Fitbit Aria scale

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The Fitbit Aria scale is another connected device in Fitbit’s ecosystem of health-tracking options. It’s first time setup involves several different elements, including the Aria’s physical packaging, the mobile web setup flow, and the scale itself.

Unboxing

Unpacking the Aria meant peeling back a few layers. When I first opened the box there was a cardboard insert with a circular cutout to the Aria display underneath, partnered with a peppy “Hello” speech bubble printed to the side. Anyone who uses a Fitbit tracker knows how much these greetings become a signature part of the experience.

After removing the cardboard insert, I came to the Aria, sheathed in plastic wrap and with a very simple piece of paper pointing to a URL for a setup tool. There was a larger paper under the scale with a bit more detail about the device and setup.

Fitbit, like other companies such as Apple, attempts to simplify the setup experience by outsourcing the paper manual to online tools. This removed the overhead of needing to read through a paper manual before jumping into the connection setup.

Web setup

What “setup” for the Aria means is to connect it to wifi and link it to a Fitbit account. Without these two connections in place, the Aria is relatively non functional. This is unfortunate, as it would have been nice to test it out and use it without requiring a wifi connection first. 

Unfortunately, my online setup experience was not without its hiccups.

First, I navigated to the URL on the paper insert from the box, using my laptop. I clicked on the button that requested I download software to manage my Aria’s network connections. I tried several times to install the software to my laptop, but despite my OS being listed as supported, the installation process stalled every time.

Thankfully Fitbit offers a web-based setup, so I followed that link. Instead of using my laptop, which was a little unwieldy to carry up to where my scale was, I used the web flow on my phone and was pleased that it was mobile-optimized.

I’ve included several screens from the mobile web setup flow. It has a clean and simple multi-step design, but at times was repetitive.  For example, the first screen (“Ready to connect your scale?”) covered much of the same steps that I’d already seen on the paper on the box, and the alert-style screen that popped up when I tapped “Get started” suggested I’d have an easier time if I downloaded their software (which had already failed for me) and offered yet another “Get started” button.

Next I was prompted to log in to my Fitbit account, give my scale a name, and put in my initials. It wasn’t clear to me that I needed to put in a 3-letter initial until I tried just the basic 2-letter initial and received an error. In retrospect, I realized, in a multi-person household, several people may have same first and last initials, but the multi-person use case hadn’t been mentioned in the setup flow before this point.

The next screen instructed me to remove and reinsert the Aria’s batteries to initiate the scale’s setup mode. “Setup Active” scrolled across the circular screen on the Aria to display its status.  At this point in the web flow I was provided with a set of instructions to go to my device’s wifi settings and connect to the Aria’s network, which would allow me to adjust the Aria’s connection settings remotely. Wifi setup on connected devices can be tricky, so kudos to Fitbit for outsourcing this process instead of building input methods into the scale itself.

All the screens after the “I’m connected” button drastically changed their look-and-feel from the earlier web flow screens, which was a tad jarring. After I entered my network’s SSID, I had to watch the scrolling words on the scale’s display to ensure that it was getting connected to the network I specified. I discovered it’s also the only way to see if there was a network error–I got a “Wifi Err” message my first time through. The web flow didn’t register the error on its end, so I had no choice but to start the full web setup all over again (I’m assuming it would have been easier had I used the setup software).

I successfully made it through the second time around. I hit yet another “I’m connected” button on the web interface (there’s that repetition again, with a feeling of “wasn’t I connected already?”) and received a success message. This is where they promote downloading the Fitbit app for iPhone. I thought the success page was well designed and gave clear next steps for customers.

Overall, the physical unboxing experience is clean and focused, and the status messaging on the Aria’s display is extremely clear (albeit a bit slow to read). It is the web-based first time experience that has issues to resolve. A few things could have been made clearer on the web side, such as why 3-letter initials are required and the status of the Aria’s network connection. Finally, it would have been ideal to test out the scale’s measurement capabilities right out of the box, without first having to go through wifi setup.