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With Google’s announcement of the screenless Fitbit Air, the company is also preparing for a big shift in how the app works and what device features it supports. That means we’re losing sleep animals and a bunch of other features that you may miss. Here’s what’s on the chopping block.
Fitbit accounts are going away (for real this time)
Fitbit used to be its own company, but after Google bought Fitbit, it started gently encouraging users to use Google accounts rather than using their old Fitbit accounts. The encouragement has gotten less gentle over time, with Google saying louder over the past year or so that you need to switch your old Fitbit account to a Google one, for real, we mean it.
The deadline to switch kept getting pushed back, but it looks like Google really does mean it this time. Social features in the Fitbit app will be locked on May 12, 2026 for people who use a Fitbit account. After May 19, 2026, your Fitbit account will stop working. Google will begin deleting your Fitbit data on July 15, 2026. We have instructions here for migrating your Fitbit account to a Google account.
The old Fitbit forums are going away (along with your post history and profile data)
If you use the Fitbit forums (which have been around since 2013), you’ll lose data there, too. Buried in a chipper announcement about a forum overhaul (“We can’t wait for you to see the updated community!”), Google says you’ll lose your post history and all profile data from the forum. Fitbit users often looked to these posts for information on older devices that aren’t currently supported. It’s not clear from the announcement whether past posts will still exist in an archive.
No more badges or sleep animals
You can no longer earn badges. No new badges will be created, and all old badges will be deleted. Google says “If you have Google Health Coach, your coach will help to celebrate your progress and accomplishments.” Sleep animals are going away, as well—more about that below. (For what it’s worth, Samsung still does sleep animals, as I noticed when I reviewed the Galaxy Ring.)
Lots of social features are going away
Besides forums, there are also social features in the Fitbit app. These are changing, too:
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Social profiles will include your name, email, and profile picture from your Google account. The first time you log in with the Google account, you’ll get a prompt asking you to approve sharing this information. You can’t have a custom name or picture except by changing it on your Google account.
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Privacy settings for social profiles aren’t available anymore, since social profiles will no longer include your sex, height, weight, location, or friends list.
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Groups and Community feed are going away.
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Direct messages will no longer be available in the Fitbit app.
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Kid accounts cannot have friends.
These health features are disappearing or changing
When the old Fitbit app is replaced with Google Health, several of the old features won’t make the jump. If you’ve been using the Public Preview, you may have noticed these features aren’t there. While Google Health will add some missing features, here’s a list of the changes Google plans to make. I’ll include what, if anything, is meant to substitute for each missing or changed feature.
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Cardio fitness will no longer be estimated based on your height and weight. This feature is now called VO2max and requires GPS data from outdoor runs. (One nice perk: it can use data from other devices, not just Fitbits.)
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Sleep profiles are going away, including sleep animals. In its place, you can ask Google Health Coach what kind of sleeper you are.
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Estimated Oxygen Variation (EOV) is going away, but you can still check your blood oxygen (SpO2) in the Health tab.
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Snore detection is going away. This was a feature on the original Sense and on the Versa 3.
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Graphs of stress checks will no longer be available. You can still do a scan on the Charge 5, Charge 6, and Sense to see the individual result.
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Minute-by-minute skin temperature is no longer available. You can still get daily and weekly skin temperature.
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Blood glucose tracking won’t allow you to add symptoms or get reminders to check your levels, but you can connect Apple Health (iOS) or Health Connect (Android) to get blood glucose data that way.
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Food plans are no longer supported with calorie targets, but you can still set calorie targets and macronutrient targets in the Nutrition section of the Health tab.
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Recipes are no longer available. This was a premium feature.
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Lifescan devices no longer have a supported connection to the Fitbit app. You can still log your blood glucose manually.
In many cases, the missing features are being replaced by a suggestion that you can ask Google Health Coach about that area of your health. Since Google Health Coach is a premium feature, that means you’ll need to pay for that answer and you’ll get it in a less structured format that may be tainted with hallucinations. This doesn’t feel like an upgrade to me! But Google seems to hope that the added features of the new app will more than make up for what’s missing.
