By Dan Moren
December 3, 2015 7:37 AM PT
Pedometer++ 2.3 steps up Apple Watch support
Note: This story has not been updated for several years.
Increase the number of apps I’m actively using on my Apple Watch by one: David Smith’s latest update to Pedometer++ brings a significant enhancement to the way the app works with your Apple Watch. Perhaps its most impressive feature is the ability to better estimate your step count by figuring out whether to use data from your iPhone or Apple Watch:
The concept of a fixed priority device doesn’t really work for step data. As you move between the various activities of your daily life, the best device for measuring your movement is constantly switching. Thus you need a data merging algorithm that can dynamically analyze your step data and determine which device’s data is best at any particular time.
That is exactly what Pedometer++ now does. It goes through your daily data and can dynamically determine which device to use for any particular point in your day. The result is a much richer and complete picture of your daily activity than you’d get from Health.
The Watch app now has a workout mode that makes tracking an active walk much easier than Apple’s Workout app (which, I agree with David, is pretty darn fiddly to use) and there’s also a complication that you can add to your watchface, showing how close you are to meeting your step goal for the day.1 If you’re a fan of Apple’s Activity rings but find them sometimes inscrutable, Pedometer++ offers a more straightforward alternative. Getting your step count from Apple’s Activity app is an annoying process, but if you just want to see your steps on your watchface, Pedometer++ is the way to go.
Pedometer++ has been one of the few Glances that I’ve kept active on my Apple Watch, and I’m thrilled that the app’s even more closely integrated–previously I’ve found significant discrepancies between Pedometer++ and Apple’s own Health app, and I always wondered why.
Best of all this is done behind the scenes in a way that’s transparent and doesn’t require you to do much of anything beyond install the app. Pedometer++ is free, with optional donations if you want to thank David for his work.
- Thanks to a lingering foot issue, the answer for me is really, really far from my goal. ↩
[Dan Moren is the East Coast Bureau Chief of Six Colors. You can find him on Mastodon at @dmoren@zeppelin.flights or reach him by email at dan@sixcolors.com. His latest novel, the supernatural detective story All Souls Lost, is out now.]
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