Activity Rings still broken in 5.0.1

[bflowers]

So within my family, we have a total fo three watches. 38mm and 42mm Series 3, and a 40mm Series 4. All of them seem to suffer from really inaccurate Exercise Minute tracking, as well as some Move calories being exceptionally low.

Under 5.0, my daughter's 38mm S3 would give her Exercise minutes for sitting in class. She would rack up roughly 200 minutes during the average school day despite only about an hour of activity. Updating to 5.0.1 over corrected that issue. Yesterday, on a 9 mile bike ride, she earned less than 20 minutes.

Likewise, after the first half hour, I received only 4 minutes despite an average pace of 8 mph and pulling two smaller children and about 100 lbs of tandem bike and trailer. After that, I just switched to Other, so I would get credit for the exercise.

My wife was on a hike on Saturday, and similarly only collected a handful of minutes after several miles while using the Hiking workout. She likewise killed the workout and switched to Other. She is using a 40mm S4 running 5.0.1.

Monthly Challenges and Competitions are worthless if you can't count on the app to track and credit a workout.

Anyone else seeing horrible tracking from the update? I've already sent feedback to Apple.

 

[ftaok]

Yes. It seems as though 5.0.1 over-corrected the Exercise Ring issue for me too. I don't care to much about it personally, thought I would like it fixed.

Separately, it seems like 5.0.1 fixed the issue of getting to much Move Ring credit. It's back to where it was on wOS4

 

[SML404]

Same here. S4 (40mm) is my first apple watch so nothing to compare to but the activity tracking doesn't make sense. I recorded a 30 minute workout (as outdoor walk) on top of the multiple walks I went on with my dog that I didn't record yet my exercise minutes only showed 29 for the whole day. I was easily active for a few hours in total. I am running 5.0.1.

 

[purpleparrotuk]

Same here. S4 (40mm) is my first apple watch so nothing to compare to but the activity tracking doesn't make sense. I recorded a 30 minute workout (as outdoor walk) on top of the multiple walks I went on with my dog that I didn't record yet my exercise minutes only showed 29 for the whole day. I was easily active for a few hours in total. I am running 5.0.1.

You have to be waking very briskly for it to add to your minutes. Over 3mph I believe.

 

[bflowers]

I know it uses increased heart rate to calculate calories and exercise, but it should be able to compare resting heart rate and give proper credit. I have a resting heart rate average 50, a sitting average 70, walking average 90. If I'm above 130, clearly, I should be getting credit for exercise.

I don't expect it to know I was towing 80 lbs of kids and 100 lbs of extra equipment, but my heart rate would have reflected that a bit, and I should have seen a slight uptick in calories burned.

 

[imagineadam]

I’m still getting more calories per run than usual. Here’s a 15 miler from today compared to before. My exercise minutes have gone down compared to 5.0 but move and run calories still up in 5.0.1 compared to os 4 and below. It’s up a good 200 calories on this run in particular. Always 100-200 more on average. And my move ring is still easier to close than before.

 

[Newtons Apple]

You have to be waking very briskly for it to add to your minutes. Over 3mph I believe.

You got to doing something to get your heart rate up before it counts it as exercise. If you are in great shape, walking may not do it. If I walk briskly for 60 minutes I will get about 50-55 minutes of exercise.

 

[SML404]

You got to doing something to get your heart rate up before it counts it as exercise. If you are in great shape, walking may not do it. If I walk briskly for 60 minutes I will get about 50-55 minutes of exercise.

Ah ok, makes sense, wasn't sure how it worked. Walking the dog wouldn't get my heart rate up that much. Will check it at the gym this week. Thanks!

 

[Deguello]

My first real walking workout with my watch on 5.0 burned 733 calories over 4.34 miles in 1:01:59.

The comparable workout today with 5.0.1 burned 724 calories over 4.35 miles in 1:03:27.

Basically exactly the same.

Today in Apple Health I'm seeing 3,321 total calories burned so far today. My Fitbit shows 3,361.

Basically exactly the same.

 

[zanoii]

Totally the same experience here. Exercise minutes are down but calories are the same. And this is a month where my monthly goal is 90 minutes of exercise a day EVERY DAY. I'm not going to achieve this goal.


Activity ring screenshot is from just a day at the office. Green ring is probably correct but getting >300 kcal in only a few minutes of activity is simply not possible.


The other screenshot is my October challenge. 2820 minutes of exercise in 31 days equals 91 minutes of activity a day. Insane.

 

[longdogs]

I updated to 5.0.1 yesterday and I’m not getting any calories or exercise minutes at all! Despite having four stand hours I’ve got zero on the other two. Re-booting the watch doesn’t help.

 

[cynics]

5.0.1 was a stark change for me but it’s reflecting reality a bit better. I would generally close my exercise ring at work since I have a physical job however that’s my daily routine I haven’t actually been exercising.

I went for a 30 minute run this morning without selecting a workout or anything and it says 24 minutes.

