The last fitness craze without question has been wearable fitness tracking devices, but did you know you can use Smart Phone Tracking too? With so many devices on the market, it can be challenging to figure out which one to get, and a lot of people aren’t willing to invest in something if they aren’t sure if it’s something they’ll even stick with or if it’ll be beneficial to them. Many people, however, have a smart phone and you can easily use that to track your steps. As an example, for iOS devices there is Apple Health, with a built-in motion sensor which will track your steps.

For Android, there is Google Fit. Basically the only catch is that you have to take your phone with you whenever you walk (but let’s be honest…. A lot of us do this anyway!) It’s all well and good to track the steps and have a pretty graph that shows them, but how do you know if you’re on the right track? There are many, many apps available which will provide you analysis and insight.

For this post, I’ll be focusing on Jawbone. I previously wrote about Jawbone because they also sell wearable devices but you can also use the Jawbone app, and use your smart phone as the tracking device. When you download Jawbone (there are two apps available on app store…. It’ll be the purple coloured one), you select “no device” on set up and by default it will link to your phone. Any steps you take with your phone will be included on the app, and Smart Coach will help provide coaching and motivation on the way. You can also use the Jawbone app to record food and these totals will adjust how many calories you can consume based on your activity levels as well.

For those of you who want to monitor your sleep, a great app to download is “Motion 24/7”. This app will also track your steps if you want to use that in place of Jawbone, but in the evening you would set your phone next to your pillow, and it will help track your quality of sleep. You can also enable the microphone, which will record any noises you make…. This can be helpful if you suspect you have sleep apnea, as an example. (You might also hear yourself saying some entertaining things because of dreams!) Regardless of which device you choose, a wearable or your phone, taking the time to focus on your health is always a good thing!

 

Image by Free-Photos from Pixabay

Source Url: http://gobelmont.ca/appy-friday-smart-phone-tracking/