Fitness Apps Suck
I use Strava religiously. When I go for a bike ride, I hit “Start”. When I go for a run, I hit “Start”. I use it for commuting, for fun, for exercise, for competitions, for fundraising events. If I’m involved in a sport, Strava is on.
I also have a Fitbit Flex. It’s awesome. It tracks my steps, my calories, my active minutes, my daily mileage, and my calories. It even tracks my sleeping habits. Its effectiveness is debatable, but it gives me some numbers to consider. At the end of the day, if I haven’t met my goal, maybe I’ll go for a short run (hello Strava!) or a long walk.
Both the Strava app and the Fitbit device solve a common pain point: tracking physical activity. Strava does some awesome things with the data, including tracking segments, GPS coordinates, and “suffer score” (with a heartrate monitor). Fitbit can tell if I’m being super active or if I’m laying around on the couch. Neat!
But where both of them fail spectacularly is where I have to interact with them physically.
In Strava, I have to open the app and hit “Start.”
In Fitbit, I have to interact to tell it I’m sleeping, track activities, and track meals/calories.
My first question is: Why?
The answer in the case of Strava is simple: it’s just an app. It’s not a device. (Hi Strava. Make a device. Thanks.) Since it’s just an app, it has to be explicitly turned on. But Fitbit has no such excuse.
A Smarter Fitbit
Fitbit, for example, already knows I’m active — it has an “Active Minutes” counter. It has a “miles traveled” counter. It also knows my height, weight, and gender. I’m sure there are some basic formulas for calculating stride based on height. (Hey-o!) If it knows I’m “very active” for 30 minutes, and it knows that I went 3.1 miles in those 30 minutes, then it should be able to guess “Hey, it looks like you ran 3 miles at about 9:45 per mile.”
So why do I have to open my Fitbit app on my phone and tap “Activities” and then add it manually?
And then there’s the “Food” section of the app. This is a major pain point for me. I eat every day, yet the number of times I’ve tracked meals on an app can be counted on one hand.
Why? Because it’s a pain in the ass.
Last night I had dinner with my girlfriend. We cooked some leftovers, and we sat at the table and talked. Once we finished, we washed the dishes, smooched a lot, and then sat down and watched TV. At no point did it ever cross my mind to take my phone out, open up the Fitbit app, and put in my meal.
This is made even worse by the fact that the entire experience of tracking calories sucks royal goat balls. For example, my thought process for adding my lunch goes something like this:
I just ate a turkey sandwich, chips, and a Diet Coke. How many calories is that? Wait… it wants to know how many servings. How many servings is two slices of turkey? Was that two tablespoons of mayo or one? Is multi-grain bread the same as wheat bread? Oh, look, they have a turkey sandwich from Specialty’s and another from Max’s Deli. I got my sandwich from Potbelly’s though. It was probably less than Specialty’s, but I’ve never had a Max’s Deli sandwich, so I don’t know… was my turkey sandwich 750 calories or 500 calories? I should round up just to be safe. Ok, two servings of turkey sandwich. Does 750 sound like too much? That sounds like too much. Better to be safe. 750 calories of turkey sandwich. OK, now for the chips…
How many ounces of turkey are in this sandwich?
Is that multi-grain wheat or just plain wheat?
One Tbsp of mayo or sixteen?
When I finally do finish, I have no clue if the number of calories I wound up with is even close to correct. And since that’s the case, why did I waste my time to begin with?
Here’s a better idea: have the app nudge me and then make educated guesses.
- “Hey Brian, it’s 1pm. What’d you have for lunch today?”
- I select “turkey sandwich”, “salt and vinegar chips”, and “diet Coke”. There is only one option for each type. Not “Turkey Sandwich (Specialty’s)” and “Turkey Sandwich (Max’s Deli)” and “Turkey Sandwich (Safeway)”. Just one “turkey sandwich”.
- The app looks at all of the turkey sandwiches in its nutritional database, does some basic statistics, and determines that the turkey sandwich was likely somewhere between 400 and 600 calories, the chips were somewhere between 120 and 240 calories, and the Diet Coke is 0 calories.
- “Hey Brian, it looks like you consumed around 520-840 calories for lunch today.”
Boom. Done.
Do I need to know the exact number of calories I ate? No, because I doubt I’d know them anyway. Even when I’m tracking my own food, I have no idea how many serving sizes I ate. And what the hell is a serving size, anyway? Did I just eat 3 ounces of turkey? Hang on a minute, Fitbit. Let me pull out my scale and weigh it.
No. Just make some educated guesses and tell me what you think. At the end of the day, you’re probably gonna be in the ballpark, and I’ll feel better about knowing roughly what my calorie consumption is.
We’ll both be winners. Sound good?
Conclusion
I’ve used multiple fitness devices over the last few years, including the Nike+ Fuel Band, Fitbit Flex, and Jawbone Up. I’ve also tried many different ways of tracking my calories so that I can watch what I eat, such as the Livestrong iOS app, Weight Watchers, and any number of other “fitness” or nutrition-tracking apps.
But in the end, it’s just too complex. It’s too much thought. It’s too much time out of enjoying my day to deal with.
I just want to enjoy my meal without fiddling with my phone for 15 minutes trying to decide how many calories I just ate. Can’t you figure that out yourself, guys?
That guy’s name?
Einstein.
Making a Smarter Fitness App
- Nudge me. (Ex: “What’d you eat today?”)
- Don’t be afraid to make educated guesses. Ask me, if necessary. (Ex: “Looks like you just ran about 3.1 miles in 30 minutes. Add this as an activity?”
- Learn from my activity. If I run every Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday night sometime between the hours of 6pm and 8pm, then maybe you can stop prompting me and just assume you’re correct. Notify me, of course.
- It’s okay to make mistakes — just make it easy to fix! (Ex: I’m in a car and not actually running, so let me click “Nope” and cancel the activity.)
- The less time I spend clicking around in your app, the happier I’ll be.
C’mon, guys. Automate this shit. I’ll love you to death.
Until then, I’ll just eat my meals, not track my calories, and lament the sad state of fitness devices.
