Fitbit Inspire 2 Review: Hands-Off Tracking in a Slim Band

Once it's fastened, the Fitbit Inspire 2 does most of its work with nothing pressed. It counts steps and follows heart rate all day, then logs the night's sleep unprompted. Its screen needs a tap, and it is hard to read in bright sun. Once the free year of Premium ends, its deeper analysis becomes a subscription question. On a budget band, the unattended tracking still carries the purchase.

Durability varies by unit. A minority fail outright within months, with a dead battery or a blank screen. Plenty of others run for three years or more.

Everything the Fitbit Inspire 2 counts on its own

Steady walking is what it counts best. On an ordinary walk, the count stays close to the real number. Distance, hourly activity and calories join the steps on Fitbit's list, and the band shows each running total. Arm movement, however, is where the count drifts. Busy hands can add steps with no walking at all, and so can a long or bumpy drive. Steps taken with still arms, in contrast, can slip through uncounted. The daily total is best read as a good estimate that leans generous.

Heart rate is the most dependable of its numbers. At rest and on an easy walk, the Fitbit Inspire 2 tracks heart rate accurately. It sorts effort into fat-burn, cardio and peak zones, which makes a walk's intensity easy to read. Resting heart rate, which Fitbit tracks around the clock, then becomes a useful trend in the app over weeks. When effort rises or falls quickly, however, the reading can lag behind the real pulse. Placement matters too, since a band too close to the hand or too far up the arm can miss readings.

Fitbit pitches the 24/7 heart rate as a means to better measure calorie burn. Even so, daily calorie totals on the Fitbit Inspire 2 tend to run high, so they work best as a rough guide. Active Zone Minutes build toward the weekly 150 minutes of heart-pumping activity that Fitbit sets as the target. They can work as a motivator, though at times they credit a quiet moment and miss a real effort.

What it notices overnight

Sleep logging starts by itself. Worn to bed, the Fitbit Inspire 2 splits the night into light, deep and REM sleep. Fitbit then turns each night into a Sleep Score for the morning. It also shows the time spent awake during the night. It catches waking well, both in the small hours and in the morning. As a record of how nights trend over weeks, the sleep log is among the band's best features.

Its sense of when sleep began is less sure. A long spell of sitting still can log as sleep, while the recorded bedtime sometimes lands late. Some nights go unrecorded altogether. For this reason, single nights count for less than the pattern across a week or two.

Light and slim, the band is simple to sleep in once the fit is right. An arm moved in the night can light the screen, though a bedtime setting keeps it dark.

Anything it sends to the wrist

Call, text and calendar alerts arrive as a buzz. App notifications can join them, shown on the band while the phone is nearby. Short texts read easily on the small screen, and the app decides which alerts reach the wrist. A Do Not Disturb mode on the band silences all of it at once. The buzz itself is gentle, though, so a call can occasionally slip by unnoticed.

It nudges you to move when an hour passes with too few steps. The app can switch those reminders off. Goal celebrations, badges and challenges keep the motivation up. Mornings can start with its silent alarm, a buzz on the wrist.

Not every buzz is welcome, however. A squeeze on both sides of the Fitbit Inspire 2 wakes the screen or returns it to the clock. Those sides also register a hand bent back against them, with a buzz to match. Worn in the wrong spot, that can add up to a good deal of stray buzzing over a day. Wearing the band a little higher up the arm and a notch looser stops most of it. Then a setting that ignores the sides until the screen is awake cuts it further.

What waits for a tap or a start

The screen stays dark until something wakes it. Raising the wrist does the job some of the time, while a tap or a squeeze of the sides is surer. Indoors, the display is clear, and a tap cycles the figure under the clock through steps, heart rate and calories. The app also holds a choice of clock faces.

Bright sun washes it out. The type is small, which makes it hard going for weaker eyes. In addition, some units stay dim and hard to read even indoors. Touch response is uneven too, since some taps go unregistered while stray brushes count. The screen scuffs easily, so a protector fitted on day one is a sensible extra.

Water Lock is the fussiest control on this fitness tracker, and it matters in the shower and the pool. It can switch itself on unasked, and leaving it takes two firm taps on the screen. Getting that double tap right can take several tries, especially with a light touch. The band itself keeps working through swims and showers.

Some workouts start by themselves. It picks up a walk, for example, or another sustained session, and logs it in the app. Auto-detection misses some sessions, however, and mislabels others. Starting a session by hand gives the cleaner record, and Fitbit lists 20+ exercise modes to pick from. The app decides which handful of them appear on the band.

