A few observations from the first days of our try-on-athon:
We have several people participating who had never before used a wearable health/fitness device, and they were anxious to get a baseline of their regular activity. And when we announced that the first staff challenge was overall step count for the week, things got competitive real fast.
Everyone who is wearing more than one wearable (some who already owned a device are doing sort of a side-by-side with whatever new device they’re trying), noticed differences in step counts during last week’s steps challenge.
From what we can tell, devices worn close to the body (Lumo Lift, Fitbit One, Withings Pulse) logged only steps whereas devices worn on the arm or neck (Misfit Shine, Fitbit Flex, Microsoft Band) tracked other movement, like bike riding or swinging, as steps. Some discrepancies were found with arm-mounted devices inaccurately counting steps when the user was pushing a stroller, shopping cart, lawn mower, etc., or otherwise not walking with a natural swing.
Later in the summer we’ll be writing about the sensors and algorithms in wearables, and why each kind might be different.
Tryers of devices that track sleep were generally shocked at the restful sleep vs. restless sleep numbers (but also kind of unsure what to do with that information).
All of the devices track progress and do notification in different ways. Katherine loves the congratulatory emails (with memes!) from Lumo about her posture goals. Morgan likes the Apple Watch nag feature for time to stand or walk. Kimberly is digging Misfit Shine’s point system for overall activity. Nick likes Jawbone’s notifications during the day that ask if you’re still “in” for that day’s goal.
In case you didn’t see the results on Twitter, our steps challenge winner was Whitley Herndon who tracked 108,329 steps in one week. Our team total for 13 people was 859,857.
Our challenge for this week—choose a goal and use your device(s) to get you there—ends at midnight Sunday. People are doing everything from workout intensity to accurate calorie counting to water consumption, and anybody who meets their goal will have their name put on the trophy. (If more than one person meets it, there will be some negotiations for how long the trophy goes in each person’s office.)
The winner of each week’s challenge gets to have their name on this bad boy.
What are we doing next week? Stay tuned to #ACTwearsIt.