I feel like I was caught cheating and the gig is up I’m going to need to actually exercise if I want to close my rings.

 

[ttforever]

My calories per walk are significantly higher, on my OS5 or it could be my series 4 as I got it at the same time, consistently 40 or 50 more calories per mile than I have had on anything previously and move ring closes much easier - I've compared it to my old data and its much higher. Exercise ring is about the same, 5.0.1 didn't seem to make a difference

 

[SteelBlueTJ]

Same here. I noticed yesterday and so far today, my exercise ring barely moves. I didn't do anything different than I normally do and it only recorded 2 minutes of exercise yesterday out of 30, yet my calorie ring (500 goal) and stand rings (12 hours) all closed??? I thought maybe the 5.0.1 update had something to do with it. Then I thought well maybe now it only records exercise when you actually do a workout in the activity app? I'm on my feet and on the go everyday for my job, and before the update, I would close all my rings almost everyday, even if I didn't do a normal "workout" with the activity app. Something just seems way off in Activity tracker with this update.

 

[ttforever]

I've just noticed since watch os5 all my workouts have no heart rate data available, on watch os4 all correct, wonder if something is really screwy with this! Is anyone else the same?

 

[bflowers]

Totally the same experience here. Exercise minutes are down but calories are the same. And this is a month where my monthly goal is 90 minutes of exercise a day EVERY DAY. I'm not going to achieve this goal.

View attachment 791303
Activity ring screenshot is from just a day at the office. Green ring is probably correct but getting >300 kcal in only a few minutes of activity is simply not possible.

View attachment 791302
The other screenshot is my October challenge. 2820 minutes of exercise in 31 days equals 91 minutes of activity a day. Insane.

I've been frustrated by the Monthly Challenges for a long time. Last month was 41 workouts of 15 minutes. Why not 21 30 minutes? Something that doesn't require me to end and restart workouts in the middle. The previous month, I needed 3 200%. My wife needed an average of 50 exercise minutes per day. Not great if she wasn't getting credit. This month I need 18500 Calories, so very doable.

 

[oeagleo]

You have to be waking very briskly for it to add to your minutes. Over 3mph I believe.

For me, that's almost a run, so that's not gonna happen.

 

[Donfor39]

October challenge
Close rings twice
Thankfuly clsed today could mange challenge at weekend
Enjoying finding the effort to continue making improvements such as over 7mph treadmill
And dumbbells are increasing-36 each excersise
Calories are no where near being dropped as what they were over summer though still managing to drop a few hundred per session

 

[kappaknight]

Are you reporting this stuff to Apple?

 

[zanoii]

I've just noticed since watch os5 all my workouts have no heart rate data available, on watch os4 all correct, wonder if something is really screwy with this! Is anyone else the same?

I had that issue on WatchOS 4, but only when biking. It wasn't an issue with the sensor as far as I can tell since I use a wristband to protect my watch from branches and such when mountainbiking. The wristband also makes sure the watch stays pressed against my wrist.

I've been frustrated by the Monthly Challenges for a long time. Last month was 41 workouts of 15 minutes. Why not 21 30 minutes? Something that doesn't require me to end and restart workouts in the middle. The previous month, I needed 3 200%. My wife needed an average of 50 exercise minutes per day. Not great if she wasn't getting credit. This month I need 18500 Calories, so very doable.

Yeah. My wife had 3 200% in September whereas I had to do 13 200%. I've had some hard challenges in the past but this month is simply impossible and will be the first month challenge I fail.

You have to be waking very briskly for it to add to your minutes. Over 3mph I believe.

I think it's the cadence and not the speed that needs to be over a certain treshold for the Walk workout type to count.
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I feel like I was caught cheating and the gig is up I’m going to need to actually exercise if I want to close my rings.

This. So true. Checking previous days' exercise (pre 5.0.1) I've even gotten a few minutes of exercise while sleeping. That's just not right.

I would be fine with the change except that future challenges are calculated from historic data without taking the change in the Exercise ring algorithm into consideration.

 

[bflowers]

I've never gotten any minutes sleeping, and almost never get any move calories either. There are plenty of times where I'll be cooking and doing dishes in the kitchen for a whole hour, and never get credit for my stand hour. That bugs me. I guess if I had to do almost half a month at 200%, I'd consider lowering my move ring to something that would let me achieve it while still being a challenge.

Apple still needs to listen to the community though, not having rest days is not good. Most active people need a day or two a week were they aren't pushing themselves so the body can recover.

 

[ttforever]

Nothings changed on my watch though apart from watchOS - I even tried my old watch and strap as I got a series 4 with the same issue, on both watches the first 2 workouts record heart properly, then all fail after that. If I hard reboot the watches again the first 2 work, then nothing!

I had that issue on WatchOS 4, but only when biking. It wasn't an issue with the sensor as far as I can tell since I use a wristband to protect my watch from branches and such when mountainbiking. The wristband also makes sure the watch stays pressed against my wrist .