Because I am a HUGE DORK I wore three pedometers today: The Omron HJ-720ITC Pocket Pedometer, the Fitbit Ultra, and a brand new Withings Pulse.

The Omron HJ-720ITC Pocket Pedometer measures steps, aerobic steps and minutes, calories and distance. The distance is calculated from the stride your manually enter into the device. The Omron data is manually downloaded via a mini USB cable that downloads the pedometer data to the Omron Health Management software you download install on your computer. The data remains only on your computer, and all the data can be exported to a CSV file you can open in Excel (or other spreadsheet program). The Omron is powered by a watch battery.

The Fitbit Ultra measures daily steps, stairs climbed, distance, calories burned, and activity level, and also has a setting to track your sleep. The FitBit wirelessly uploads your data to the web, via the FitBit base you install on your computer. This data goes straight to the FitBit company databases and is accessible only through FitBit website. The FitBit uses the base as a charging station. In my experience, I can go just over a week between charges, but I found the charging station to at times be finicky. I also repeatedly would get distracted and forget to take the FitBit off the charging station and put it back on.

The Withings Pulse measures tracking steps, elevation, distance and calories burned, has a setting to track your sleep, and also has the ability to measure your heart rate. The Pulse uploads your data to your cell phone via a bluetooth connection, and the cell phone app then uploads your data to the Withings website. This data is available only through the Withings website. In my brief looking around, I didn’t see a way to download my data to my computer. But I plan on looking. The Pulse charges via a mini USB connection. The USB cable is somewhat stiff, and actually sticks up when plugged into my laptop, which I think will remind me to put it back on.

All three allow you to cycle through the data on the device, so you can see at a glace how many steps you have.

I also wore two of them (the Pules and the FitBit Ultra) to bed last night and used the sleep tracking functions.

Here are the three pedometers: The Omron, the Pulse, and the FitBit Ultra.

As you can see, the Omron is pretty large. But I’d like to mention I wore it every day for three years and it’s still in pretty good shape (It also has a leash, which makes it MUCH harder to lose). The FitBit I had less than a year, and you can see that it’s beat up. The outer shell is cracked in multiple places along the joint. The Pulse is small and flat and looks sturdy, but only time will tell there.

Here are the pedometers in their clips.

The Omron clip is plastic with rounded edges and a slightly rubbery feel. The FitBit clip is rigid hard plastic with edges, but can be worn without the clip. The clip for the Pulse is silicone and has no sharp edges. It seems to be like the silicone case for my Sansa clip, which has held up well for years.

When clipped onto the waistband of my pants, the FitBit clip was uncomfortable, the Omron clip was noticeable, and the Pulse case wasn’t noticeable at all.

Now, onto the programs where you view your data.

FitBit Web Overview

Withings Web Overview

Omron Software Overview

All three programs display your data in a graph, and allow you to expand out/focus on a specific area of your data, such as daily steps.

The Omron data exists only on your computer, so it doesn’t have a phone app. Here are the apps for the other two.

The Withings App

The FitBit App

As I said, both the Withings Pulse and the FitBit track your sleep. You start a timer before you fall asleep, and you turn off the timer when you wake up.

I started and stopped both timers within a few seconds of each other–here is their analysis of my sleep last night.

Withings

FitBit

There is a 16 minute discrepancy as to the amount of time each device judged was asleep, with the FitBit saying I didn’t get as much sleep. They’re interesting, but I’m not sure if they’re useful or not.

Now, onto the step counts.

This was FASCINATING.

In that first picture, you can see the step counts for the day. As I said, I wore the Pulse and the Fitbit to bed, and was soon as I got up, I put on the Omron. The FitBit and Pulse were worn on my waistband while the Omron was worn in a pocket.

Here are the totals when I took the picture:
Omron: 11815
Pulse: 11806
FitBit: 12470

The Omron and the Pulse are extremely close in their count–only 9 steps off, while the FitBit count was 655 steps higher than the Omron and 664 steps higher than the Pulse.

That is NOT an insignificant difference.

The Omron has a reputation for accuracy (and in my experience was very accurate), so I believe it is the FitBit that was inaccurate in counting my steps. I believe I’ll repeat this experiment again tomorrow, and I’ll see if FitBit is again significantly off from the other two.

So there’s an overview of three different pedometers. I still love the Omron, but it doesn’t have an altimeter, which is why I’m trying out the Pulse.