Best Fitness Trackers 2015: Misfit vs Fitbit vs Jawbone vs Garmin

Aug 18, 2015 07:34 PM EDT

Since we are living in an age of "there's an app for that", it stands to reason that one's physical health will not be left behind.  Some of you might know someone or might be someone who has one of those fitness tracker bracelets around your wrist.  This is the best fitness trackers of 2015 including Misfit vs. Fitbit vs. Jawbone vs. Garmin. 

Misfit has been making the news recently as it recently teamed up with Speedo to create the Speedo Shine which is designed for swimmers.  I had a chance to try out the Misfit Shine a few months ago, and it doesn't really require a band to work, but it is this really cool disk. It comes with a band that you put on it, and then you can wear it on your wrist. You don't have to put it on your wrist, shoes, pocket, waist, or neck.

The Shine can track your progress of walking, running, swimming, an cycling. It has automatic sleep monitoring, daily photo food journal, as well as the usual fitness band tracks of steps, calories, and distance.  Thanks to the help of the free Misfit Shine application, you can find your friends and view other fitness accomplishments, making some friendly competition, or some terrible bragging rights.

For more information on Misfit, head on over to the Misfit site. The Speedo Shine is not yet available, but some of their other products are getting slashed, as the Misfit Shine is just $69.99.

Fitbit is another company that makes many types of fitness trackers.  Like Misfit, Fitbit's goal is to track fitness, and products like the Fitbit Zip are made for tracking steps, distance, calories burned and active minutes.  The Zip costs about $59.95, and is also good for wireless syncing as well as a long battery life of six months (the Apple Watch has a battery that will last a day, if you are lucky). Similar in construction is the Fitbit One, which has a clock and display, and can do a little more with a higher price ($99.95) but lower battery life of 10+ days.  The Fitbit Flex has a minimal display of five LED lights, but it can do similar features at the same price as the One ($99.95). 

Once we go to the Fitbit Charge ($129.95) and Charge HR ($149.95), this is getting into smartwatch territory as these can give call notifications.  When it comes to the Fitbit Surge, or "The Ultimate Fitness Super Watch", it can do pretty much anything a lower-priced fitness band can do, and more for a price of $249.95. 

Another company that has got into the Fitness band business is Jawbone which was more famous for its speakers and headsets.  Their Up series of bands is quite diverse, including the UP Move (a clip-on tracker for $49.99), the Up 2 (a Smart Coach bracelet with a slimmer design than the original for $99.99), the Up 3 (with heart health and advanced sleep and activity tracking for $179.99) and the Up 4 (has all the health features place a connection to the American Express Card for payments for $199.99). 

Garmin used to be a company known for their standalone GPS trackers, but now they have gone into the fitness and activity trackers business.  Not only do their products do the usual counting calories and steps of fitness trackers, but some of them are smartwatches, or at least smart enough for giving notifications. 

Their Fitness bands include the vivofit ($79.99), the vivofit 2 ($99.99) and the vivosmart ($149.99).  Those that are more like smartwatches include the vivoactive ($249.99), the Forerunner 620 ($349.99), the Forerunner 610 ($349.99), the Forerunner (225) ($299.99), as well as the Approach series, which are all can be found on the Garmin site