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I'm always leery about reports coming from these seemingly random "research firms" that seem to crop up overnight. For example, Endeavour Partners seems to have cropped up overnight. Their site has exactly one research paper (the one cited in the news story). There's no client list, and no information on who is backing them.
While I don't know what the angle is for reporting this, it still makes me suspect.
In other news, I have a Fitbit One that's going on two years strong and I wear it every day.
I'm with you. My attempts to get active were usually hit-or-miss until I got a Charge HR and used it to track all my runs. Having that real-time tracking on hand lets you make informed decisions more often regarding calorie intake, quality of your exercise and whether or not you're keeping to your habits.
I would seriously recommend a Fitbit to anyone, and everyone I know that has one feels the same (plural of anecdote isn't data, so maybe we're outliers).
Ultimately, fitness trackers will not make you lose weight. It's just a measuring device. Better than that, it's a reminder. For one brief moment out of your day when you put it on, it reminds you that you should do a little better than yesterday.
I think the people who stopped using their trackers decided they didn't want to be reminded.
Not really surprising, think how many pieces of home-exercise equipment wind up as a convenient place to hang clothes.
This is why, I believe, the only fitness trackers that will succeed are ones that are integrated into something else useful. Like a watch. The watch I wear was only $200 (now only $100) and it is a smartwatch that uses epaper so the battery lasts 5+ days, and has popular fitness tracking software as an app. My watch is useful for many things, including the fitness tracking, which is why I will keep wearing it.
Why buy a $100 fitness-tracker only, when you can buy a $100 smart-watch with fitness built in.
When shopping for a tracker back in the say, I had the same thought. However, I went with a model which clips to your clothes and wear a separate (non-smart) watch, instead. Full disclosure, it did take me about a week to get used to clipping it on whenever I was getting dressed for the day. Now, I feel funny not feeling it clipped to my jeans pocket.
So, now I have the flexibility of a watch which lasts years without a new battery, a tracker that lasts 10 or so days without a recharge, and the flexibility to swap either one out as needs dictate.
Yes! This is one point I forgot to mention. When I had my misfit shine I always put it in my coin pocket of my jeans. I felt that this gave me a more accurate count of my actual steps and not arm movement. Now that I have the pebble, I think it'll often count things like typing on the keyboard which is not cool.
Also, when playing soccer I preferred to slip the misfit into my sock/shoe, whereas I can't wear the watch while playing.
So I guess I more meant the wrist based fitbits will either converge into a smartwatch (which they already are leaning towards), or people will choose a smartwatch that does step counts.
Yeah I bought an Wear watch for the novelty of it, but the Fit app really motivated me to get more steps. It moved me to take an extra walk in the afternoon to reach 10,000 steps. I never would have thought about steps were it not for the app naturally integrated like that.
I stopped using mine because I didn't want an extra thing on my wrist, and now my phone tracks steps for me anyway. Also, entering food manually is just too much for me. So I just dropped the whole thing, exercise on my own, and if I'm curious as to how many steps I've taken that day, I check my phone.
Pen and paper is all you need to track. I like the concept of being able to get people motivated for fitness but at a certain point I do agree it sucks the fun out of it. More worried about getting steps then just enjoying a hike. As a trainer, clients constantly ask me about these gadgets and I tell them the same thing its only going to be worth it if you want to balance your fitness like your checking account.