Fitbit Ace 2 Makes Health Monitoring Enjoyable For Youngsters And Households
“The Fitbit Ace 2 is a kid-friendly health tracker with enjoyable animations to maintain them hooked.”
Colourful, kid-friendly, and replaceable bands
Animated watch faces
Swim-proof
Motivating targets, badges and trophies
Tracker is liable to falling out of the band
Annoying to change between little one and father or mother view in Fitbit app
Show liable to scratching
There are dozens of health trackers for adults, however just a few for teenagers, particularly ones from established manufacturers like Fitbit. The Ace 2 is right here to fill that hole. It’s $70 and replaces the unique Ace which was praised for its kid-friendly design, however fell brief in some areas like waterproofing. Fitbit has listened and the Ace has an all-new look — with enter from children — in addition to water resistance.
I’ve three children who fall inside the goal ages (6 to 12) for the Ace 2. I allow them to free with the tracker for a couple of weeks to see what works and what doesn’t.
Rugged and replaceable
The Fitbit Ace 2 appears to be like like a children model of the Fitbit Encourage, however they’re two very completely different health trackers. The Ace 2 is a throwback to the times when the Fitbit was a small monitoring unit wedged inside a silicone band. Fitbit selected this standalone tracker design for sturdiness causes; children are robust on and can in all probability tear the strap or break the clasp. When this occurs, it’s useless easy to take away the tracker from the wristband and slide it right into a substitute one. Wristbands can be found from Fitbit in quite a lot of vibrant colours and kid-friendly patterns.
Kelly Hodgkins/Digital Traits
The silicone bands are sturdy, designed with a bumper to guard the fragile show. The bumper helps some, however my children nonetheless managed to scratch the entrance display inside the first month of utilizing the Ace 2. The clasp is made with skinny plastic, nevertheless it’s versatile and will maintain up properly. The bands are sized completely for teenagers 12 and beneath with loads of room for changes to suit a spread of wrist sizes.
Not like older Fitbit items that needed to be faraway from their band to cost, the Ace 2 may be charged whereas it’s contained in the wristband. You solely have to take away the tracker once you need to put it into a brand new band. That’s except, after all, the tracker falls out inadvertently –which it did a number of occasions throughout testing. This led to a frantic hunt round the home or yard to seek out the small black monitoring unit.
More often than not, the tracker fell out when the youngsters have been taking the bands on and off. They usually pressed too laborious on the tracker whereas adjusting the band, and it might pop proper out. Not the neatest design.
Child-friendly animations
The Fitbit Ace 2 borrows closely from the Fitbit Encourage. Each gadgets use an analogous touch-screen OLED show and there’s a single bodily button for interplay. The Ace 2 interface is pushed by a customizable clock face and information screens that youngsters can scroll by means of by swiping up and down and tapping to pick out them. Identical to the Fitbit Encourage, the aspect button can be utilized to entry the short settings menu, the place you’ll be able to verify the battery, activate/off notifications, and extra.
The Fitbit Ace 2’s daring colours and animated watch faces will attraction to children.
The clock face is the touchdown display and may be modified inside the Fitbit app. Youngsters can select between quite a lot of clock faces starting from a primary analog watch face to animated faces that change as kids make progress in the direction of their step purpose.
The animated plant and rocket ship have been favorites between my two boys. A rising plant or a shifting rocket ship was way more significant to them than an rising quantity, and so they beloved the celebration on the display when a health or sleep purpose was reached.
Motivating and rewarding health monitoring
The Fitbit Ace 2 doesn’t have a coronary heart fee monitor or GPS, so health monitoring is restricted to step rely and energetic minutes. It’s a child’s health tracker, so any extra metrics can be overkill. The Fitbit app robotically selects targets for exercise (step rely, energetic minutes, and hourly exercise) and train (1-7 days of coaching) however you’ll be able to change these values within the app to replicate your little one’s health stage.
It’s primary, however that doesn’t imply it’s inaccurate. The Fitbit Ace 2 precisely measured each step counts and energetic minutes. I by no means as soon as noticed a lot discrepancy between exercise stage and the step rely or energetic minutes. My children even wore their trackers on a couple of long-distance hikes, and we in contrast step counts on the finish of the day. Their step counts have been nearly twice as excessive as mine, however their stride size is wildly completely different, which explains the distinction.
Kelly Hodgkins/Digital Traits
I appreciated the swim-proof design that allowed my children to go from the climbing path to the swimming gap with no need to take off the tracker.
Fitbit needs to encourage children to be energetic, so it’s not stunning the Ace 2 is likely one of the most rewarding gadgets we’ve used. There are purpose celebrations when a each day purpose is met and badges which might be awarded when your little one reaches a milestone. Youngsters can also be part of challenges and invite family and friends to take part. Challenges inspire children to maneuver and promote pleasant competitors amongst members. The winner of every problem earns a trophy that’s added to their profile within the Fitbit app.
Sleep monitoring
As a result of it doesn’t have a coronary heart fee monitor, sleep monitoring on the Ace is 2 primary. It robotically detects when your little one goes to mattress and once they get up. It calculates how lengthy they’ve slept and the way lengthy they’re stressed or awake through the night time. All of this info is distributed to the Fitbit app the place you or your little one can view it.
