13.99 mm

 

Buying tips

• Flex works well in optimum environmental conditions. It works well in pressures below 5 Atmospheres while under water, temperatures between -20° to 45° C and a maximum operating altitude of 30,000 ft.

• The fitbit connect application requires an internet connection. It is designed to work online.

• If you envisage using a PC for data sync, you will need a free USB port to insert in a Bluetooth sync dongle.

• Fitbit app is compatible with Operating systems; Windows XP/7/8, Mac OS X 10.5 or higher and browsers; Firefox, Internet explorer, Safari and Google chrome.

• The flex is neither a smartwatch nor does it include functionality of a smartwatch; it is purely a fitness wristband.