Why I Traded in my Fitbit Flex for a Polar Loop

One hot item that appears on many wish lists this holiday season are fitness wristbands/watches. But with all the options available it can be hard to decide which one to get. The best wristband for you all depends on what information you hope to get from it and what your goals are.

A little over a month ago I made the decision that it was time to upgrade from the Fitbit Flex. Don’t get me wrong, I loved my Flex. It gave me the motivation to get up and moving days I felt like laying around and doing nothing. However, with the workouts that I do 4-5 times per week I wasn’t getting accurate readings. I do a lot of strength training, so after a 45 minute workout my flex was telling me I had only taken 500 steps and burned a few calories, when I know I had worked MUCH harder than that. I wanted to know just how hard I was actually working. I had also ran into a few issues with the charger and the wristbands breaking. I had to reach out to Fitbit 3 times to have replacements sent.

The Polar Loop

I started to look into a few fitness wristbands; specifically one that had the ability to monitor heart rate with a sturdier wristband/clasp. In the end, the Polar Loop was my favorite option. Paired with a separate heart-rate monitor during workouts, it would give me a more accurate reading compared to other bands that monitor heart-rate through the wrist.

The first thing I noticed was the quality of the band itself. It’s much sturdier than other brands I looked at. The wristband just FEELS higher quality than the Fitbit band did. The metal clasp to close the band is much nicer and easier to use as well. It doesn’t fall off like my Flex did all the time. And I love that it looks more like a piece of jewelry than a fitness wristband.

Out of the box the Polar Loop comes in one size that you will need to cut to fit the size for your wrist. After a quick charge (the Loop charges almost twice as fast as my Flex did) and setting up my account on the Polar Flow website I was ready to go!

One of the things I love about the Loop is the display. The Loop provides much more information than the Flex did. I can view the time, steps taken, calories burned, and amount of activity I need to do in order to reach my daily goal. I also get alerts when I’ve been sitting for too long. And in the morning you get little messages like “Good Morning”, or “Hey You!” It’s just a little something extra you didn’t get with the Flex.

I also love that the Loop automatically knows when you go to sleep. This is a nice feature since I constantly forgot to put my Flex into sleep mode at night. I also had an issue with the Flex going into sleep mode by itself while I was pushing carts in the grocery store or clapping. I don’t have to worry about that with the Loop.

Polar Flow App

Inside the app your activity is broken down a few different ways for you to look at. You can see exactly how many minutes you spent laying down, sitting, standing, walking, and being active. You also get to see the benefits of being active, or little reminders that maybe tomorrow you should get up and move some more.

When paired with the heart-rate strap you can get even more detailed information about your workout including average heart-rate, max heart-rate, calories burned, fat burn % of calories, and the training benefits. It was interesting to see that in those same 45 minute workouts I am actually burning 800 or more calories, as opposed to the 200 or so the Fitbit told me I had burned.

My Rating

Overall I’m very satisfied with the Loop. I’d have to give it a 4.5 out of 5 stars. For the person looking to track their fitness a little more closely with a nice sturdy wristband, this is a great option. There are a few minor things that Polar could do to improve the wristband; for instance I would love it if the band would vibrate for inactivity alerts. It will be interesting to see a few months down the road if it holds up to my standards, or if it falls apart like my Flex did (literally.)

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Is a fitness wristband on your shopping list this year? Which one do you plan to buy? Comment below and let us know!