The Withings WiFi Scale

Back in January, I was looking for a better scale in order to help me keep my weight on the right track while training. I had owned a Tanita scale for several years, but it never seemed to measure weight or body fat% in a consistent way. In addition, in order to track gains and losses, one had to manually record and log your weight. Not exactly convenient. Using RunKeeper to track my runs, I had found via advertisement that there was Wifi-connected scale that would allow the user to automatically upload the data directly from the scale to RunKeeper. I felt like this would be a better way to track my weight changes without any effort. So I went ahead and bought the Withings scale from Amazon for $159. Not cheap, but worth it.





The appearance of the scale is quite modern. It has a very smooth glass surface and a very low profile. It runs on a pair of AA batteries. Set up was a snap and I was quickly able to get measurements of my weight, body fat%, and BMI displayed in digital right on the scale. I then set up a free account on withings.com, and now the scale automatically recognizes me when I step on it, and uploads the measurement data to my secure withings account via my home wifi router. Once the upload is complete, the wifi radio shuts off, so battery life is actually great.

Once everything uploads, it gets even cooler. The website interface is outstanding. Your measurements are displayed in graphic form in a very elegant way. If you are an iPhone or iPad user, there is great free app from the App Store that allows you to access this data as well. The nice part is all this is controlled wirelessly and without any manual input of data on your part. Just login to the site or open your app and the last measurement, as well as a line graph (scale fully adjustable) of your previous measurements (see below). There's also a very nice display feature in which the overall trend of your weight is displayed as a separate line, because the day to day weight may normally fluctuate by several pounds. The apps are especially nice as you can quickly resize/rescale the graph with a pinch of the fingers. Personally, I found that the apps to be much easier to use than the withings website, but it works well too.




In addition to tracking weight, it will track body fat % and lean body mass, and can be used to track height and blood pressure as well (separate accessory needed).

I've now owned the scale for 3 months, and am very happy with my purchase. I generally weigh in a few mornings a week, as well as before and after my long distance run each weekend to monitor hydration loss. A few times per week I will open the withings app on my iphone and check out my progress. Its been enlightening to see not only how much weight will fluctuate with hydration, but travel and sleep as well.

Yeah, its a pretty geeky gadget, but very useful. Send me any questions!


Josh



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