Better sleep tracking!

I went from Fitbit to Garmin as well and for me sleep tracking usually is spot-on.

"....... compared to the Fitbit, and lacks functionality like sleep stages etc." Do you mean that you don't get any deep,light and awake parts during the sleep?
For me Garmin is as good as Fitbit, maybe even better. Tracks all my sleep, light, deep and awake.
Have used Garmin for almost a year, and my Fenix is the second one due to warranty replacement, but both did a good job for me.

Can your problems be related to other things than to Garmin in general? Poor HRM reading. Too tight? Too loose? Faulty unit?

i think as well, that it should be possible to activate the sleep tracking by hand.

if i go to bed i usually read for a while. the sleep tracking of the fenix 5 starts as soon as i am in bed and read. if it is not possible to recognize sleep automatically one should at least offer the option to start the tracking by hand.

another strange thing is, that my stress level is very high when sleeping - way higher than during the day. this might be normal or another problem of the fenix (or perhaps of my body).

Sleep tracking is patchy at best. If the sleep period is within the limits of what has been set in the profile (for example, normal sleep hours between 11pm and 7am), tracking works, more or less. But it is off as soon as the sleep period deviates (I would say, 50% chance of not tracking sleep at all, or tracking it wrong). I have had at least 10% of my nights not tracked with the remark - "if you want to track sleep movement, wear your fenix to bed" - when of course I was wearing it. I have owned a fitbit surge, and that watch would get it right every single time. With the Garmin, it is hit or miss every time. and indeed I've had the same fenomenon as described by Bandit: I sit down after my "normal sleeping hour" to play a game - and the fenix promptly records it as sleep. The fitbit would never do that. My assessment: very little time/resources was spent on the algorithm to detect sleep, and therefore it only looks for something "sleep like" during the hours manually indicated, but does not do a more in-depth analysis of the recorded data to be able to predict sleep properly. It needs, indeed, either a manual "sleep mode" or much better detection of sleep - ideally both.

I went from Fitbit to Garmin as well and for me sleep tracking usually is spot-on.

Can your problems be related to other things than to Garmin in general? Poor HRM reading. Too tight? Too loose? Faulty unit?

Thanks for your reply Bekkedlen. It's less of a problem with the tracking working or not. I believe it to be working as designed. The bit that bugs me is that the functionality is there more to tick a box on a feature list, rather than a well thought out implementation.

As others pointed it, auto sleep tracking is poor (will start whenever I'm still and its inside the sleep window), the actual data is poor (shows as asleep when I'm laying awake, only shows as light / deep / awake, no sleep alarm, etc). Its a feature which could at least do with a bit of love.

Take a look at these (random first results from google image):

Garmin:

https://i1.wp.com/www.peanutbutterru...king.jpg?ssl=1

Fitbit:

https://racery.com/blog/wp-content/u...59721495-1.png

In addition, my old fitbit was good at auto tracking sleep; if I were to take a nap, it would detect it. It would track just fine on a Saturday night, when I'm up watching a movie where I'd normally be asleep on weekday. The Garmin would set that as asleep.

It would just be nice to know or see if Garmin are going to spend more time on the activity tracking side of the product. I'm sure all the hardwars and sensors are there, just let down by the after thought on the features. Like I say, I really like the actual sports features, but the activity tracking side (Food tracking, sleep, weight etc) are poor. Bit of a pain as it turns from an all-in-one smartwatch/sports tracker/activity tracker which I could wear all day to something I'm going to end up using when at the gym / training, and a fitbit for the rest of the day!

The good news though, is that (i think) its mostly a software thing, so could be massively improved if Garmin chose to do so!

If I remember correctly on Dcrainmaker’s review of Garmin sleep tracking, it was mentioned that it is done server side, after movement info is uploaded.
I also haven’t seen big changes on how my sleep is being recorded, through my various devices. (Even going back to the vivofit)
Garmin should probably update their algorithm, now that all devices have built in hr.

I moved from Fitbit Ionic to Garmin Fenix 5. Generally I find Garmin precision much better across multiple activities including HR. So far Garmin tracks my sleep quite precisely. The only exception in sleep tracking I notice compared to Fitbit is the lack of REM sleep detection.

Thanks for your reply Bekkedlen. It's less of a problem with the tracking working or not. I believe it to be working as designed. The bit that bugs me is that the functionality is there more to tick a box on a feature list, rather than a well thought out implementation.

As others pointed it, auto sleep tracking is poor (will start whenever I'm still and its inside the sleep window), the actual data is poor (shows as asleep when I'm laying awake, only shows as light / deep / awake, no sleep alarm, etc). Its a feature which could at least do with a bit of love.

Exactly.