How to Manage Your Health in Android with Google Fit?
A vast majority of the world population is using a smartphone. Mobile phone is an indispensable part of life, assisting us with every domain of our lives. However, using too much mobile screen time will affect our health and lifestyle. Ironically, you can use the same smartphone on your hand to help monitoring your health too. iPhone comes with a Health app that integrates with many third-party apps to offer complete health monitoring solution. With Android phones, you can use Google Fit to manage your health and we will explore more about this in this article.
What Health Information You Can Monitor?
You can use Android smartphones to monitor almost every aspect of keeping you healthy.
- Monitor the steps count to keep track of your physical movement and avoid long sitting in the same place.
- It can give you instant information about the heartbeat rate.
- You can record and monitor your eating and other activities.
- You can also get tips and tricks to maintain your daily food intake.
In summary, you can use the mobile phone to record your physical activities thus assisting you with the workout and living a healthy lifestyle.
Google Fit App
Google has an official fitness platform called Google Fit. It offers an app for Wear OS, Android and iPhone; hence you can use the features on all these devices if required. We recommend using Google Fit as the app offers large number of health features and integration with other apps to cater all age groups.
- As it is from Google, it integrates perfectly with Android phones.
- You can assist your workout schedule from your phone or watch.
- Google Fit displays real-time stats of your jogging, walking, and bike riding.
- It will use your Android phone sensors to automatically record all the activities.
- Most importantly Google Fit app will offer the latest research-based statistics and custom recommendations with the collaboration from World Health Organization (WHO) and the American Heart Association (AHA).
- You can also check the recommendations from American Academy of Sleep Medicine about the factors which can affect your sleep and the amount of sleep you need.
Setup Google Fit App in Your Phone
Use the following steps to install and use Google Fit app on your phone.
- Go to Google Play store and install ‘Google Fit: Activity Tracking’ app available under ‘Health & Fitness’ category.
- Open the app and sign in with your Google account.
- On the next screen, provide your personal information like gender, birthday, weight, and height. Make sure to enter these details correctly, so that the app can offer you appropriate recommendations. Press ‘Next’ to proceed further.
- On the next screen tap ‘Turn on’ to enable ‘Track your activities’ feature. A dialog box will ask you to allow ‘Google Fit’ app to access your physical activities automatically. Confirm the app to access your activities.
- The next screen will let you set various activity goals. ‘Heart points’ is the score you get for each minute of activity that runs your heart, like jogging or brisk walking. You can also set your goals for the number of steps each day. Tap ‘Next’ to move to the next screen. Note that the app also will offer tips on how to earn more ‘Heart Points’ based on your health information.
- The coming screen will allow you to set your daily goals for ‘Heart Points’ and ‘Steps.’ Choose the plan that suits your fitness requirement.
- Finally, the home screen will appear with the stats, daily goals, and recommendations.
Google Fit Home Screen
Here are three essential features of the Google Fit app.
1. Set a Pace for Your Walks
This feature is an exciting way to make walking a simple exercise by assisting you with brisk walking. You can access this feature by going to the home screen of the app and scrolling down a bit.
First, press the ‘Get started’ button and then press ‘Next’ on the following screen.
The next screen explains this feature that a brisk walk should leave you a little out of breath. This rate is around 100 steps per minute – press the ‘Next’ button.
The coming screen will tell you to step with the beat to keep pace and press ‘Done.’
You should allow the app to access the device’s location. And the final screen will show up where you can press the ‘Start paced walking’ button to start the activity. When you press the ‘Start paced walking’ button, the phone will start ticking, and with each tick, you must take a step. You can increase or decrease the pace to adjust with your step frequency. The device will show your step count in real-time.
You can also choose other activities from the list of ‘Activity type.’
Set Pace for Walk in Google Fit
2. Track Your Respiratory Rate
The way you breath tells a lot about your body’s wellbeing. Google Fit gives the ability to measure breathing which many health apps do not provide. It will use your phone’s camera to take a reading.
- Press the ‘Get started’ button below the ‘Track your respiratory rate’ option.The next screen tells the process of measuring your respiratory rate with your phone camera and press ‘Next’ to continue.
- The following screen explains the exact measurement process. Google Fit app detects small movements in your chest to measure your respiratory rate. Therefore, make sure to sit in a well-lit area without covering your face and then tap ‘Next.’
- Allow the app to take pictures and record videos. Lean your phone on a stable surface and sit down comfortably in front of the camera to see yourself from the waist up.
- Tap the ‘Start measurement’ button to start detecting your face and chest area on the next screen.
- The measurement will start soon after and stay still and breathe normally.
- Once the measurement is completed, you will find the results on the screen.
Track Respiratory Rate
3. Check Your Heart Rate
Heart rate is an essential measurement of heart activity. You may need to take this measurement in different situations like when walking, doing exercise or while on the bed.
- Touch ‘Get started’ and the next screen will demonstrate how to take the measurement.
- You have to put your finger on the lens of the rear-facing camera of your Android phone. Hold your hand steady for an accurate measurement and go to the ‘Next’ screen.
- You will get further instructions to put your finger fully over the rear-facing camera lens.
- Put light pressure on the lens with your finger and once you are ready, press the ‘Start measurement’ button.
- Results will come up on the screen once the measurement is completed.
- You can save the results if you want. If you are not in a well-lit area, turn on the flashlight by tapping on the flashlight icon on the measurement screen.
Check Heart Rate in Google Fit
Other Features of the App
Google Fit also provides tons of other features and personal customization options.
To add an activity, you can press the ‘+’ button on the Google Fit app’s home screen. The activity could be for adding blood pressure, weight, track workout, etc.
Similarly, you can tap on the ‘Journal’ tab at the bottom of the home screen to see your record of activities.
‘Browse’ tab presents extra health-related features like ‘Nutrition.’ The nutrition feature will let you connect with other compatible health and fitness apps. It will display ‘Calories consumed’ and your ‘Hydration’ status. The same is the case of the ‘Sleep’ menu in the main ‘Browse’ tab. Remember that some features require wearable gadgets to acquire measurements like sleep, body temperature, etc.
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