You should utilize the Ace to assist enhance your little one’s sleep by setting a sleep purpose. By default, it’s set to 9 hours, however you’ll be able to change it. Identical to step targets, kids might be rewarded once they attain their sleep purpose. You’ll be able to set a bedtime reminder to assist your children hold a constant bedtime. You can also set a vibrating alarm to wake them within the morning if wanted.
The alarm just isn’t designed particularly for sleep — there isn’t any sensible sleep part that detects the most effective time to wake you up — however you’ll be able to nonetheless use it to softly awaken your little one. The vibration is tender so it is best to take a look at it first. It woke one in every of my kids persistently, however not the opposite who slept proper by means of the buzzing.
The Fitbit expertise till you need to swap
The Fitbit Ace 2 syncs to the Fitbit app on iOS or Android. Although I like the Fitbit interface and its ease of use, the Ace 2 expertise isn’t enjoyable. The Ace 2 works finest when it’s paired together with your little one’s cellphone and never yours. In case your little one has a cellphone, they will configure the tracker and monitor their progress utilizing a kid-friendly interface. This “Child View” is a simplified model of the Fitbit interface that exhibits stats and badges with restricted social options.
My greatest gripe is switching between child and father or mother view — you need to enter your Fitbit password every time.
Youngsters can change their clock faces and select and avatars, however for security causes they will solely join with parent-approved associates. In addition they can ship messages to associates in addition to cheer and taunt them, in a pleasant manner.
However not each little one beneath 12 has a cellphone, and that’s the place issues come up. Once I first arrange the Ace 2, I used to be logged into the father or mother account, and the system was connected to my account. You need to create a child’s account, log into the kid profile, after which pair the system, so it’s assigned to the kid’s account and never yours. If a father or mother makes use of their smartphone to sync the Ace 2, then they must swap between the father or mother view and the child view. The issue is each time you turn again to the father or mother view, you need to re-enter your Fitbit password, which is a irritating inconvenience.
Restricted notifications
Like most Fitbit gadgets, the Ace 2 is supplied with Bluetooth to sync to a cell phone or pill. The tracker syncs all through the day if you happen to allow all-day sync. In any other case, it would sync robotically every time you open the Fitbit app in child view mode. More often than not, syncing was dependable, however we did must restart the system a couple of occasions to get it to sync.
The Ace 2 helps notifications, and it points mild vibrations so children are conscious. Youngsters can obtain notifications from the Fitbit app, together with low battery alerts, new badges, and extra. If they’ve their very own cellphone, your little one can see incoming cellphone calls on their tracker, however they can not obtain texts or third-party app notifications. Youngsters can flip off cellphone notifications utilizing the short setting menu on the Ace 2 or inside the Fitbit app.
Kelly Hodgkins/Digital Traits
As a result of it’s a children system, Fitbit doesn’t encourage social sharing from the system. The system will sync to the Fitbit app on most iOS and Android gadgets, however that’s so far as it would go. Not like Fitbit’s grownup trackers that ship information to Strava and different companies, information will keep inside the Fitbit app. Like the unique Ace, the Ace 2 is compliant with all little one privateness legal guidelines.
The Fitbit Ace 2 doesn’t embrace GPS or navigation options. You can’t observe the situation of your little one whereas she or he is sporting the system, nor can you employ location to seek out the system whether it is misplaced.
Battery life
The Ace 2 has a promised 5 days of battery life, and I discovered the estimate to be near real-world use, however not precisely 5 days.
My children most well-liked the animated shows, so battery life was usually three to 4 days. Nonetheless, the encouragement they acquired from the animations was definitely worth the tradeoff.
Value, availability, and guarantee info
The Fitbit Ace 2 prices $70 and is offered for buy now.
Fitbit covers defects in supplies and workmanship beneath regular use for one yr after buy.
The Fitbit Ace 2 just isn’t a rebranded grownup tracker. Its daring colours and animated watch faces will attraction to children, and oldsters will admire the flexibility to trace their child’s health, in addition to the privateness controls that assist hold their children protected. My greatest gripe is switching between child and father or mother view within the Fitbit app, which is an pointless trouble.
Is there a greater various?
The Fitbit Ace 2 is right for fogeys who already personal a Fitbit system, however in case you are coming from one other platform, there are equally worthy decisions. The highest competitor to the Fitbit Ace 2 is the Garmin Vivofit Jr 2.
The Ace 2 and the Vivofit Jr 2 each price $70, and each have a sturdy, kid-friendly designs that youngsters will get pleasure from sporting. Essentially the most vital distinction between the 2 trackers is battery life. Whereas the Ace 2 has a chargeable battery that lasts for as much as 5 days, the VivoFit Jr 2 doesn’t require charging as a result of the battery lasts for a yr. As soon as the battery is useless, the Vivofit Jr 2 battery may be changed. The display can also be completely tiny on the Garmin, which is why the battery can final as lengthy.
How lengthy will it final?
Fitbit designed the Ace 2 with longevity in thoughts, and I count on the tracker to final for 2 years beneath common use. If a wristband fails or a clasp breaks, mother and father can simply take away the monitoring unit and match it right into a substitute band.
One problem is the show, which is liable to scratching. The wristband has a bumper that protects the display from most, however not all, scuffs and scrapes. Relying on the kid and their actions, the lifespan for the system may very well be lower than two years.
Must you purchase it?
Sure. The father or mother who needs a health tracker for his or her children and already owns a Fitbit system ought to put the Fitbit Ace 2 on the high of their record.
