My new Fitbit is great for telling the time

For the last 19 months I've been wearing a Fitbit Alta HR fitness tracker that was a gift from one of my lovely friends. Replacing an earlier Delvefire tracker, it's been an enormous success and has renewed my determination to exercise regularly and get plenty of quality sleep at night.

The one disadvantage of the Alta HR was its display, which was difficult to read in sunshine. Consequently, during sun-blessed countryside walks I would have to seek a shady spot to read the time or find out how many steps I'd taken.

Digital time displays are okay, but I prefer the good old analogue ones. The Alta HR had an analogue option but it wasn't easy to interpret, due to the narrow screen width – a consequence of its lovely small size.

It was time to upgrade. A new one must have a clear analogue display that was readable in bright sunshine and must also not be too large.  I dislike large watches and still have a lingering affection for my old battery-powered tick-tock one, which (as you can see from the state of the glass and metalwork) had endured many years of faithful service.

There are many fitness trackers and smart watches that have similar features to the Fitbit range, but I've grown to trust the Fitbit's data and appreciate the way it's displayed on the phone app.  The smallest Fitbit that's wide enough to feature a clear analogue display is the Charge4. It's noticeably larger than the Alta HR, but would it be too large? I ordered one from Amazon, hopeful that, if I didn't like the look of it, I could return it. Six weeks later, I still have it and am pleased with my purchase.

So what's the Charge4 like? Well, it is a fitness tracker, rather than a smartwatch, so doesn't have all the features of a smartwatch. It does, though, have the features that I want... plus several that I'm not really interested in. 

Most importantly, it counts my steps.  The recommended target is 10,000 steps daily, which I generally find impossible to achieve for more than a couple of days in succession.  However, I do give myself a hearty pat on the back when I manage 70,000 steps in a week, which must surely be almost as beneficial to my fitness.

Last week was a good one – 71,187 steps.  The week before (62,057) wasn't quite so good. Fitbit has given me the incentive to walk more, though I don't beat myself up if I fail to hit 70,000. I do, however, try to take one long walk every week (weather permitting), plus a couple of shorter ones.

Here's something else that's improved since I was given the Alta HR – my sleep. The data above is typical – deep sleep until about 4am, then increasing amounts of Rapid Eye Movement (REM) when I dream before waking. 

This is the latest complete week of sleep data. It's a vast improvement on the pre-Fitbit days and achieved mainly by going to bed on the day I got up, rather than getting up on the day I went to bed!

The last piece of data that interests me is my resting heart rate – the lower it is, the healthier I presumably must be. 

From this data, Fitbit calculates a Cardio Fitness Score. If it's to be believed then I'm very fit indeed for someone of my age, which is most reassuring. During the first Covid lockdown, when I was taking long walks every other day (what else was there to do?), my Cardio Fitness Score rose to 47-51. 

As for the other data that my Charge4 produces – stress level, breathing rate during sleep, heart rate variability and skin temperature during sleep – all I can say is that it's interesting to look at occasionally, but I've no idea how important it is, or what to do to improve it.

All I want to do is to keep an eye on my overall health....  oh, and tell the time.