The Use of Fitness Trackers: An Evaluation of Benefits and Drawbacks

This essay delves into the world of fitness trackers, examining their benefits and potential dangers. It highlights the growing popularity of these devices, such as FitBit and Mi Band, which are used to monitor fitness metrics like steps taken, distance covered, and calories burned. The essay addresses the risks associated with location tracking and the potential for misleading calorie counts, as well as health issues arising from constant wear. It provides a comparative analysis of FitBit and Mi Band, outlining their respective advantages and disadvantages, such as tracking accuracy, discreetness, water resistance, sleep monitoring, and battery life. Ultimately, the essay argues that the benefits of these devices generally outweigh the dangers, provided they are used responsibly and users are aware of potential health hazards. Desklib provides access to a wealth of similar essays and study resources for students.

Running head: FITNESS TRACKER
FITNESS TRACKER
Name of the student:
Name of the university:
Author note:

1FITNESS TRACKER
The activity tracker which is also known as fitness tracker. (de Zambotti et al., 2015). It is
a device or an application which is used for the tracking and observing some metrics which is
related to fitness such as the distance that is walked or run, amount of calories that is consumed.
The dangers of using the trackers that track location are:
 The calorie count that the fitness tracker shows can be sometimes misleading which is
harmful for the person wearing the fitness tracker.
 There can be health related issues due to constant wearing of the fitness tracker. The common
health hazards for wearing fitness tracker are heart related issues.
The two different apps and devices can be Fit Bit which is an application and the devices chosen
for the essay is Mi band.
The advantages of Fit Bit are:
 The Fit Bit app is best for cyclists and runners because it records the training which helps to
improve.
 It acts as a motivator by tracking the fitness and activity that is done every day.
 The best feature about the app is that nutrition can be tracked using it.
The disadvantages of Fit Bit are:
 The steps are incorrectly tracked
 It is not very discrete
 It should be connected to a Smartphone or computer
The advantages of Mi Band are:

2FITNESS TRACKER
 The mi Band is elegant and water resistant.
 It can track sleep and measure the heart rate.
 It can be synced with the notification of the phone.
The Disadvantages of Mi Band are:
 The mi Band is sensitive to touch and its display is not good outside
 It is does not have a good accuracy of tracking.
 The battery of Mi band is not good and it lasts for 2-3 days.
The benefits of the devices outweigh the dangers because the advantages are more than
the disadvantages. There are few disadvantages which are related to the battery and touch of the
fitness band but the advantages are more like the band is water resistant and it looks good. It
measures the hours of sleep and the heart beat (Kaewkannate & Kim 2016). The best advantage
is that it can be synced with phone and the notification is received. Sometimes it is not very
accurate but most times it gives accurate results and the problem with fitness tracker is that it
causes health hazard. So it should not be worn always.

3FITNESS TRACKER
References
de Zambotti, M., Claudatos, S., Inkelis, S., Colrain, I. M., & Baker, F. C. (2015). Evaluation of a
consumer fitness-tracking device to assess sleep in adults. Chronobiology
international, 32(7), 1024-1028.
Kaewkannate, K., & Kim, S. (2016). A comparison of wearable fitness devices. BMC public
health, 16(1), 433.