What is FitBitAria?
The FitBit Aria is a bathroom weighing scales that connects to your home internet connection (via WiFi) to send your daily weigh in data to FitBit.
FitBit then syncs that data with an app on your phone/tablet so you have a readily available history of your weight and body fat percentage.
FitBit Aria setup
Setup was fairly painless, though I don't recall the exact steps (our FitBit Aria was purchased a while before writing this).
Setup was dont through my phone rather than having to try and enter WiFi SSID info through buttons on the scales.
Syncing FitBit Aria sclaes with other services
Once setup it was easy enough to get FitBit to sync data (and so my daily weigh ins) with other services.
When I weigh in, my data is sent to FitBit automatically directly from the Aria scales, FitBit then syncs that to MyFitnessPal as well as the FitBit app on my phone.
Runkeeper is also being updated, but I think that is MyFitnessPal -> RunKeeper syncing rather than FitBit -> RunKeeper syncing. I'm not too worried, my favoruite fitness apps are being updated with data from my FitBit Aria.
FitBit Aria bathroom scales - should you buy them?
The Aria, as bathroom scales go, are a bit pricey. At the time of writing around £100 on Amazon.
Are they worth the money? They are a luxury item. I used to manually enter my daily weigh ins via MyFitnessPal app on my phone which was a satisfactory way to do things.
They are good at what they do, just step on and your weight data finds its way to services you use magically. It's great. Though given you can get bathroom scales for a tenth of the price it wont be a worthwhile investment for everyone.
Updated verdict on the FitBit Aria scales: Don't buy them! Too unreliable for the price.
FitBit Aria scales problems
I've found recently my weight was dropping and I was happy.
The scales had also started having problems connecting to my WiFi network.
On a hunch I tried changing the batteries to sort the WiFi connectivity issues, that worked. Unfortunately at the same time my next weigh in jumped by 4Kg. I guess as battery juice runs low, the accuracy of the scales goes with it.
I've taken to recharging the batteries (4xAA) every month to avoid a repeat of that dissappoinment!
So I was wrong. I don't think batteries are the problem.
The variance (3 or 4 Kg) between weigh ins has been silly at times, even with fresh batteries, and these can be weigh-ins done seconds apart.
I've also recently discovered a doc on FitBit webpage that shows the Aria scale has a battery low indicator. I don't recall ever seeing it, but I will now look out for it. Given recent variance has happened even with fresh batteries how ever I don't think I can blame batteries for the poor consistency of weigh in from my aria bathroom scales.