Hi friends. Today I bring to you a review on a great little gadget that I was introduced by a program at my husband's work. This device has been around for a while now, but maybe like me, you hadn't heard of it before and I thought I would share in case it raises interest in you guys as it did with me.

What is it?
This little gadget is called a Fitbit zip. Fitbit has developed several types of activity tracking gadgets that can help you take control of your well-being and stay fit. It comes in different colors: Blue, Black, White, Fiusha, and Green. It requires a battery that is included in the packet, and it is my understanding that it lasts up to about 6 months.



Why have one?
Sometimes staying in shape is really hard. Sometimes eating better, and exercise is not enough, specially when you are in a hurry all the time with work and the never-ending home chores. Sometimes it is hard to keep up with everything you have to do and then remember what to eat and what not to eat. How much you exercised or if you are even willing to exercise when you realize you are exhausted from your daily routine.  Well, this gadget is great for that, because even if you are running around doing errands, or cleaning the house, or just at your work place, it will count your steps and it may count as exercise all along, so in that matter you just have to balance it out with maybe some meditation to relieve the stress, and a better way of handling what you eat. If you want to know why I decided to start with the use of the fitbit zip read the story here.

What it does:

• It counts your steps
• It calculates distance
• It calculates calories burned
• It tells you the time
• and it also makes you faces, yes I said faces. If you are on track it gives you a happy face. If you slowed your rhythm, it will stick it's tongue out at you. For me, this is quite motivating.

It connects via wireless. This allows you to stay connected and to keep up to date data of what I have mentioned above so you can keep your goals without over-passing your calories nor over-exercising if it is not in your goals.

You can use the support of the new technologies such as your PC or a laptop, and you can also use your mobile devices to keep on track. In order to use all these tools together, you download an app into your device and that would synchronize your tracked information and link it to your account automatically after you set it up. Then all you have to do is go online and check your information and log in your food and water intake.

On their website, they have a dashboard where you can keep track of your total calories, steps, and distance covered not only daily but weekly too. You can manage your settings to see what you want related to your goals. To me it is a very fun way to know what you are up to in your daily basis and become your own personal trainer. It also has a section where you can log what you ate for breakfast, lunch, dinner or as snacks. There you can choose from the different food options that they already have in their memory so you don't have to struggle with the number of calories, but in case that what you are eating is not in their system, you can log it as new food and add the amount of serving vs calories per serving. I have enjoyed this very much because I had no idea of how to calculate or manage calories and this has made it very easy. Your food usually tells you in the back of the label as well how many calories per how many servings and the rest is simple math. I have found that there are other websites that are very useful to calculate what you are eating too, in case your packet does not tell you. (Example: I bought a peach at a farmer's market. I had no idea how many calories it was, so I checked here and that helped a lot. Then I just added it to my dashboard and it is saved for the future.) The dashboard also remembers food that you often log, so it keeps it at hand for an easier and faster future entry. I also found it very handy to be able to calculate how much water I drink. I tend to have migraines because I get dehydrated, and with the log in of my water intake, I can see how much I've drank in a day, and how much I still need to drink. Let's face it, we don't usually drink the water intake we really need, and this is just fantastic to be able to track. You can also change the settings on this, so if a doctor is telling you for whatever reasons you need this much water to take, you can set it up to that amount and then just keep track of it. I think this is fantastic, and one of my favorite features.


Another great feature that is offered through the dashboard is the ability to track your lost weight. You can set your goals of how much weight you want to loose, and it will tell you how many calories and how much activity you require per the time frame you gave yourself to loose that weight. I thought this was very useful to know how active you must be and keep up with your goals.

Price: Since I bought it in January, until the date (July 13th 2014) it has stayed pretty much the same. It values at $59.95 usd directly in the fitbit website, and right now they have the "free shipping" offer. (Price may vary at the time of purchase, and may or may not include local taxes, or shipping rate. Just be aware of that. The price described here is not guaranteed. It may change by the time you purchase.)

