Free Fitbit update could improve bedtime and add a spring in your step

Sleep tracking is a feature pretty much every fitness tracker and smartwatch offers these days. Some are better than others, offering more data and deeper insights, but all will give you a rough idea of how well you slept and more often than not, the time you spent in each stage of sleep: light, REM and deep.

Fitbit has long been known for its accuracy in sleep tracking however, so while it has tougher competition these days, it has had a head start on a lot of them.

Sleep tracking has been offered on Fitbit devices since 2009, but it added sleep stages in 2017. For context, Apple Watch didn't offer sleep stages as part of its sleep tracking data until 2022, some five years later.

And you can't stand still in this space. Not only will your watch or tracker tell you to get up, but everyone else will catch up.

With that in mind, things have improved further on the sleep front if you are a Fitbit user. The company announced on its community pages, spotted by 9to5Google, that it has updated its tracking technology to "provide a more precise measurement of your sleep stages".

Why is my Fitbit sleep data different?

According to the post, you may see changes to your sleep stages and awake time data in that "you may see your awake time increase slightly as we now capture brief awakenings the old system missed".

It reveals that as a normal part of your sleep, those smaller, brief times you wake are important for getting a more precise picture. As the Google-owned fitbit also says, "The sleep data you see now is a more accurate reflection of your night's rest. This more detailed data will help you better understand how your body is recovering each night".

Fitbit also intriguingly revealed that this is just the first step in making its sleep tracking more effective.

For now, the company hasn't announced any further details about what is coming down the line, but with the Made by Google event just days away, it's possible we will learn more about plans through the Pixel Watch 4.