Gentler Streak Fitness Tracker 12+

I routinely use Gentler on my watch instead of Apple Fitness. For me, it’s easier and quicker to get this one started and to tell it pause and then stop. I arranged the activities so that the one I use most is at the top of the list, which is very handy.

The other thing is that this app has a much more realistic idea of how often and how much I can go-go-go, and is nice enough to point out that Zone 2 is fat-busting, when I was being hard on myself about not working harder. Very encouraging!

There’s no pressure to do more than I have time or stamina or strength to do. At first, Gentler was very concerned that I needed to slow down. (I actually needed to change my goal.)

There have been weeks when I haven’t gotten very many workout sessions in, and I get a gentle reminder that I needed to be consistent. No guilt trip, though.

The only problem I have is that I keep forgetting to end my session, and two hours later I look down and see that it’s still going. And sometimes my watch needs charging but I still workout and the app doesn’t know it. Would be great if there was a way to take out or edit a workout that appears much longer than it should be, or add one when I didn’t wear my watch.

I didn’t think I would like this so much, but it’s a good motivator for someone like me who is trying to workout to improve physical and mental health, but is not an athlete, and has other things to get done too.

Thank you so much for taking the time and sharing your opinion on this little baby of ours. 🧡 So so happy it is working this well for you! 💪

About editing a workout: this is on our radar, and we will look into it once we are done with bigger upgrades in the works.

Sometime in the future, we will also make it possible for you to enter a workout by hand and determine the effort: in case you forget to track, your watch dies, or the tracking was, for some reason, off.

Thanks again for giving GS a go, and for spreading love. :)

UPDATE: We still aren’t getting anything to show our steps as activity in this app. That’s a critical issue here. We shouldn’t have to log our daily steps as workouts to record the activity. I’ve tried doing this to have a more accurate picture of wellbeing and actually have the app saying I’m overreaching when it’s not that hard to walk throughout the day, taking breaks in between. Developers need to find a way to work this into the algorithm for the app. As it stands it seems that while other apps ignore the need for customization based on individual abilities/needs this app ignores the need to have basic data at its core. We need to meet somewhere in the middle here ASAP.
————
I like the app but there are area it needs work; 1) The new Wellbeing tab and syncing with Health is good, but why doesn’t it show our steps? and why aren’t our streaks reflecting our walking throughout the day? This needs attention ‼️ 2) I’ve had to edit sleep in other apps as it over estimated my time sleeping. But then this app shows “Insufficient data” under the Wellbeing tab.🤨 The day is there? I just corrected it so that the record is accurate. This shouldn’t be a problem. 3) One of the reasons I’ve liked this app is the ability to do things at our own pace. I don’t like the “reminders” about exercising or losing a streak. A streak shouldn’t rely solely on workouts but also steps. See point 1.

Hello,

thank you for taking the time and leaving a review. We are indeed a work in progress. 😊

1.
a) Steps may become a part of Wellbeing if we find a sensible way to include them.
b) Your heart rate is the base for the TRIMP formula, which lies at the core of our algorithm. When you don't track your workout, we get very scarce feedback on it; therefore, we cannot estimate the toll it took on your body. The same goes for steps that appear as exercise minutes (if you use Apple Watch). We take it into account, but since heart rate data is not dense, we can't tell the strain it had on your body, therefore the effect on Activity Path is most probably not as great as it would be with full data. The Apple Watch reads your heart rate continuously every couple of seconds when tracking a workout, giving us great data to work with. When you are not tracking, your watch reads your heart rate every 2 to 5 minutes, getting up to 20 readings per hour at best.

2. This was a bug that was removed with the next version. If the problem still persists, please send over an email to support@gentlerstories.com and we will have a look into it.

3. Reply in the 1st point covers this. I agree this would be optimal, but it would not be backed with data, which then makes it messy. You could insert walking activity by hand, and do an equivalent of distance, and estimate your efforts with RPE. However, this is not optimal and we would suggest tracking as many workouts as possible, and with that getting quality data in, so we can guide you best as we can.