Coming from Fitbit to Watch3: Where's the total burned calorie count (also the non-excerise ones) ?

[SonicUth70]

Hi all. I Just got my Galaxy Watch 3 yesterday and trying to find my way through all the options and statistics. Overall my impression is quite positive and one of my major goals is to loose and control weight.

However there's one MAJOR thing that I cannot seem to find, neither on the watch nor on the Samsung Health app (on Iphone IOS though). And that is the amount of total calories I have burned during the day. I can see that calories are tracked per activity bases and also during sleep but the sum of all calories is not visible. We do burn calories, even if we're not doing "anything". So far I guess that the calories of the recorded (and auto-detected activities) are most likely captured and shown but what about your overall burned calories? To me this seem extremely useful if one would keep a healthy balance.

To only focus on calories burned when one if active does not seem logic to me. After all insight in the total picture (total burned vs consumed) is the most accurate way to make some decisions. Another illogical thing I noticed is that the steps (and calories going with that) are tracked both from the mobile phone and the watch. In the overview, this can be viewed separately which is well-thought I guess. I am trying to find out how to turn off the addition of the step-count of my phone's moves because this leads to duplication in the number of steps. But more disturbingly I noticed that the calories of both devices step counts are summed up in the total calories. So if one would walk with the watch and phone, one would bet a "bonus" duplication of those calories 🙂 So this really does not make sense but if I can figure out how to disable the addition of those step counts of my phone, it would okay for me.

I have read some disturbing messages that Samsung has removed this statistic quite recently so I wonder if it's true and what the logic behind this is? In my opinion, this is one the most basic functions an activity tracker should have. On the Fitbit, the stats even compared the burned vs the intake of calories. The reason I moved away from the Fitbit platform is the incredibly cheap and crappy hardware (it really breaks every 4 months or so) but I really like their simplicity in terms of statistics and analysis. It's well focuses on the purpose of having an activity tracker/watch.

Do you know if there's a way to get insight information on the total calories burned and if not, what reasoning and logic lead to Samsung's decision to remove this option? As much as I really like the watch, this would be huge disappointment that would even let me consider to return the watch while I can. Going back to the Fitbit is not an option because of their crappy hardware but I will consider maybe other brands that would have this calorie tracking information.

Thanks!

[SonicUth70]

Hi, having used the Watch for a couple of weeks now, I can say that my only issue is how those calorie dashboards are organized. That is somewhat confusing as it's different on the Watch than the app on your phone (IOS that is).

But in terms of accuracy, I would not necessarily go back to the Fitbit. There's is a fundamental  difference in approach  between the two watches if you're interested in burning extra calories. There where the Fitbit is collecting your entire burned calories as one "entity", the Samsung watch tends to put focus on the extra amount activity that you would do (like training but also non sedentary activity). That extra amount of activity is diversified in that like doing some cooking in the kitchen lets you relatively burn less calories than you would do when doing a "real" workout. The basic amount of calories one would need, is taken as a fact. So they don't add that up in their to focus goals. Like in my case, male, I would need 2500 calories regardless. That figure is not embedded in any of those total goals you define. Instead, you would for example be able to set a target calorie goal and it would be credited if you actually become active. I have set a goal for example of 1000 calories for those type of additional activities and achieve that by biking, running or whatever.

My issue with the Fitbit in hindsight is that even for those low-level activities, you would get "massive" amount of credit returned in your overall calories burned. I had days where I was standing in the kitchen and doing basic cooking and I would end up having burned 4500 - 5000 calories. And I did not even spend one minute of a real work-out. To me that is misleading if you for example would like to loose weight. I would rather be focusing on the additional stuff I need to pay-attention to, than to look at my total calories count. In that respect the Fitbit burned calorie algorithms are set way too optimistic, even at the level that it can mislead you in your endeavor to loose weight for example.

Now where Samsung can definitely improve is to make this principle of approach better to be understood. Although generally I like their dashboards and overviews, the part where there's improvement needed is wight management linked to the daily goals. Another thing is that level of info on the watch itself is not really in line with the app. I wish for example that they could synchronize the goal overview on the watch (where you get the colored rainbow hearts for a day) with the Samsung Health app.

My personal experience with the Fitbit products is especially bad because of their hardware quality. I have seldom seen such a bad and cheap endurance from this kind of hardware, it seems almost to be designed to break every 6 months or so. If the Samsung Watch 3 is going to last longer, future will tell as I only have it for 1,5 months now.