Healthy Obsessions The Adventures of a Mild Obsessive Compulsive

Tag Archives: Sleeping Disorder

Fitbit vs. Zeo vs. Sleep Cycle: Accuracy

I’ve been using all three for at least a month now, so I feel like I can give them a fair shake. Let’s do a quick recap of what each one does.

  • Fitbit – Accelerometer, used both as a pedometer during the day and as a sleep monitor at night when strapped to your non-dominant wrist (I still don’t know why non-dominant, but I’m willing to go with it). Conventional sleep labs also make use of an accelerometer.
  • Sleep Cycle – There’s an app for that! (Sorry, I just couldn’t resist). This app for the iPhone uses roughly the same tech as the Fitbit. Accelerometer based monitoring. You place your phone on your bed, near – but not under – your pillow. It tracks movement via the mattress.
  • Zeo – Completely different tech. Instead of monitoring movement, the Zeo focuses on brain wave activity to track sleep phases. The monitor comes on a headband that you wear to bed. As tech goes, this is most akin to the EEGs used in sleep labs.

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Sleep Tracking Poll

I am curious about how other people think about this sort of stuff. Do you find it interesting? Boring? Of value? Problematic? Indication of societal decline and the end of days?

Sleep seems like a problematic area for most of the people I know. I wonder if this extends as far into the general population as I think it does. From all the articles and websites dedicated to the topic, you’d think so. But then, you rarely hear from people when they’re happy; you most often hear from them when they have a complaint (if nothing else, working in video gaming has taught me that).

At any rate, I’m curious to see how many people find tracking of value.

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