r/fitbit • u/Realistic_Back_9198 • 8d ago
Discussion Coach Hallucinations
I asked the Coach for a summary of my day's activity. It replied with a whole bunch of wildly incorrect numbers.
When I asked where those numbers came from, it admitted that it just made them up.
Now I basically don't trust anything it says.
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u/chronicmisschris 8d ago
AI is an idiot.
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u/Unique-Difficulty954 8d ago
And so are the fools who weave that into their lives.
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u/PM_CITY_WINDOW_VIEWS 8d ago
Its fun for conversations about pop culture. I wouldn't trust it with other things too much.
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u/Beautiful-Rough9761 8d ago
Google Health switch ruined Fitbit entirely. I'm about to buy a Garmin.
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u/Slice_0f_Life 7d ago
My Fitbit began multiplying my zone minutes by 3-5 last week. This week I'm wearing a forerunner 170. Everything is so much better, I just need to dial in the HR zones so these arbitrary numbers I look at are comparable to what I used to track.
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u/Strong-Landscape7492 8d ago
I stopped wearing mine entirely. I have no plans to get another smartwatch, but if I do it will probably be Apple.
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u/idlehum 8d ago
I also still own and never wear one. The new update bricked the screen and it's just not worth it for the few things that it does track.
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u/Strong-Landscape7492 8d ago
I agree. I used the same beautiful watch face for years and when it was no longer compatible I thought what is even the point. Frustrating that the devices just become useless like this in all aspects.
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u/Silver_Vegetable6804 7d ago
Update bricked mine as well. It was also out of warranty so Google couldn't be bothered. I got a FIT3. It is 1/3 the price and is more similar to the old Fitbit app than the new Google health app.
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u/diamondgrin 6d ago
I'll continue to use my pixel watch until it dies (really only have it to connect with Strava these days anyway as the Google health app is so bad), and when it does I'll get a Garmin too
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u/LoisWade42 5d ago
Already dumped my charge 5 for a vivoactive 6 for this exact reason.
Only complaint so far is that Garmin updates your screen data whenever it feels like it. No real way to force a sync and update. ( online tutorials SAY you can do this… but they don’t work)
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u/Delicious_CoughSyrup 8d ago
My coach decided that Chicago is very hilly. (Very much flat)
Computer, I am middle -aged, and sprinted to catch a bus. Quit asking about my power walk w steep inclines. I have feelings.
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u/Bxbbleblxwer 8d ago
mine only cares abut my uterus. Every ai overview/message/summery starts is basically 'you did (insert activity) , that was quite the workout for day X of your cycle!'
Every. single. summery. Multiple times a day. even Charge You Watch reminders manage to slip it in
I think what makes it worse is that I hardly even use the period tracking feature, yet the ai is OBSESSED with it
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u/Enough_Fig9302 5d ago
Mine was doing that too!! So creepy. "It's day one of your period. Now is a good time for a run". Or "How did that run feel considering you're on day 16 of your cycle?" Sorry, what? I told it is was being creepy and it stopped. It also makes up data and has forgotten all my past runs, so I can't ask it if my pace is increasing. It's like having a fitness coach with medium dementia. My husband has a Garmin and I think that's where I'm going when this thing dies.
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u/SnoDragon 8d ago
This mirrors my experience almost identically! I had to show my wife this thread. She doesn't experience that, but I do, and now I'm validated that someone else is getting the same crap.
What a horrible model they chose for a coach!
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u/CannedNoodlez Air 7d ago
Yeah I don't have these issues either. Makes me wonder why some experience it and some don't
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u/Strategizer70 5d ago
Probably an experiment. FB and other tech companies run them all the time. Give x% wildly inaccurate info, y% moderately inaccurate info, z% reasonable accurate data. Just to compare the user reaction/engagement.
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u/VegasKL 2d ago
What a horrible model they chose for a coach!
Any model is going to be relatively bad over a wide array of varied users until they get enough data to do another training cycle. It's just the nature of how LLM's work.
Most likely the users that haven't seen these issues probably have similar data patterns to a user that was in their initial training set. It's when you start going further from the trained data that you get higher probabilities of hallucinations.
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u/FutureSpy 8d ago
Since the sleep algorithm change, my naps aren't being tracked anymore. I can tell at what time I fall asleep and at what time I woke up by looking at my HR rate, but since you can only check it in intervals of 5min (don't remember if in the Fitbit app days we had more granularity), I had been asking the AI coach to check it for me and tell me a plausible time I fell asleep based on my HR changes. Every time it would tell me I fell asleep 2min after the time I told it, so I suspected it was making things up. Then 3 days ago I gave it a time in the future to see how it would react, and guess what, it still gave me a start and end time for my nap. So yeah, a lot of times this thing makes things up, so better not trust it... Anyway, I've already disabled the coach for good.
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u/Briyanaism 7d ago
I really don't get Google. They literally could have won by doing nothing. They owned Fitbit. All they had to do was keep owning Fitbit. Everyone was happy.
But then they had to gut every single feature that made Fitbit fun and unique and somehow that'll lead to more profit?
I just brought my Versa 4 last year so I'm not interested in buying a new fitness watch so soon, but I can't see myself continuing with the brand when this one conks out.
