Wearing a Fitbit on the Ankle: All you need to know

A Fitbit fitness tracker is a versatile piece of equipment that has the potential to change the way you train and analyze your health.

The natural way of wearing your Fitbit is at your wrist, but the combination of plastic and sweat can induce redness and uncomfortable rashes. 

A solution may be you either wear it at your waist with a clip or at your wrist. 

But can it be done, and how? Will the steps tracking still be accurate? Will you lose some or most of the health tracking features?

This is what we will aim at answering in this article. In addition, we will also give you some tips on the best accessories to consider when starting the ankle Fitbit way of life.

What are the pros of wearing your Fitbit on the ankle?

Fitbit technology is accurate and calibrated to be worn on the wrist. You can even define if you are wearing the tracker on your dominant or non-dominant arm to improve the accuracy of the pedometer.

The issue when wearing a fitness tracker on the arm, any fitness tracker, is that the tracking device must move to get an accurate count. Unfortunately, this is not always the case. For example, when pushing a trolley or a pram, mums know that they walk a lot and spend a lot of calories. Hence, as the arms do not balance, the tracker will not detect the movement and count the steps.

Wearing your tracker on the wrist may sort this issue. So even if the detection will be less accurate than when worn on the wrist, the accelerometers will detect some movements and count steps.

Also, if you walk without moving your arms, detection may be impaired and result in an inaccurate overall step count.

What are the cons of wearing your Fitbit on the ankle?

At first, the obvious cons is that Fitbit does not recommend wearing your tracker this way. Hence, if something wrong happens during your workout or while running in the mud, it may void the warranty, which can be a real issue.

Secondly, a Fitbit Tracker is much more than a simple pedometer, and using your device like an ankle tracker will impair if not altogether cancel heartbeat detection. Considering that one of the critical features (at least in our opinion) of the newest Fitbit models, such as the Fitbit Charge or the Fitbit Inspire, is to monitor the heart zones when worn on the ankle, this many interesting metrics will be lost.

For this reason, we do not recommend wearing your device on the ankle while sleeping. Sleep tracking relies on the accelerometer and the heart rate, blood oxygen monitor, and breathing detection. All of these vitals will be lost on the ankle, which will dramatically reduce the value of the sleep tracking feature, which is an evident strength of the Fitbit trackers.

The last downsides of wearing your tracker on your ankle are apparent. First, you will not have access to the screen to check on the information.

How to wear your Fitbit on the ankle? 

As you understood, we recommended wearing your Fitness Tracker the way it has been designed and calibrated, meaning on your wrist. 

If you somehow want to wear it the ankle way, there are, on Amazon, plenty of non-expensive options to do so. The first thing is to unclip the wristband and use an ankle strap accessory.

MoKo Sweatproof Ankle Strap

Last update on 2023-01-14 / Affiliate links / Images from Amazon Product Advertising API

The MoKo Strap is compatible with most of the Fitbit range. Made of neoprene, it is designed to be breathable and hypoallergenic. 

The tracker goes in a small pouch specially designed to protect your tracker. The mesh pocket is 1 1/8 inches wide and 2 5/8 inches in length and the strap adjusts with zinc alloy buttons and fits 8.2″-12.2″ (210mm-310mm) ankle circumference.

Users reported that it was comfortable to use even while swimming or under the bath, even if we genuinely wondered about the benefits of doing so.

Ankle Strap compatible with Fitbit Trackers

Last update on 2023-01-14 / Affiliate links / Images from Amazon Product Advertising API

This ankle strap is highly rated, but numerous customers appreciate its comfort of use. It even offers the possibility to still use the heart tracking feature by turning it upside-down.

Somehow, the tracker needs to be tightly adjusted to avoid sliding out of the band while jogging or cycling.

B-Great Ankle Band with Mesh Pouch

Last update on 2023-01-14 / Affiliate links / Images from Amazon Product Advertising API

The B-Great Ankle Band is compatible with the Fitbit Flex 2, Fitbit One, Fitbit Alta, Fitbit Charge 2 3 4, Fitbit Inspire HR Fitness Tracker. Customers appreciated the overall quality of the product and the fabric.

Adjustable Elastic Strap

Last update on 2023-01-14 / Affiliate links / Images from Amazon Product Advertising API

This strap is compatible with the Fitbit Inspire 2, Inspire and Inspire HR Activity Trackers. It is cleverly designed as contrary to the other models. The tracker will clip directly to the strap. 

By avoiding having to insert the tracker in a pouch, the fit will be more secure. It could even allow maintaining tracking of the heart rate even though, as we repeatedly mentioned, the tracker is not calibrated for use on the ankle.

To wrap up

In this article, we hope that we have convinced you that wearing a Fitbit tracking device on the ankle is not designed to be used.

Somehow, using an Ankle Fitbit strap may be a solution to consider for those with a contact allergy to the Fitbit strap material or not moving their arm entirely while walking.

Always keep in mind that the drawbacks, such as the risk of voiding the warrant or losing the possibility to track health metrics, may outweigh the benefits.

Ultimately, the choice is yours.