Bike Riding Counting as Steps

Why would you not want it to count steps? 

I don't understand why you wouldn't want it to count steps. To me bike cadence and running or walking cadence is on and the same. In fact, you burn way more calories on a bike in the same amount of time as walking or running. 

Mine is counting a lot less steps when I cycle. It's a bit annoying as when I cycle to work, I never reach my 10k step goal. When I would walk the 3km, I'd reach it probably every day... I think, the "activity bar" of Polar is a bit nicer for that reason, but ya... Personally I can live with it, for me there are worse things with Garmin watches that this one...

This is probably not pertinent 8 months on, but in a year of ownership I have never had steps register during cycling activity regardless of whether I am recording or not.

Did any software updates fix your problem?

“Steps” is just a surrogate for work done. Your Fenix records HR, speed, distance traveled and time in specific HR Zones, as well as total time. It can also record power with appropriate input. Calculating or equating this work done to steps should not be a difficult proposition. Fitbit does it quite nicely. Being a “quiet, aero rider is irrelevant for all intents and purposes to the calculation of work done. Garmin needs to figure out how to convert other activity to “steps” ( since that’s what our employers are using to record and measure our “healthy” lifestyles).

After now 5 months with the F5+ and some bumpy rides with my Cyclocross bike, I observe that only very few steps are counted during the ride, less than my previous Fenix 3 did. So the software really has improved, which I think is quite impressive as the accellerometer has to differentiate beween steps ans bumps! Even on the Fenix 3 the numbers were low and as I am interested in tracking my sports and not my dog-walks (dog is unfortunately too old for running), I do not care about a few additional steps.

Please!  I wouldn’t have bought the Garmond as a replacement for my Fitbit if I knew it was going to do this.  I do  lot of biking and now I am losing $500 a year on my health insurance because the Garmond doesn’t convert my biking activity to steps.  

If you want a device that counts everything as steps then you should not buy "Garmond" - you should go for a 20 bucks tracker and you can brush teeth, drive car, ride a horse… and you will get a big refund from your insurance!