MY OPINION

Likes: I like that it is small and practical. That it truly keeps track of the calories and steps I take so I can take control over how active or not active I am and be able to reach my goals to stay fit. I liked the variety of colors. I like that we only have to use 1 of the USB antenna/devices to have it pick up and update both my husband's fitbit zip and mine. I really get excited every time I log into my dashboard to see how I am doing. It is colorful, very easy to use, and you can change the tiles as you please according to your needs and what your goals are. I like that it is not bulky nor heavy. The design is very simple and very effective. I like that sometimes it updates the information by itself and I don't really have to log in to do it myself, I just need to be close to the USB and that's it. I really enjoyed the way the food and water log in was designed. It makes it really easy to track your calories and also to calculate how many calories you are still allowed to eat. I loved that it calculates for you how much you need to be working on in order to loose the weight you want to loose if that is your goal.

Dislikes: One of the main things I didn't like is that somehow it tends to come out from the clip and you can easily loose it. My husband lost his first fitbit zip a month after he got it. He saw the clip on, but the device itself was gone. I thought that maybe it was a random thing, but 2 weeks after I had mine, it fell too. The good thing is that I was inside the house and I found it, but my husband wasn't that lucky and he had to buy another one. Why buy another one? We really love this fit-tracking gadget. I know they are not way cheap but they are definitely worth it. However I did find out through the local lost and found classifieds that this has happened to a lot of other people. Another feature I didn't like is that it shows you a symbol that looks like you are running out of battery when it only wants to update. You see, in mine I have not seen that symbol at all, but since my husband got his, he has gotten it twice thinking it was the battery and that was disappointing since the battery is supposed to last 6 months at least, and this had popped up in a time frame of 3 months, both times. I would had preferred maybe a different symbol for the "update" warning, because it can get confusing and you might end up thinking that the device is defective, and you spend on something you yet didn't need.
So if you see the "low on battery" symbol, first update your fitbit zip before you run off to buy a new battery, because maybe you don't need to buy one just yet.
Another thing that wasn't very appealing was the fact that it needs a battery. I do understand it has been like that for a long time in the past, but most of the new technologies and devices don't use them anymore. Now at days you usually charge them by connecting them to your computer through a USB port, so honestly it had been long since I had to worry about buying batteries to anything other than a watch.

Suggestion: I usually don't add this section but I guess I will here because I had a dilemma. My husband's first fitbit was lime green. Then he got mine and I chose blue because it is my favorite color. When he lost his green fitbit, he went for blue too because it is also his favorite color and we had to figure out a way to differentiate his from mine. My solution was to paint some nail-polish on mine so we know it's mine, but obviously it doesn't look that great. I think if we had the ability to choose a different clip from the color of the device, that would had been great and I wouldn't have had to visually mess mine up, lol. Like let's say; I would had chosen the fiusha device with the blue clip. That would had looked great, and matched my workout outfit. It does not have to be this way, but it is just a suggestion because it would make it fun, and won't cause confusion when you have more than one people in your household using them. I had this problem with my brother all our lives and I just don't like getting confused with my stuff in that way. I think that being able to personalize it in such a simple way is a great way to continue with the fact that everything else is so personalized too. Also, if the clip could be redesigned in a way that it does not allow the gadget from falling off, that would be awesome. My solution was to place the gadget inwards so if it falls at least it falls inside our pocket, or work-out top.


Conclusion: Despite the not very fun experience my husband had of loosing his first fitbit zip, we found a solution which was as I mentioned; to use the gadget inwards so if it falls, it falls on you inside your clothes. Why he got another one? Even if they are not that cheap they are truly worth it. I thought this was the best little every-day gadget invented after the cellphone. Handling our weight has always been troublesome and if you consider that most of the population in the USA as well as in other countries have an overweight problem, you will realize that it is because staying in shape is not that easy in certain countries where fast food is everywhere and stress levels in our lifestyles are just rising. So either you are looking to have a more fit lifestyle, stay in shape, follow doctor's orders, loose weight, or just for fun, this is a great activity-tracking gadget to invest on. To get your own, you can go to their website here: http://www.fitbit.com/home