During a session, a bent wrist can press pause as well, and a lock setting guards against that. For a walk or run, the Fitbit Inspire 2 borrows the phone's GPS. The band also carries a Relax session for slow, paced breathing, along with a timer and a stopwatch.

Whatever needs a charger and a phone

A charge lasts about a week in everyday wear. Fitbit quotes 10 days, noting that the figure varies with use. Some units get close to that or run past it. Others manage only three to five days, however. A low battery brings a warning on the wrist and by email.

Topping it back up doesn't take long. The charging clip can take some fiddling to seat properly. It's wise to check that charging has begun before walking away.

Setup is quick, and it runs through the Fitbit app on a phone or tablet. From then on, the app wants Bluetooth on to sync, and on some phones it drains the battery faster. A single morning sync, with Bluetooth off in between, spares the phone's battery, though alerts then stop reaching the wrist. Meanwhile, the band keeps logging and hands everything over at the next sync. The app lays the numbers out in clear graphs. It also logs food and water, with a barcode scanner for packaged food. Weight goes into the app by hand, and one of the band's screens can show it. Cycle tracking sits in the app as well.

All the band asks of the wrist

The stock band fits slim wrists. Its case and band don't always lie flat, however, and can leave a gap against the skin. The case is light enough to forget about through the day. Fitbit packs small and large bands, so bigger wrists have an option too. On some wrists, though, it irritates the skin, especially after sweat or with a tight fit. A notch looser, a clean dry band and the other wrist now and then usually settle it.

A fabric or other softer band has settled it on some wrists. The swap itself is fiddly, because each band hangs on tiny pins that take nimble fingers.

The weakest point is the plastic where the band pins into the case. On some units it cracks or wears through, sometimes inside the first year and sometimes after two. The Fitbit Inspire 2 keeps working after that, yet the case has nothing left to hold a band. Warranty help can be hard to get when one fails, so I'd keep the receipt from the first day.

What costs extra after the first year

A year of Premium comes with the band. It adds guided workouts, meditation audio and deeper sleep analysis. Membership also unlocks the Daily Readiness Score, which Fitbit pitches as a daily call between exercise and recovery. The calming audio and short workout videos are the strongest parts of that library. The step and heart rate tracking works without it. After the free year, membership turns into a monthly or yearly subscription.

Fitbit's software now sits under Google. Since the move, the app has dropped some features it once had. That makes the app worth a close look before the first payment falls due. I'd treat the Premium year as a bonus and judge the Fitbit Inspire 2 on what it does without it.

Pros: What we liked

• Pro: Steps, heart rate and sleep log themselves around the clock, with nothing to press
• Pro: Tracks heart rate accurately at rest and on easy walks, with resting-rate trends over weeks
• Pro: Light, deep and REM sleep stages plus a nightly Sleep Score make the sleep log a real strength
• Pro: About a week per charge in everyday wear, and a quick top-up
• Pro: A slim, light build that disappears on the wrist, with small and large bands in the box

Cons: What could be better

• Con: The small screen washes out in bright sun, and some units run dim even indoors
• Con: The sides can read a bent wrist as a press and buzz until the band sits higher or a lock setting is on
• Con: Busy hands and bumpy drives add steps, and daily calorie totals run high
• Con: The stock band irritates some wrists, and the plastic band joint cracks on some units
• Con: Deeper analysis becomes a paid subscription after the free Premium year, and the app has dropped features since moving under Google

Specification	Details
Heart rate	24/7, including resting heart rate
Battery life	10 days per Fitbit; varies with use and other factors
Water resistance	Swimproof, water resistant to 50 meters
Sleep tracking	Light, deep and REM sleep, with a nightly Sleep Score
Exercise modes	20+
All-day activity	Steps, distance, hourly activity, calories burned and Active Zone Minutes
Notifications	Call, text, calendar and smartphone app notifications when the phone is nearby
Bands	Small and large included, black
Premium	1-year membership included for new and returning Premium members; activate within 60 days of device activation
Listed size and weight	1.47 x 0.66 x 0.51 inches; 0.07 pounds

Final Verdict

Its walking step count, its resting heart rate and its sleep trends are all worth having, and each arrives without a tap.

I trust the band joint least, since a crack there retires a tracker whose sensors still work. Its unattended tracking makes it a good budget band, and uneven durability is why my verdict goes no higher.