Pedometer function (step counter) highly inaccurate
eranbram
Registered Users Posts: 1 
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I have my new TomTom Spark GPS+Cardio for a week and have encountered the following problem- The step counter is highly inaccurate and grossly exaggerates my steps count. It would get into the >1000 steps within the first hour from waking up (at which point the count starts at 0 for the day) and that is for walking to the bathroom and to the kitchen for coffee. On a fairly sedentary day it counts >12,000 steps and within less than a week of use it logged 85,000 steps!!! With an average 2000/mile that would mean I walked/ran ~40 miles in 6 days, when I only ran 18 miles this week and have definitely not walked an additional 22 miles (I work in an office). The step counter is accurate and counts steps when they are taken but I think that it also counts many different arm movement types as steps. Did anyone else encounter this problem? Do you know of a way to fix this? Thank you
-Eran
-Eran
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eranbram wrote:I have my new TomTom Spark GPS+Cardio for a week and have encountered the following problem- The step counter is highly inaccurate and grossly exaggerates my steps count. It would get into the >1000 steps within the first hour from waking up (at which point the count starts at 0 for the day) and that is for walking to the bathroom and to the kitchen for coffee. On a fairly sedentary day it counts >12,000 steps and within less than a week of use it logged 85,000 steps!!! With an average 2000/mile that would mean I walked/ran ~40 miles in 6 days, when I only ran 18 miles this week and have definitely not walked an additional 22 miles (I work in an office). The step counter is accurate and counts steps when they are taken but I think that it also counts many different arm movement types as steps. Did anyone else encounter this problem? Do you know of a way to fix this? Thank you
-Eran
Since it is using a wrist based accelerometer there is an inherent issue, in that extra arm movement will count as steps and lack of movement will be missed. This means that if you are sitting a your desk and typing or doing an activity with a lot of arm movement it may see this as extra steps, while to the contrary if you are walking pushing a shopping cart or baby carriage it will not see them as steps. That being said, yours seems extraordinarily high. There may be a problem in your firmware image. I would suggest doing a factory reset which will clear the watch and reinstall the latest image, which may solve the issue. If it does not I would suggest calling Customer Support and seeing what they can do. They are able to more deeply investigate and diagnose problems than we can here on the user forum.
To do a factory reset, make sure the Connect software is running and dock the watch to your computer. The Connect window will open up and you will see a button at the bottom of the window that says "Factory Reset". Press it and follow the steps provided, giving the watch the same name and using the same email address. When prompted to register or sign in to MySports, select sign in and use your existing account credentials. It is fairly straightforward and should take less than 10 minutes.
To get the number for Customer Support, go to tomtom.com/support, choose Contact Us, and fill out the web from (select the Sports Watch and the issue - doesn't matter which one) it will show the Phone Us button, Press it and it will give you the phone number for the country your account is registered under (this can be changed by clicking the flag icon in the top right corner of the screen).
I hope this helps, please let me know if this answered your question. If it did, please mark it as a solution so others can look for it if they have the same question.0 -
I just posted yesterday also commenting on the inaccuracy of the step counter. I wouldn't bother with the factory reset - I did a reset and the accuracy hasn't improved. I made a visit to the bathroom this morning and it counted over 100 steps. The bathroom is only a few m away.
https://en.discussions.tomtom.com/spark-and-runner-2-473/accuracy-step-counter-and-calories-on-runner-2-992309
As long as Tomtom is actively working on getting these issues sorted I am OK with it but if not this appears to be a very poor activity tracker if you can even call it that. Arm Movement Tracker would be more accurate.0 -
I am also having the same issue. My watch counted 900 steps while I was folding laundry! I have done the factory reset and spoken to customer support with no improvement.0
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Hi all,
Thanks for all your feedback regarding activity tracking!
I'll forward this to the watch team. Meanwhile, I'd recommend following tfarabaugh's advise above.
Cheers, Mikko0 -
I have had my Spark since the 9th November and on average I am covering well over 5 miles a day based on the Pedometer, which is wildly inaccurate. I have updated to firmware 1.14 and then 1.19 and done a factory reset, without any improvement.
I however noticed a pattern.
Walking downstairs = 75 steps (on average)
Walking upstairs = 90 steps (on average)
Commuting to work in my car with the watch on my left wrist (25 miles, 40 minutes) = 2000 steps on average
Commuting to work in my car with the watch on the passenger seat (25 miles, 40 minutes) = 2000 steps on average
Commuting to work in my car with my Samsung Note 4 on the passenger seat (25 miles, 40 minutes) = 5 steps on average (for comparison)
Normal walking seems very accurate on average based on my count.
I would appreciate others feedback o whether my unit is faulty or if this is part of a wider problem that will be addressed by a firmware update. I would also be keen to hear if others are getting invalid steps, time exercising, calories burnt results based on the time they spend in their cars.
It is a real shame as the Gym, Swimming and running modes seem to be extremely good, but the step count is invalidating all that good data.
Mr D.0 -
I raised a support ticket reporting the same problem and was told they are aware of the inaccuracy of the pedometer and they are working on it.0
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Yes the steps counter is innacurate, when I'm walking is correct, but when I'm doing other activities, shower (standing still) or typing with in my computer, or washing dishes is inaccurate. I understand that is not easy to solve this problems, because the accelerometer is in wrist, but should be more accurate anyway. They should apply different filters or differents alogrithms. Results is more then 13000 steps per day.. Too much! I hope they are going to fix with the next firmware update. Probably the team is already working to address the issue...0
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Same here. Just swinging your arm and the steps counted is getting higher and higher0
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Hmmm, fingers crossed the issue gets addressed as you say then.
