Fitness trackers for dogs are irresistible to data-loving humans

Dogs can’t tell us that they crushed their workout. That’s where smart collars come in.

Collars with GPS aren’t anything new. But earlier models were designed for tracking working or sporting dogs in the field and their bulkiness and unwieldy antennae weren’t exactly consumer-friendly. 

In recent years, however, several new companies have improved on the concept and repackaged it for the average pet-owning consumer. There are several on the market (Fi, FitBark, Whistle, to name a few) and they’re all waterproof, sturdy yet lightweight devices packed with GPS, WiFi/cellular connectivity, long battery life, and activity tracking. 

Just like Fitbit or Apple Watch, smart collars (or pet wearables) use sensors and motion tracking to gather data about your dog’s habits. The app shows graphs and charts of doggy data about their activity and sleep. 

Credit: Fi

Credit: Fi

But, humans and dogs have been best friends for tens of thousands of years. Do we really need an app to tell us about our dogs? Why do we need a device that tells us what a responsible dog owner should already know? Apparently there is more to be learned about our furry friends.

For one thing, dogs can’t verbally tell us what they need.

“I cannot just look at [my dog] and say, ‘Hey, did you sleep well last night?’ But I can actually pull my app and see.” It’s a sound argument from Jonathan Bensamoun, founder and CEO of smart collar company Fi. 

Surprisingly, Bensamoun isn’t someone who is obsessed with trackers. “I’ve tried all of the trackers and every time after a day, I’m like, ‘Okay, cool, what do I care?’ If I had a bad night of sleep, I knew that before [my Apple Watch] told me.” But for Thor, his German Shepherd, it’s different. “When it comes to my dog, absolutely. It’s super reassuring.

Bensamoun says while the activity features are fun and useful, the location tracking is absolutely Fi’s primary function.

Victor Esteves and his Golden Retriever/German Shepherd mix, Harvey were in a wooded park in Boston when Harvey took off into the woods and didn’t respond to Esteves’ calls. After 15 minutes of frantic searching, Esteves found Harvey hunting for moles. “Of course he was happy-go-lucky,” Esteves said, but that was the moment when he decided to buy a Fi collar. “I feel a huge peace of mind knowing that he has it.”

Happy-go-lucky Harvey just wanted to hunt for moles.
Credit: Victor Esteves

Losing your dog is every owner’s worst nightmare. So the ability to track your dog’s whereabouts is an undeniable value proposition. But it’s the activity tracking that raises questions about the role of tech in our lives.

Bensamoun says the company wanted to avoid users getting obsessive about accumulating steps. “When we build these features, we make sure that we don’t create the wrong incentive. You don’t want to just create like a leaderboard and be like, ‘Okay, go walk your dog 100,000 steps a day.’” The interface shows how many steps dogs are getting in a bell curve distribution. That way users can get a sense of what’s a normal amount of exercise, and what’s not.  

“If anything,” Bensamoun said, “the incentive we’re trying to create there is consistency.” All the activity tracking — the steps, the streaks, the goals, the bar graphs — is about meeting your own goal for your dog, not some universal standard. This effectively removes any direct competition. 

Of course with all this dog activity data, there’s gotta be some friendly rivalry between dog owners. “I live for the notifications that say, ‘Riley is scored in the top [ranking] of Australian Shepherds in the area,’” said Jo Tic, who has a Fi collar for Riley, her almost two-year-old Border Collie/Australian Shepherd mix.

Does she ever feel like the competition gets to be too much? “Actually, it never stresses me out,” said Tic. “It just gets me really excited to see the potential because I think I feel inspired by what other dog owners and other dogs do.” Tic, who lives in Austin, TX volunteers as director of fundraising for a foster group in Texas. “If anything, I like to celebrate other dogs’ successes.”

For David Buccola, a carpenter from Manhattan, NY seeing a dog inch ahead on the leaderboard motivates him to walk his dogs. Buccola who has two Chihuahuas named Taco Bell and Lexi Bell likes to prove people wrong about the breed. When Lexi scores high in the ranking, “I get such a kick out of that. It defies the stereotype that she should just be carried around in a little purse or something, but she loves to get out there.”

Taco Bell and Lexi Bell aren’t interested in your anti-Chihuahua prejudices.
Credit: David Buccola

Buccola and his wife, who have FitBark GPS devices for Lexi and Taco, often go for bike rides in northern Manhattan. They have baskets on their bikes for when the dogs get tired, but they’re routinely amazed by their little dogs’ endurance. “These devices make you realize that our dogs can do a lot more than we give them credit for.”

Like Buccola, being able to track activity has made Jo Tic feel more in tune with Riley. It’s the consistency of the tracking that allows her (and her veterinarian) to look for trends or find answers. Tic recalled how Riley wasn’t eating the day before this interview. So she looked at the Fi app. “I saw that we actually got so much exercise on our hike, she was probably just pooped out.” 

Tic also says when she goes to the vet, she can just pull up the data and share exactly what’s going on. That’s exactly why Dr. Ernie Ward, a veterinarian and founder of the Association for Pet Obesity and Prevention (APOP) is a fan. 

“Most of the time when I’m in the exam room and I’m asking the client, ‘So how often or how much do you walk your dog a day?’ I mean, most Americans are going to say, I don’t know, you know, 30 to 40 minutes a day. When we actually match that up with the data that’s reported on a device, that objective device, it’s like 12 minutes.” A 2011 review of studies reported that humans asked to report their activity level tend to overestimate by an average of 84 percent. It stands to reason that we would do something similar with our dogs.

Dr. Ward says that weight loss for dogs is “60 to 70 percent diet-related,” but activity trackers can help by providing accurate data about how much or how little exercise your dog is getting. 

“I think people are under a misperception that their dog stays in the yard and runs around in circles all day long and the reality is about 16 hours a day your dog is probably laying down somewhere completely inactive.”

For dogs that are being led toward a specific goal, this benchmarking can be particularly useful. When Sassafras Lowrey’s dog, a Newfoundland named Sirius, had double knee surgery, she used FitBark to track her rehab progress. Lowrey, who is a dog trainer and author, was also working with a veterinary physical therapist for Sirius, but the metrics gathered by FitBark helped Lowrey to see Sirius’ improvement over time and boosted morale.

Lowrey used FitBark to gather different metrics about Sirius’ knee surgery rehab.
Credit: Sassafras Lowrey

Smart collars may seem like more intrusive tech that bombards the data-weary public with still more data. But if they let us know where to find our dogs, keep us honest about exercise, and give us other health insights about our best friends, maybe they’re worth it.