Smartphones as Good as Wearables for Step Tracking According to Survey

[Maura]

AppleInsider reports today that according to a new study from the University of Pennsylvania, smartphone apps are just as accurate as, and sometimes much better than, wearables when it comes to tracking daily fitness activity such as steps taken.

“In this study, we wanted to address one of the challenges with using wearable devices: they must be accurate,” said Meredith A. Case, B.A., who is a Penn medical student and lead author of the study. “After all, if a device is going to be effective at monitoring—and potentially changing—behaviour, individuals have to be tracking physical activity.”

Study participants were fitted with 6 wearable devices, including Nike’s Fuelband. Also, an iPhone 5s running the Fitbit app, Withing’s Health Mate app, and ProtoGeo Oy’s Moves apps was carried in one pocket, and a Samsung Galaxy S4 running Moves on Android was placed in another pocket.

Each of the study participants was then asked to walk on a treadmill at a pace of 3 miles per hour for 500 steps and then again for 1,500 steps. The data from the phone apps had a range of -6.7% to 6.2% relative distance from the actual number of steps that were seen to be taken by the participants, and the wearables had a range of -22.7% to 1.5%.

As far as specific wearables were concerned, Nike’s Fuelband was found to be very far off the mark, while Fitbit’s Zip and One were pretty much on the money.

Source: Smartphones apps equal to fitness wearables for step tracking study says