Do Not order!!! Total garbage!!!!

I should know better, but I never learn you get what you pay for. The tracker I ordered:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B016HT8DEM?psc=1&redirect=t rue&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o01_s00

is a total piece of junk. One night I sleep with it on and when I wake up the screen won't respond, so I think "maybe I laid on the button and it caused it to die overnight" so I put it on the charger. Low and behold the screen lights up on the charger and shows me the home screen. "That's weird" I think to myself. I take it off the  charger and the screen is still on but it will not respond to touch at all. Then the alarm I set (which I woke up prior to it going off) starts going off, it is a vibrate alarm and I cannot turn it off. I'm sitting here listening to this damn thing vibrate in the box, until it dies.

Amazon is refunding me and I have to ship it back which they pay for. I know I shouldn't let it irritate me, but it really does, because now I get to try and find something else and wait for it to show up and I really want to start upping my fitness. Which I know I can do without a tracker but then I have no basis on which to calculate calories burned etc other than myfitnesspal but I believe their estimates for calories burned is so off. There is basically nothing available in local stores other than the more basic fitbit flex which is not the one I want if I am dropping money for a fitbit I want one with extended features like heart rate and sleep tracking. Which the tracker I ordered had, and if it hadn't been trash, I would have been so content with. Why can't I catch a break on stuff like this? What a great start to day, not. 

You do not NEED a tracker. You can up your exercise just fine without one. There is NO REASON to track calories burned because you should NEVER eat back your burned calories. Also, almost every exercise/calorie burn calculator waaaaaaaay overestimates the number of calories burned. 

What you need to do is drink tons and tons of water and up your physical movement and exertion level each week. That's how you gain strength and fitness. 

Save your money. I was given a fitbit for xmas one year. I wore it for a while, until I realized how absolutely inaccurate the step counter was. I know my fitness level has increased when I realize I'm doing something I couldn't do some time in the past (e.g. I can do a two level squat to box jump now. When I started a single box was very difficult. Now two is easy peasy!). Walk a 1/4 or 1/2 mile every day for a week. Then up your pace or up the distance - your choice. That's all you need to do. No gadgetry necessary! 

Oh I don't eat back the calories (still 700 or under a day for me), I just like seeing how much I burned of what I ate for the day. I'm always water logged so that is definitely not a problem. I can't tell how far I walked without someway to track it though. When I am walking inside my office building or when I go window shopping on the weekends to get steps in I have no gauge for how far I walk since it's not like there are mile markers in my office or the mall/Costco/Target. It's not like when you walk a trail outside where there are mile markers, but it's too cold for outside where I live right now at least for me personally. And I'm still going to exercise no matter what, but I want to see numbers physically to see steps taken etc as motivation even if it is an over estimate sometimes. I know I don't NEED one but as a die hard millennial I WANT one lol, we love our technology. :)

You're gonna have to cough up the cash for a decent tracker. The fitbit hr gives a heart rate & is a sleep tracker if that's what you're looking for. I recently ordered the misfit shine which also tracks steps & activity, but it also works in the water & can be worn as jewelry. The top of my list is the apple watch, but its pricey as hell, then again its apple.

I'm just so cheap lol. Plus I am scared to spend over $100 and still not be happy, but I am weighing (hehe) my options to see what will work best.

I just recently got a Microsoft Band.  I'm most interested in the sleep tracking as I definitely don't get nearly enough and my sleep apnea is pretty bad and it shows now (on the tracker).  I get my CPAP machine next week and it'll be interesting to track it there.  I do like that it pings me when I've been inactive for a set period of time to get up and move.  I'm a software engineer so I spend a LOT of time in front of a screen.  It's tough to remember to get up and move when you're deep into it.  I also never eat the calories I supposedly burned.  It's nice to track how many steps and try to make sure I'm on track to increase my activity, though.  That and MyFitnessPal is what I use to track food and exercise and it doesn't have any really good way to track the exercise.  The Band is better on that.  Again, just to track my progress in getting more active.

I saw the Microsoft band and am weighing it as an option. Working in an office (call center) it's hard to stay active for me too and I like the push of seeing that I am not where I am supposed to be and being conscientious about it.

Have you tried looking on eBay or Craigslist? A lot of people sell old trackers when they upgrade to newer models.

Do you have a Target nearby? They seem to run sales fairly often for $25 off or so.

Look into smar****ches as well. Almost all have pedometers, some have heart rate monitors, and they have accelerometers for sleep tracking. The original Pebble runs for $75ish, I started with one and it's pretty good.

I do have a Target (I'm obsessed with it) so I will check that out. I have checked Craigslist too, I found one I wanted (a Fit*****arge HR for just $90) but the band size was too large for me. Still looking daily and weighing my options. I will look into the Pebble as that was not one I had heard of yet in my research.

I love my fitness trackers. I have a Fitbit Zip and Fit*****arge. I got my Zip new on ebay for 40 (regularly $59). I got my Charge on sale for $75 on Black Friday.

I will admit it is so easy for me to be a couch potato. Looking at it makes me realize when I need to get some activity in. For me, the cost was worth it. They help me maintain my weight loss.