Health App Not Accurate

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Health App Not Accurate

I recently started to use Apple's Health app (iOS 9.2) and have found that the walking distance shown in the app is consistently about 15% low. I've checked this several times by walking on a route for which I know the precise distance. For example for a walk of 4.2 miles, the app shows a distance of 3.55 miles. For a walk of 2.15 miles, the app shows a distance of 1.78 miles. The app MapMyWalk is absolutely accurate when used at the same time (so GPS seems to be working fine).

In addition, the number of steps per mile shown on the Health app is extremely high (about 3,000/ mile for me - more realistically it should be ~2,200) when compared with miles walked shown in the app and or with the actual (precise) distance walked (e.g., using the numbers shown on the Health app, my walking stride is 1.85 feet - much too short).

Anyone else observed this apparent error in both miles and steps shown on the Health app?

iPhone 6, iOS 9.2

Posted on Jan 1, 2016 3:14 PM

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Answer 1

Jun 15, 2016 6:08 AM in response to jas

I've noticed similar distance issues but my distances were not on the short side, but instead on the long side.

When I look at the distance traveled during a 5 minute interval, and I know I didn't just walk 1km. I notice that the distances recorded seem to "calm down" after about 20 minutes of walking. The first 5 or so recorded distances seem to be around 0.5km/5 minutes, and then seem to drop to an expected 0.10km per 5 minutes.

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