How To Clear Messages On Fitbit Versa

Love your Fitbit but not receiving any text messages, notifications, or calls from your phone to your Fitbit? Tried everything but left wondering how you can get your Fitbit to show your text messages and other notifications and alerts?

If you aren't receiving notifications on your Fitbit and don't know why or how to fix it, this article is for you! Fitbit Sense or Versa 3 notification center

Various Fitbit owners complain that notifications have stopped working altogether regardless of the type of device–so it's impacting both iPhones and Android devices.

Today, we're going to look at a few different methods to troubleshoot before calling it quits.

Those who recently updated the Fitbit app reboot your mobile device and then try setting up notifications again.

Quick checklist

Download and install the newest version of the Fitbit app from the Apple App Store or Google Play Store.
Make sure your phone is within 30 feet of your Fitbit.
Check that you turned on Bluetooth on your phone and that your phone has notifications on.
Verify that you turned on notifications in your phone settings and within the Fitbit app.
Turn off Do Not Disturb and Sleep Mode (if available) on your phone and Fitbit. When you use the Do Not Disturb setting on your phone, you don't receive notifications.
1. For Fitbit band models like Ace, Charge, and Inspire Series, hold the side button or buttons, and go to Quick Settings.
2. For Fitbit smartwatches like the Sense, Versa, or Ionic, and the Luxe tracker, swipe to see your Quick Settings options.
3. For iPhones using iOS 15+, look in your Focus Settings to find do not disturb, sleep, and similar options.
If you're not receiving notifications during exercise only, turn off Focus mode inSettings > Quiet modes > Focus mode.
Make sure you allow the Fitbit app to run in the background on your phone.
Disable any battery-saving feature on your paired phone, such as Low Power mode for Apple devices or Battery Saver on Android. Also, make sure battery optimization is set to not optimized for the Fitbit app.

Android users, check these settings.

Apple iPhone users, check these settings.

There are a lot of notification settings to check on Apple devices. So it's easy to miss one or two. So let's check those out.

Check your Fitbit's notification settings

The first issue is that you did not set up the Fitbit app to send notifications to your Fitbit device. To check this, you can do so in two different ways: via the Fitbit app or on your Fitbit device.

Before jumping into your phone, make sure that you turned on your Fitbit device's Notification setting.

Depending on your model, you may have a distinct notification setting (like on the Inspire Series trackers) or Do Not Disturb (DND) and Sleep mode settings.

Look at notification settings on your Fitbit device:

Blaze — Hold the top right button for 3 seconds. Or on your clock face, swipe up, and make sure notifications are turned on.
Surge — Swipe the touchscreen until you get to the Settings menu, then find Notifications.
Ace 2, Charge 2, and Inspire & Inspire HR — On your home screen (the clock screen), press and hold the button to reach the quick settings screen. Scroll down and look for notifications. If the icon appears dim with a line through it, tap it once to turn notifications on.
Ace 3 and Inspire 2 —Press and hold the side buttons. Verify that DND and Sleep
mode settings are off.
Luxe — Swipe down from your Luxe's clock face to access its quick setting. Verify that DND mode and Sleep mode settings are off.
Charge 3 — On the clock screen, press and hold the button. For Fitbit Pay-enabled trackers, swipe left to access the quick settings screen.
Charge 4 — From the clock screen, press and hold the button, and swipe left to the quick settings screen. Then, tap DND and verify do not disturb and sleep mode settings are not on.
Charge 5 — On your clockface, swipe down from the top of the screen to access quick settings. Make sure DND mode and Sleep mode are off.
Ionic, Sense, & Versa Series — Swipe down from the top of the screen and tap the quick settings icon (Ionic and older Versas) or swipe left from the clock face (Versa 3 and Sense.) Check that both sleep (crescent moon icon) and DND (minus symbol) are off.

For Fitbit Sense and Versa 3, there's an additional mode called Focus modethat silences notifications and calls during workouts with the Exercise app.

To check if you enabled this, go to Settings > Quiet modes > Focus mode and toggle it off.

Sleep mode vs. Do Not Disturb on your Fitbit

It's easy to get confused with the differences between DND and sleep modes.

While both modes mute notifications, sleep mode reduces your screen's brightness and prevents the display from turning on when you move.

When you turn on Sleep mode, the following occurs on your watch:

Notifications, goal celebrations, and reminders to move are muted.
The screen's brightness is set to dim.
The Always-On Display clock face is turned off.
The screen stays dark when you turn your wrist.
Thesleepmode icon illuminates in the quick settings.
You can schedule sleep mode to turn on and off automatically. If you don't set a schedule, you must disable it manually.
1. Set a sleep mode schedule in the Settings app.

When you turn on DND, the following occurs on your watch:

Notifications, goal celebrations, and reminders to move are muted.
The do not disturb icon illuminates in the quick settings.
DND does not automatically turn off. You must manually disable it.

