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Wrist heart rate monitor WHR inaccurate

Former Member
Former Member over 6 years ago

Anyone else experienced issues with the heart rate inaccuracy? My FR945's HR reading is often higher than actual by 10%-30%. Usually when walking or moving around (e.g. cooking or talking & moving hands). It is disappointing because my $200 Fitbit tracks my heart rate accurately. This is a critical feature, because many other calculations depend on it.

Resetting the sensor (with garmin's support) did not fix it.

  • 0 over 5 years ago

    I think its fine during activities but for 24x7 stuff I get some pretty high figures during rest.  Like 20-40 bpm higher.  Same on my Vivoactive HR, 935, etc.

  • 0 over 5 years ago

    I think its fine during activities but for 24x7 stuff I get some pretty high figures during rest.  Like 20-40 bpm higher.  Same on my Vivoactive HR, 935, etc.

  • 0 over 5 years ago in reply to sekarb

    Mine is also same. I do not know what to do?

    hope that they will solve it.

  • 0 over 5 years ago in reply to GarminMarathoner

    I've never tried it during activities yet, because I use an HRM-Run, but for 24x7 I get the same as you, at least most of the time. Sometimes I will rest and see 50bpm. It's enough that I get up for 5 seconds, and it shoots to 80-90 and sometimes even 100+. The HR reading I get is definitely wrong significantly more than it is right.

  • 0 over 5 years ago

    Finally I had some time to cut these video clips I made.

    What you see is the OHR showing ~100bpm in total rest (albeit in the first 60 minutes after a run, while the HRM-Run is still on), and dropping to 55-65bpm once I enter the widget, forcing the HRM-Run to be used. On the last one the drop is from ~80 to 46. This is a difference of 60-70% (!)

    Except for sleep time (which seems completely correct), and about half the time when laying down and hardly moving, I find the OHR is significantly off much more than it is accurate. 

    (I have tried loosening the watch strap 1,2 and 3 notches, and spent a few hours here and there with the watch on the other wrist - no change registered)

    Former Member, I'd very much appreciate your take on this.

  • 0 over 5 years ago in reply to talsela

    I actually decided to cut some wrist hairs down -  why not? and that definitely seemed to improve accuracy.  Now I generally have 'rest' activities around 50-60 bmp around the house like go upstairs.  No more 100bpm! 

    I've found the activity HR has been better too - found my average HR has dropped like 10-15bpm.  I'm a lifetime athlete but on my 935 and before my average HR would "be" 150-160.   Now its closer to 140 which I think is more realistic and not necessarily because I'm magically more fit or older.  It's super humid out so my HR generally does not get better in those conditions!

  • 0 over 5 years ago in reply to GarminMarathoner

    That's interesting, although I didn't have more wrist hair when I had my FR645M which was showing very plausible OHR most of the time.

  • 0 over 5 years ago in reply to talsela

    Just back from literally the slowest training run I have run in the past year (9m10s pace, 7mi) I was surprised to see the average HR of 130BPM on the 945, since I barely raised a sweat. I took it off and did the old wrist-pulse with a second-hand, and the actual HR was 70bpm while when I put it back on the 945 said 110bpm. I have seen it swing and be inaccurate before, but this is a whole new level of wrong. For comparison I put on my old vivofit HR and it was far closer to reality, though still high - around 78bpm.

    Has there been any recent firmware update that would cause this? I agree with the original poster - even if it's wrong or a bit inconsistent, this level of wackiness substantially reduces the usefulness of the stats from the watch and the app. I'm a bit surprised the high end model is so much worse than the Vivofit that cost 1/4 as much. I'll watch this thread for suggestions. And maybe spring for the chest strap...

  • 0 over 5 years ago in reply to Peter Hand

    Mine has also started reading high on easy runs. 165-170 today. I took it off and put back on and dropped to 130.  It really ruins the usefulness of the stats. I’ve installed latest beta and still no good. Was fine at first. 

  • 0 over 5 years ago in reply to talsela

    That second last video is bizarre - I've never seen HR just drop from 102 -> 59. It almost looks like the HR (or at least the display) is getting stuck at that value, and only refreshes when you enter the widget. I'm on the latest beta (2.64, sensorhub 2.32) and have never seen that behavior - what SW are you on?