If you want the most advanced Fitbit experience to track your fitness journey in the most detail, a Fitbit Premium account can help you do that. It costs $49.99, per year, so is it worth it for you?
What is it?
Maxed out the standard Fitbit functions and are ready to kick your training up a level? Or maybe you're starting out and want the most detailed tracking information to help you chart your improvements. Either way, Fitbit Premium could be the way to go.
Upgrading to Fitbit Premium is like having a personal trainer, a nutritionist, and a sleep consultant cheering you on! It is a paid service, costing $49.99, per year, which gives you access to a digital trainer, advanced tracking information, personalized coaching tips, and more.
What's the difference?
A lot of the features in Fitbit Premium are the same as what you'll find in the free Fitbit dashboard, just with much more detail. You can add more photos to your Fitbit profile with a premium membership, but the main differences with Fitbit Premium comes from accessing the Fitbit digital trainer, detailed activity reporting, and a fancy Fitbit Premium icon on your account.
Fitbit Trainer
The Fitbit Trainer is available with a premium membership and will customize a 12-week exercise regime that will push you to gradually increase your fitness level. The trainer will look at your current stats, compare that with your goal stats, and figure out what you need to do each day and week to close the gap between you and your fitness goals.
This will come to you in the form of a daily activity score you reach by doing various activities. You'll see your daily scores mapped in your Fitbit dashboard over the course of 12 weeks. At the end of that time-span, you can set a new goal with your digital trainer.
Detailed Reports
The Fitbit dashboard is generally pretty great for tracking your daily activities and viewing your fitness history, but Fitbit Premium really digs deep to show you more information that can help your overall fitness plan.
Food Report: Analyzes your calorie intake, grouping your foods into categories like fat, carbs, and protein which are displayed in a pie chart. The food report will also show how many calories are coming from each meal and will provide tips to help you eat in line with your fitness goals. It will also list your top 10 most eaten foods (hopefully you see more apples and avocados than cheeseburgers and fries).
Activity Report: Shows you detailed information about your weekly exercises and active minutes flagging trends in your lifestyle (example, Wednesday you consistently exceed your activity goal, but overall your weekday morning activity is low). These reports can be helpful in showing you where you need to tweak your habits to move toward your goals faster. You can also rank yourself against other Fitbit users using the premium benchmarking feature, displaying your activity in a graph against other people's activity, sleep, and weight.
Sleep Report: Tracks your sleep habits and displays this information in an easy-to-understand graph. You can flag sleep trends to identifying how much sleep you're getting compared to recommended amount. Sleep time is displayed to the minute and the report indicates how much more or less sleep you should get to align with your sleep goals.
Is it worth it?
If you don't already review your logged Fitbit activity info in the free Fitbit dashboard, then upgrading to Fitbit Premium isn't going to do anything for you.
The detailed information is extremely helpful if you want to analyze your current fitness activity and figure out what you need to adjust to improve your habits. If you're not disciplined with logging your activities and goals and reviewing your results daily, then there's no point in upgrading to the premium account because the information is only helpful if you use it.
Fitbit Premium is best for users who have already embraced their Fitbit and the information it tracks as a crucial part of their lifestyle. If you're on the fence or really curious to see if Fitbit Premium is right for you, you can sign up for a free seven-day trial and test it out!
