{"id":123346,"date":"2026-05-07T11:38:16","date_gmt":"2026-05-07T14:38:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ubirataonline.com.br\/googles-taking-a-big-swing-at-ai-health-with-the-fitbit-air\/"},"modified":"2026-05-07T11:38:18","modified_gmt":"2026-05-07T14:38:18","slug":"googles-taking-a-big-swing-at-ai-health-with-the-fitbit-air","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ubirataonline.com.br\/en\/googles-taking-a-big-swing-at-ai-health-with-the-fitbit-air\/","title":{"rendered":"Google\u2019s taking a big swing at AI health with the Fitbit Air"},"content":{"rendered":"


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It\u2019s a Whoop dupe.<\/em> That was my first thought when I saw the new $99 Google Fitbit Air. You can hardly blame me. The band is screenless with a metallic fabric clasp. My eyes flickered between the Fitbit Air and my wrist, where I\u2019m wearing a Whoop MG. Was I not seeing double?<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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But as my press briefing went on, my opinion started changing. The Air is sort of like the OG Fitbits that Whoop then duped once Fitbit went all in on smartwatches. Think back to 2012, when the Fitbit One could clip to your pants, be turned into a pendant, or dangle from a keychain. That device was mostly a pedometer, whereas the Air is more of a modern, modular sensor that can be popped out of one band and stuck into one of three others. But in many ways, this feels like a return to Fitbit\u2019s roots \u2014 a simple band for casual tracking.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cThe reality is right now, wearables have made huge advancements, but for a lot of people, they\u2019re still either too complicated, too bulky, or too expensive,\u201d Rishi Chandra, Google\u2019s vice president of Health and Home, tells The Verge<\/em>. \u201cThat\u2019s where the Fitbit Air came in. We wanted something you could give to your kids and parents that they could just put on their arms. They don\u2019t have to learn anything new.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The sensor pops out of the band, allowing you to swap straps. <\/em><\/figcaption>Image: Google<\/cite><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Compared to previous Fitbit trackers, the Air is 25 percent smaller than the Luxe and 50 percent smaller than the Inspire. It weighs a mere 12g with the band, and 5.2g without. There are no buttons, though there is an LED charging light and haptics for silent alarms. Sensor-wise, it\u2019s not as high tech as the Pixel Watch, but it\u2019s got the staples: an optical heart rate sensor, gyroscope, accelerometer, blood oxygen sensor, and skin temperature sensor for sleep tracking. You can dunk it in water up to 50 meters, and the battery lasts seven days on a single charge. That\u2019s somewhat disappointing, but it was typical for old-school Fitbits, too. At least this one purportedly gets you one day of juice with a five-minute charge. It\u2019ll also work concurrently with a Pixel Watch \u2014 meaning that if you\u2019d prefer to wear the latter during the day and an Air for workouts and sleep, you can now. (Recently, Fitbit hasn\u2019t supported multiple devices.)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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But the Air is not a signal that Google\u2019s reviving Fitbit as it was. This is Fitbit\u2019s first hardware product in nearly four years, but it comes alongside the death of the Fitbit app. Starting May 19th, the Fitbit app and Android\u2019s Health Connect app will be consolidated into the single Google Health app. The Fitbit Premium subscription? That\u2019s also being rebranded as Google Health Premium, though the price won\u2019t change. To top it all off, its AI-powered Health Coach<\/a> is leaving beta and rolling out to the public.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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This is hardly surprising. Since Google acquired Fitbit<\/a> for $2.1 billion in 2021, it\u2019s been slowly but surely integrating Fitbit into the overarching Google umbrella, much as it did with Nest. The transition hasn\u2019t always been smooth. Longtime Fitbit users were enraged<\/a> by multiple widespread outages, deprecated features like challenges, and a confused wearable lineup once the Pixel Watch was introduced. Then, in early 2024, Fitbit\u2019s original leadership was laid off<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Here\u2019s what you get with a subscription versus what you get for free.<\/em><\/figcaption>Image: Google<\/cite><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\u201cI know it will be hard for people. It was hard for us internally,\u201d says Chandra, referring to the rebrand. \u201cBut as we think about the future, where the health app needs to go, the health app is not going to be specific to Fitbit hardware \u2026 We want to be a health coach to an Apple Watch user, too. That\u2019s why we had to make the brand change.