Fitbit recalls Ionic smartwatch for burning fat – literally

Fitbit recalled all models of its Ionic smartwatch on Tuesday after a small number of wearers were left with burns when the gadgets' lithium-ion batteries overheated. Fitbit Ionic was made between 2017 and 2020 and comes in a variety of colors, including burnt orange, charcoal, and smoke gray. On top of monitoring things like …

[Jeff 11]

“a variety of colors, including burnt orange, charcoal, and smoke gray”

Are these colours before or after combustion?

[Michael Strorm]

The orange sounds like it'd be "during".

[Anonymous Coward]

Sedentary by choice

My phone nags me enough. I don't need a watch nagging me too

[Howard Sway]

monitoring things like heart rate and sleep

Good luck getting your heart rate down and going to sleep, knowing that it might catch fire during the night.

But there's always a workaround isn't there - "Please take the watch off before going to bed, and store safely in a glass of water".

[Phil Kingston]

Free upgrade time.

Have to say though, I've had 3 Fitbit devices and they've now all had to be warranty-claimed or returned. But at least they are pretty good at the actual process of doing so.

[_gh_]

I went through 6-7 in 2 years before I gave up and got another brand. They were always v. good about replacing them to the point where I thought they were too good at replacing them and should perhaps just manufacture the devices to be more reliable.

In the end I thought that most fitbits probably got binned or passed on after a short time which was why the engineering was not good enough for actual use (>3 months).

[MrBanana]

Just like Dyson

As someone who always wants to repair something rather than replace it, I thought that it was great that there were so many spares available for Dyson vacuums. But after repairing a few of them, only a couple of years old, it dawned on me - the frickin' things are crap, that's why there are so many spares, and fools willing to participate in the cult of Dyson. My 25 year old Panasonic (one replacement drive belt), and venerable Henry hoover have never been any trouble.

[Michael Strorm]

Just like Dyson? Exactly.

Let's remember that James Dyson supported Brexit having already shut his factory in England and moved production to the Far East a decade earlier.

And who- *after* having supported the ra-ra nationalism of Brexit and puffery about promoting Britain- announced he was moving the company's HQ from the UK to Singapore.

The person who was painted by his Brexiteering chums- and himself- as a hero of British industry while being in reality everything that was wrong with it.

Odious excuse for a human being sells overhyped, overpriced plastic tat? No surprise.

[excession]

Dang!

Wish I’d kept mine! Sold it a few months back for £not much!

[Kevin McMurtrie]

"Taking it off when it gets hot might also be an idea"

Having angered some LiPo batteries intentionally, I wouldn't be surprised if there was not even 1 second between the stage of feeling cuddly warm and being a branding iron.

A reinforced silicone wristband that breaks at 450 C now sounds like a horrific idea. I'll take those ugly thermoplastic bands of decades ago that sometimes melted by accident.

[innominatus]

Branding

"less than 0.01 per cent of units sold" but with 1.7 million sales doesn't that add up to 150+ customers literally now sporting a Fitbit brand?

[Anonymous Coward]

does the device need to be sent back?

I have an ionic, the faq's for the recall say they disable the device. will they want it back also?

[Fading]

Re: does the device need to be sent back?

Part of the process "unlinks" your ionic from the fitbit app - so technically it isn't de-activated just un-paired. They want you to agree to have it destroyed/recycled in the approved manner an it is a 3-6 week wait before you get your refund though. Yep, I've jumped through the hoops to get the refund for mine (that I was still using) so at the moment I don't have a tracker enabled for my Vitality health insurance points - no free coffee next week for me.

[Tom 7]

Re: does the device need to be sent back?

You get free coffee for health insurance points? When I was a long distance runner it became apparent pretty quickly coffee was your enemy and not your friend when it came to building stamina. No-one in my rowing crew drinks coffee on the day of a race either.

[Disgusted Of Tunbridge Wells]

> the Ionic supported contactless payments

Amazingly, not through any major UK bank.