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Fitbit will lay off 110 employees amid challenges in wearable market

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Re: Fitbit will lay off 110 employees amid challenges in wearable market

#31

Post by nemild »

CydeWeys wrote: post #28

I've said it before and I'll say it again: A big part of Fitbit's problem is the poor hardware quality of their products, especially considering the high price. A lot of people, me included, will never buy another Fitbit after having been burned. Their warranty only lasts one year, yet I've had to replace both Fitbit devices I've had twice within that one year. I'm now Fitbit-less because the latest, a Charge HR, fai…

Is your experience emblematic of the that for most customers? Some of the things you mention seem like fundamental design flaws, so I'm curious if most customers have issues?

Re: Fitbit will lay off 110 employees amid challenges in wearable market

#32

Post by moonka »

nemild wrote: post #31
CydeWeys wrote: post #28

I've said it before and I'll say it again: A big part of Fitbit's problem is the poor hardware quality of their products, especially considering the high price. A lot of people, me included, will never buy another Fitbit after having been burned. Their warranty only lasts one year, yet I've had to replace both Fitbit devices I've had twice within that one year. I'm now Fitbit-less because the latest, a Charge HR, fai…

Is your experience emblematic of the that for most customers? Some of the things you mention seem like fundamental design flaws, so I'm curious if most customers have issues?

We had similar issues with my wife's charge. To Fitbit's credit, they were happy to send out multiple replacements, but my wife got tired of it and stopped using it after the 3rd replacement starting showing the same issue. By contrast, I have an old Fitbit One which still works well after all these years, but it's just a simple pod as opposed to a wrist band.

Re: Fitbit will lay off 110 employees amid challenges in wearable market

#33

Post by theli0nheart »

nemild wrote: post #31
CydeWeys wrote: post #28

I've said it before and I'll say it again: A big part of Fitbit's problem is the poor hardware quality of their products, especially considering the high price. A lot of people, me included, will never buy another Fitbit after having been burned. Their warranty only lasts one year, yet I've had to replace both Fitbit devices I've had twice within that one year. I'm now Fitbit-less because the latest, a Charge HR, fai…

Is your experience emblematic of the that for most customers? Some of the things you mention seem like fundamental design flaws, so I'm curious if most customers have issues?

Been using Fitbit devices since 2010, and using a Charge HR since it came out. Never had a problem like OP's.

Re: Fitbit will lay off 110 employees amid challenges in wearable market

#34

Post by drewg123 »

CydeWeys wrote: post #28

I've said it before and I'll say it again: A big part of Fitbit's problem is the poor hardware quality of their products, especially considering the high price. A lot of people, me included, will never buy another Fitbit after having been burned. Their warranty only lasts one year, yet I've had to replace both Fitbit devices I've had twice within that one year. I'm now Fitbit-less because the latest, a Charge HR, fai…

I think this is a problem with wearables in general. All in all, I've never seen a wearable last more than 9-10 months. I'm not that rough on them either.

My MS Band 1 lasted ~8 months before it suddenly died. MS replaced it. I then borrowed a friend's Band2 which had already been replaced 4 times. It died twice for me. MS replaced it once, then issued a refund check when they ran out of stock.

And then there is the Moto360 sport I had that went into an endless bootloop after ~9 months.

My wife's ChargeHR had a physical failure of the band after 9mo, and the same exact issue happened again last week.

I now have a Polar M600 and my wife has a Samsung Gear Fit2. Hopefully at least one of them will last more than a year!

Re: Fitbit will lay off 110 employees amid challenges in wearable market

#35

Post by pookieinc »

nemild wrote: post #31
CydeWeys wrote: post #28

I've said it before and I'll say it again: A big part of Fitbit's problem is the poor hardware quality of their products, especially considering the high price. A lot of people, me included, will never buy another Fitbit after having been burned. Their warranty only lasts one year, yet I've had to replace both Fitbit devices I've had twice within that one year. I'm now Fitbit-less because the latest, a Charge HR, fai…

Is your experience emblematic of the that for most customers? Some of the things you mention seem like fundamental design flaws, so I'm curious if most customers have issues?

Personally, I've had two fitbits, bought mother-in-law a fitbit, and have another friend who also had one and all of ours broke for similar reasons listed as OP, all in the second or third year of wearing it.

