Google has issued a refutation of information about its intention to abandon the production of smartwatches under the Fitbit brand – the company has no plans to discontinue production of products in the Fitbit Sense or Fitbit Versa lines, its representative told Ars Technica.
Image source: fitbit.com
Google acquired Fitbit in 2019, and the Pixel Watch 3, unveiled last week, offers free features that were previously only available with a Fitbit Premium subscription; Moreover, buyers of the device receive this subscription itself as a gift for six months. In this regard, it was reported that Google decided to abandon the release of smartwatches from the Fitbit Sense or Versa lines – the Fitbit brand will now supposedly be used for fitness trackers within the Fitbit Inspire, Luxe and Charge lines, and the smartwatch form factor will remain only with the Pixel series Watch.
But Google itself said that this information was not true: “We are committed to Fitbit and, more importantly, to the customers who use and depend on these products and technologies. It’s also worth noting that many of the health and fitness-related features we introduced with Pixel Watch 3 were enabled by Fitbit’s innovations and leading advances in fitness. Plus, we just launched Fitbit Ace LTE, and you’ll continue to see new products and innovations from Fitbit.” A Google representative did not provide any specifics about the devices of the Fitbit Sense or Versa lines, but said that the production of devices within these lines has not been closed.
However, the Fitbit Sense 2 and Versa 4 smartwatches still lost some functions, including music controls and access to music services – while the Pixel Watch has support for YouTube Music, Spotify and Pandora. Google, as the trademark owner, takes some of Fitbit’s features and integrates them into smartwatches under its own brand. The company has closed the Fitbit.com toolbar, its integration with social networks and the ability to sync with PC; in 2025, all Fitbit accounts will be closed, their users will be transferred to the Google ecosystem; The Fitbit SDK for application development is also expected to close.
Previously, Google’s Fitbit division was also noted for an unsuccessful firmware update for the Charge 5 tracker, due to which the device had problems with battery performance – the company never published official confirmation of the reasons for the incident, provoking accusations that insufficient attention was being paid to owners of Fitbit devices. Thus, the Fitbit brand has not closed, but in the form in which it existed before the Google takeover, it no longer exists.