Okay, so my Fitbit battery started draining like crazy recently. It was lasting only a day or two, when it used to go for almost a week! Super annoying. I started digging around to figure out what was going on.
Troubleshooting Steps
First, I restarted my Fitbit. You know, the classic “turn it off and on again” trick. I held down the button for like 10 seconds until the logo popped up. That didn’t seem to fix it, though.
Next, I checked the charging contacts. Sometimes they get a little gunked up, preventing a good charge. I took a look and, sure enough, they were a bit dirty. I grabbed a cotton swab and some rubbing alcohol and gently cleaned both the contacts on the Fitbit and the charger. Still no luck.
Then I started thinking about what might be causing the extra drain. I remembered I had recently turned on “All-Day Sync” and “Always Connected”. Those features are handy, but they definitely use more power. So I went into the Fitbit app on my phone and disabled both of those.
- All-Day Sync: This keeps your Fitbit constantly syncing with your phone.
- Always Connected: This maintains a constant Bluetooth connection.
I also made sure the screen brightness wasn’t cranked up all the way. I lowered it to a more reasonable level. And I turned off any extra features I wasn’t really using, like notifications for every single app on my phone.
I also checked which clock face I was * of the more animated clock faces are a lot of fun, but they use a lot more power to run it.I changed my to a basic clock face that didn’t have a bunch of moving parts.
Finally, I made sure my Fitbit’s firmware was up to date. Sometimes updates include battery optimizations. I checked for updates in the app and, yep, there was one available. I installed it and restarted my Fitbit again.
The Result
After doing all of that, my battery life is MUCH better! It’s not quite back to a full week, but it’s definitely lasting several days now. I think the biggest culprits were the “All-Day Sync” and “Always Connected” settings, combined with a slightly dirty charging contact. I also realize clock face has something to do with it! Problem solved (mostly)!