Based on these experiences, I wholeheartedly agree that their hardware just doesn't last very long and is why I switched to an Apple Watch (just got one a couple weeks ago!)

Re: Fitbit will lay off 110 employees amid challenges in wearable market

#36

Post by breck »

CydeWeys wrote: post #28

I've said it before and I'll say it again: A big part of Fitbit's problem is the poor hardware quality of their products, especially considering the high price. A lot of people, me included, will never buy another Fitbit after having been burned. Their warranty only lasts one year, yet I've had to replace both Fitbit devices I've had twice within that one year. I'm now Fitbit-less because the latest, a Charge HR, fai…

But this is endemic to the industry. I still caution fitness band buyers that they should consider themselves early adopters who should expect some troubles while the quality evolves.

I owned a Microsoft Band 1 and Microsoft Band 2 since the day they came out. My Band 1 broke twice in two different ways, and my Band 2 died 3 times. Microsoft replaced them free of charge every time, which was great. So in 2 years with the Band I had 5 devices die on me. Other than that it was a terrific device.

Microsoft isn't coming out with a Band 3 so the last time it died they replaced it with a FitBit Charge 2, which I'm enjoying so far, and the design seems more resilient than the Band (though time will tell).

Re: Fitbit will lay off 110 employees amid challenges in wearable market

#37

Post by snuxoll »

dkonofalski wrote: post #21
dragonwriter wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Fitbit totally killed itself for me when it decided to launch its own ecosystem without integrating itself into HealthKit and Google Fit. They launched their own ecosystem before both HealthKit and Google Fit existed; there was nothing for them to integrate with.

While that may be true, Fitbit was one of the launch partners for HealthKit and debuted their web interface at the Apple Keynote where HealthKit was first shown. Google had info online that Fitbit was working with them from the start to include integrations. They pulled out of both after they had already had a functional integration. Edit: Fitbit launched their web integration in 2012 and there are mentions of a part…

The lack of HealthKit integration and needing to use half-assed hacks like the sync apps on the iOS AppStore really turned me off fitbit. Since their API doesn't let you pull anything but basic data like steps walked you were effectively locked into their little garden with your data.

I'm much happier with my Apple Watch as a fitness tracker, I wish the battery was better and it had sleep tracking support because that's the one feature I seriously miss from my Charge HR.

Re: Fitbit will lay off 110 employees amid challenges in wearable market

#38

Post by ben_jones »

moonka wrote: post #32
nemild wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is your experience emblematic of the that for most customers? Some of the things you mention seem like fundamental design flaws, so I'm curious if most customers have issues?

We had similar issues with my wife's charge. To Fitbit's credit, they were happy to send out multiple replacements, but my wife got tired of it and stopped using it after the 3rd replacement starting showing the same issue. By contrast, I have an old Fitbit One which still works well after all these years, but it's just a simple pod as opposed to a wrist band.

Couldn't such a lenient return policy signal that these devices really are being marked up a ridiculous amount? I.e. $10 devices going somewhat unfairly for > $100 as mentioned above?

Re: Fitbit will lay off 110 employees amid challenges in wearable market

#39

Post by snuxoll »

akshayB wrote: post #19

Even if you are a premium fitbit user and use their customer API you don't have access to some data point for heart rate, cardio time-frames and performance stats. They not only need to catch-up but also provide people their own health data forget HealthKit and Google Fit integration that is like step 2.

They don't WANT to provide people their own health data, I'm guessing. They demoed a full integration with HealthKit years ago but canned it, I'm guessing for the exact same reason.

And honestly, I think this is exactly why Fitbit ended up failing. They tried to create a walled garden where you would collect all your data into their service, the hardware wasn't what they wanted to sell you, but their premium services.

Re: Fitbit will lay off 110 employees amid challenges in wearable market

#40

Post by teach »

throwaway_374 wrote: post #2

I always thought this was simply nothing more than an overpriced step counter and nothing changed the perception for me - if anything, the glorified marketing felt quite deceptive. Strangely, on the contrary, I find myself addicted to the "step counter" on my Galaxy S6 everytime I go for a run.

I have a Fitbit for exactly two reasons: sleep tracking and heart rate. The step counter is interesting, but I wouldn't have bought a device just for that.
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