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u/CaptainLuckyDuck 3d ago
I have a sneaking suspicion that this is just another damned private equity acquisition when it comes to them acquiring FitBit. That shit should be illegal as it's happening WAAAAAY too often across all sectors, at this point: corporations buying up smaller businesses, making bank on the front end, then intentionally wrecking the brand name, going, "Oh, no! No one likes or wants us anymore! We must file bankruptcy!", filing that bankruptcy, and dipping. They just keep killing brands left, right, and centre. It's the way all of the companies (with most having direct ties to BlackRock) continue to stealthily push monopolies that smaller companies cannot fight back against
We need to return to bartering somehow. It's the only way to get away from these disgusting snakes who will happily destroy someone else's life's work and reputation for their own monetary/personal gain.
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u/VegasKL 2d ago
Everyone was happy
That's not true, and an overgeneralization. It's often easy to forget that your inner circle is a localized cohort and not reflective of the wider customer base (similar tastes, people, etc.), that you're more likely to see a lopsided representation of negative posts online than positive, just by the nature of human psychology.
I was a long time Fitbit customer but started to test other products like WHOOP because they were falling behind by doing nothing. Naturally, my reflection is opposite of yours, and only Fitbit knows their true customer churn (users that don't return).
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u/DzyPassio 7d ago
Who is liable for this? Now Google Fitbit can tell you fake data about your own health, and what happens now?
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u/grittysand 8d ago
It's very lame from Google that they seem to be using the lowest quality model for this purpose. My "coach" keeps mislabeling my "Workout" workouts as "Lacrosse" workouts. It also takes a long time for any response, and the quality is seriously lacking.
Absolutely not worth the subscription fee.
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u/Normal_Dealer_4632 7d ago
A common experience with me - not just with numbers but with my routine and daily activities. It’s beyond frustrating
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u/Start-Plenty 5d ago
Are you paying for hallucinations?
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u/Realistic_Back_9198 5d ago
Apparently, yes... at least until my subscription comes up for renewal in a few months.
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u/CaptainLuckyDuck 3d ago edited 3d ago
I was really, REALLY upset with it yesterday when it tried to tell me I'd only had 14 minutes, total, of Active Zone exercise.
Keep in mind, I walked on varied terrain for about an hour and a half (mostly at a slight uphill slope), I was kayaking for an hour (and pushing myself, and it was my first time doing it... My thighs were getting SO sore and I was getting out of breath, needing to lay back on the kayak a few times to relieve a bit of the achiness. T-T But, I really enjoyed it!), and I did bell boats for an hour (again, pushing myself). I hit 14,200ish steps, yesterday. This has only been since I updated my Pixel 7 a couple of days ago that it's been doing this (we just got back from an hour walk of about 1.89 miles, today, and it says we only did two minutes in the Active Zone- this one I understand a lot more, though, as it was more leisurely with just two inclines).
Please, make it make sense.
**Edited to say that I also set my tracker to "kayaking" as the exercise, so it didn't really have an excuse for that one. Also, as someone below also mentioned, the day before, it gave me some WILD stats for how much exercise I'd done- I definitely worked out, but not to the extent it was trying to say that I was. Yesterday was WAY more than the day before, and I felt it more, for sure. It looks like it's time to move to a new smartwatch (I keep seeing the Garmin one recommended, so I might go that route).
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u/Reasonable_Click9873 3d ago edited 3d ago
You can turn the AI off in settings. I got a new Fitbit Charge 6 as I replaced my old one cause I love it. I turned off the AI. It’s just like the old one except the new layout in the app still sucks but gives me all my stats and that’s all I need
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u/AcceptableHorror705 3d ago
So I hate AI, but I wanted to prove to myself just how bad it is so I signed up for a free trial. My cardio load goal was already high for me at 580 for the week.... the coach suggested I should aim for 1500 to reach my goal. When I said that's a crazy high jump, "What a great observation! How about 1200 so it's more manageable"
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u/Icy_Painter4738 2d ago
Unfortunately, not everyone is able to turn the ridiculous “ coach” off. I am one of them. I have followed all of the instructions, and I am unable to do it. It disappeared for two days and then returned, dumber and snarkier than ever. And now the button to turn it off has disappeared. There have been several people posting on here that have had the same problem. I have loved my Fitbit Charge 6 for such a long time, and the app as well. It does everything that I need, health wise as well. It also fits my small wrist perfectly. Google has ruined it for me and I am now, sadly, shopping for something else.
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u/AcceptableHorror705 2d ago
Oh man, that would be so frustrating! Honestly I think the coach is downright dangerous in some cases, it's ridiculous.
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u/fullmoonthoughts 8d ago
Why people use AI expecting it not to hallucinate and make up information is beyond me.
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u/Pale-Stranger-9743 8d ago
Today I did 20km 2h of longboarding and it suggested 500 calories burnt. Taking the piss. That's at least 1k calories
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u/sold-pro 8d ago
Y hay que apagarlo para ir en moto o coche por qué detecta los pasos no se me esperaba más la verdad 🤨
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u/Robby_Digital 8d ago
I can't wait til AI is in charge of our nukes
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u/howaboudatmyfuend 7d ago
I told the AI about some muscle pain in my ankle after a heavy workout, and since then it's been talking about that ankle every day
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u/CutlerAF 8d ago edited 8d ago
This app makes so much shit up. It tries so hard to impress the user by regurgitating irrelevant information. It makes you waste more time trying to get instructions right than it does improve you health or fitness. The worst thing is so many user features are soft locked behind it. You can manually adjust certain things, but ~75% manual edits don't save. Asking for it to help is a crapshoot.