I might log it as a fault regardless, because if it doesn't get sorted it pretty much makes the data collected invalid. As such, the watch as it stands is far too expensive.
Cheers Mr.D0 -
I think they just rushed something out before Christmas. There are going to be a lot of disappointed people come Christmas day who will wonder how they have knocked up 13,000 steps when all they did was eat sprouts and drink beer!
Not heard anything back from support after raising a ticket, but Amazon have said they will accept a return until 31 Jan.0 -
Have you added a review on Amazon yet?0
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Not yet, giving TomTom a chance to respond so I can leave holistic feedback!0
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I posted a fair review under Tomtom Runner 2. I had support calls open for the fitness tracker accuracy and the inability to sync with Android 6.0 and in both cases Tomtom aknowledged them as known problems that are being investigated.0
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Just read it. I have noticed they have lowered the price for that watch to £135 on Amazon. If you paid more and it is within 31 days they usually refund the difference.
Strange, I have the Nexus 6 and it syncs fine.... However I need to go into the app and pull down the activities to prompt a refresh and then click down on the watch before the sync starts.
A major annoyance is that quick GPS is downloaded everyday and not as a background activity so if you want to view your stats you have to wait for that to finish!0 -
Way out today! Looks like it has picked up the drive to the nursery!0
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On my Nexus 6 it only updates the QuickGPS settings on the watch when I try to get it to sync.
Regarding Amazon watch - I pre-ordered the black one(now reduced to £135), waited for 2 weeks for them to have stock then gave up and ordered the blue one. The blue one hasn't been reduced in price.0 -
Just got a response from support
"The data and information provided by the activity tracker is intended as a close estimation of your activity, but may not be completely accurate, including step, sleep, distance and calorie data."
Not any mention of working on a fix or improving.
Well, I don't like their definition of the term 'close'!
Today it is already at 3k steps, compared to 2k on other devices!
Yesterday it was 15k vs 11k steps
The day before 10k vs 7.2k steps
It's going back to Amazon, not worth the premium price tag and it will get a review to suite, with the response from TomTom, so others don't make the same expensive mistake.0 -
speric07 wrote:Just got a response from support
"The data and information provided by the activity tracker is intended as a close estimation of your activity, but may not be completely accurate, including step, sleep, distance and calorie data."
Not any mention of working on a fix or improving.
Well, I don't like their definition of the term 'close'!
Today it is already at 3k steps, compared to 2k on other devices!
Yesterday it was 15k vs 11k steps
The day before 10k vs 7.2k steps
It's going back to Amazon, not worth the premium price tag and it will get a review to suite, with the response from TomTom, so others don't make the same expensive mistake.
Just curious, how do you know that the others are accurate and the TT is inaccurate? Is it possible that TT is right and the others are counting short? Have you done any testing by walking and manually counting steps to compare?0 -
Walking it is fine, just a few steps out, which I do not mind! Counted to ensure. It is the inability it has to ignore train journeys, sitting at desk and trips in the car! Fitbit and googlefit manage that!
The distances are way out if anything other than walking, forgot to activate a run the other day and it tracked 8miles for 3.2 miles! My phone captured 3.1 just using pedometer as hadn't activated endomondo! I know the route is 3.2 as measured it and TomTom tracks it on GPS!
They have said everything is as expected so sending it back ... As it is not what I expected for the price!0 -
The response I got was that they were investigating but your response is newer than mine so maybe they decided not to improve the accuracy after all.
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This is in Customer care again! Thank you for your query about the activity tracker.
The tracker get its reading from motion sensors and aims to provide information to encourage an active and healthy lifestyle. Your TomTom GPS watch uses sensors that track your movement. The data and information provided is intended as a close estimation of your activity, but may not be completely accurate, including step, sleep, distance and calorie data.
We are aware of there being very inaccurate recordings and this is being investigated and improved.
If I you have further queries do not hesitate to contact me using the response link below.
With Kind Regards
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Hi all,
Thanks for all your feedback regarding activity tracking!
Your feedback has been noted and forwarded to the watch team. They are currently working on various improvements on activity tracking to be released in future updates
Cheers, Mikko0 -
Any news about next firmware's updates and are their improvements on this pedometer issue?0
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Is the watch supposed to count a run as steps? in other words if I set the watch to track a run, and run 5km should my activity tracker be also counting away my arm movements? I have a feeling my watch does this but I think this is likely to result in a duplication between distance covered in pursuing a sport and distance covered going about my daily life.
I think it is important to be able to make this distinction, essentially turning off the step counter while running would be helpful.0 -
Unfortunately have to add in similar experience with the TomTom Spark Cardio here. Walking around seems pretty accurate but I've been sitting at my desk for the last 3 hours and yet have apparently managed 60/70 odd steps in that time. I also appear to have been doing laps on my train carriage on the way to work. Mine currently doesn't seem quite as bad as some and there are always teething issues with this kind of thing but hopefully it is something that can be refined.
Benefit of the doubt for now but we'll see.0 -
I have my Runner 2 Cardio for two days and I see extreme differences between TomTom step counts and other devices.
I have fitness band Xiaomi MiBand which is in price of about 20$ and it counts steps very precisely. For example if I compare it with Runkeeper I get similar numbers as well as step count in Health app on iPhone 6S.
Now in the middle of the day TomTom says I made 2100 steps (1,8 km) and Xiaomi MiBand and iPhone 6S say I made about 1200 steps (1 km).
I am very disappointed with the watch :-(0
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