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Another reason, Chandra says, is that the current health data market is entirely too fragmented. Before now, Google itself had two separate apps: Fitbit and Health Connect. Before that, it was the Google Fit app. Many wearable users have their data stored across a hodgepodge of apps, including Strava, Garmin, Peloton, etc. Their medical records are often stored on other systems. In some cases, health app data can be siloed depending on your phone\u2019s operating system. Which is why, Chandra says, Google Health will be iOS compatible and eventually work with third-party wearables like Garmins, Whoops, and Oura. (To start, however, it\u2019ll be limited to Pixel and Fitbit devices.) This platform-agnostic approach also harkens back to the Fitbit of yore. It\u2019s just that this time, it\u2019s under Google\u2019s name.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Even so, the Google Health app won\u2019t come as a shock to many Fitbit users. There\u2019s been a public preview beta<\/a> since October. In a briefing, Google said nearly 500,000 users had participated in the beta, and the company received over a million bits of feedback. Based on that feedback, Google says the final version will add back missing features (the preview did not include cycle tracking, for instance), more flexibility with the fitness coaching, a more customizable interface for highlighting metrics, a more accurate sleep algorithm, and a less chatty AI coach.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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What the new Google Health app will look like. It rolls out May 19th.<\/em><\/figcaption>Image: Google<\/cite><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\u201cFor us, this is not a \u2018We\u2019re launching this and see you in six months or a year, then hopefully we\u2019ll update it,\u201d Chandra says, emphasizing that the plan is to continue pushing out frequent updates based on feedback.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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By bundling these three announcements, Chandra says Google is trying to write a distinct narrative. In a nutshell: Here\u2019s a simple, affordable device for the average person that pairs with a consolidated health data platform, complete with a built-in AI coach. Buy in, and you\u2019ll get the most streamlined, low-effort way to get personalized insights and take control of your health. In this case, you can get adaptive fitness plans, chat with the AI about your medical records, use your phone camera to log meals, and ask how your various health metrics relate to each other.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Google is far from the only wearable maker attempting this \u2014 and in a parallel universe, I\u2019d bet that an independent Fitbit would be embarking on this road too. But, like Apple, Google is one of the only players that could make good on the data consolidation part of the equation. But the part that everyone\u2019s currently stumbling on is the AI. I\u2019ve tested nearly all the major AI health, fitness, and nutrition coaches. They are either hallucinatory dogshit<\/a> or useless book reports<\/a>. That\u2019s not to mention data privacy fears regarding sensitive health information. (On that front, Google says it will continue to keep Fitbit data siloed from its ad business; AI model training is opt-in and turned off by default.)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Google, convince me this is better than regurgitated book reports. <\/em><\/figcaption>Image: Google<\/cite><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\u201cThis is a very hard problem,\u201d concedes Chandra when pushed on this. \u201cThe reason why we did the public preview is that we need to make sure we didn\u2019t make big mistakes. The rigor here is absolutely critical \u2026 but we are going to make mistakes. We\u2019ll try to clarify those mistakes when we can, and we\u2019ll try to own up to them and keep improving the product as we go.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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It\u2019s a big swing. Personalized health is the holy grail of the wearable and health industry right now. Every new wearable launch, optimized metric, and AI feature is hurtling toward this goal. I\u2019m no fortune teller. I don\u2019t know how Google\u2019s health gambits will play out. What I do know \u2014 and Google will likely disagree with me \u2014 is that the old Fitbit era is definitely over.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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