Notifications only appear on your Fitbit device for a few seconds

If you do not interact with those notifications, they automatically disappear from your device's screen. To see any unread notifications, swipe down from the top of your Fitbit's screen.

The other method for checking notifications involves the Fitbit app on your phone, tablet, etc. To check the notification settings, you'll need to follow these steps:

Look at notification settings using your Fitbit app:

Open the Fitbit app.
Tap your account picture or icon in the top left-hand corner.
Select your Fitbit device.
TapNotifications, then tap App Notifications (if applicable).
Scroll and find the app in question.
For iPhone, toggleOn any app you want to show notifications on your Fitbit. For Android, tap the item, then turn it on.

Are you too far away?

Occasionally, everything may be working on your Fitbit, and then all of a sudden, it stops.

The first culprit of this is due to how far away you are from your smartphone.

Say that you're cleaning around the house and leave your phone in one room.

Well, your notifications might stop after a certain distance threshold has been met.

In the case of Fitbit, your smartphone must be within 30 feet for it to transmit correctly. If not, your Fitbit will become just a digital watch until you get back within range.

The nice thing here is that you won't have to worry about repairing the Fitbit, as your devices should communicate.

Once you're back in range, everything should go back to normal.

Do you sync your Fitbit with more than one mobile device?

When we sync our devices with more than one mobile device (especially two phones), our notifications often disappear or go haywire.

That's because your Fitbit can only receive notifications from one phone–when you allow your Fitbit to view (and send) texts, you create a bond between that phone and your Fitbit.

Your Fitbit can only bond with one phone at a time.

If you sync your Fitbit with more than one phone, make sure you turn notifications on for only one phone and turn them off on the other–that way, they won't interfere.

Frankly, we have trouble with notifications not showing up even when syncing with our iPhone and iPad.

So it's a good practice to use only one mobile device with your Fitbit consistently.

Other methods that help when notifications aren't showing up on your Fitbit

The methods above are likely some of the easiest ways to get your Fitbit back in working order. However, there are still some others that you can try before giving up.

Force Quit

This next option is a straightforward one, as Fitbit suggests you Force Quit the Fitbit app. This can be done in a variety of ways, depending on the device that you have.

For an iPhone, swipe up on the home screen to the app switcher. Find the Fitbit app, then swipe it off the top of your screen.
- For older models with a home button, double press the home button and then swipe the Fitbit app off the top of your screen.
On an Android device, you access the multitasking menu. From there, you can swipe away the app and re-open to check to see if everything is working.

Refresh

Another way to get your Fitbit working again is to refresh the notification settings. To do this, you'll need to follow these steps:

Open the Fitbit app.
Tap your device icon in the top left-hand corner.
SelectNotifications.
Turn off all notifications,including app notifications.
Restart your phone.
Open the Fitbit app and toggle notifications on.

This gives your device a "fresh" start without needing to set everything up again. Performing this task has been known to knock out any cobwebs.

Restart your Fitbit

There's an old saying, "did you try unplugging it and plugging it back in?" Although technology is much more advanced than 20 years ago, this adage still applies from time to time.

Performing a restart on your Fitbit varies, depending on the device that you own.

For example, these are the steps to restart your Sense, Versa Series, Blaze, or Ionic:

Press and hold the button (Sense and Versa 3,) the back button (Versa 2 and Versa Lite), or the back and bottom buttons (Versa, Blaze, and Ionic) for around 10 seconds.
When you see the Fitbit logo, let go of the buttons.

This forces your Fitbit to restart, bringing you back to the "home page" once completed. But your mileage may vary if you own a different tracker.

For other Fitbit models or a step-by-step, see this article: Need to restart or reset your Fitbit device? Learn the steps.

Start your Fitbit's Bluetooth connection from scratch

If all else fails, you will need to go through and set up notifications again from scratch. Of course, this method is only suggested if your Fitbit is working in every other capacity.

However, here are the steps you need to take to set up notifications from scratch:

Open theSettings app on your device.
SelectBluetooth.
Find your Fitbit and tap on it.
Find the option toForget Device.

This halts communications between your smartphone and smartwatch. From there, you need to go back into the Fitbit app and set up the device as if you just opened it.

Delete the Fitbit app and reinstall

If you tried all the steps above and still cannot get your notifications to show up on your Fitbit, then uninstall and reinstall the Fitbit app.

For iPhone: go to Settings > General > iPhone Storage > Fitbit app > Delete app.
For Android: go to Settings > Apps & Notifications > Show all apps > Fitbit > Uninstall.

To reinstall, visit the Apple App Store or Google Play Store and download and install the Fitbit app again. You'll need to set your Fitbit device up again.

Since Fitbit saves your account information on its servers, deleting the app and reinstalling it does not result in data loss.

Conclusion

These are just some methods you can use if you run into issues with notifications on your Fitbit. If one of these worked for you, let us know in the comments below!

If you found a different method than the ones listed above, let us know to add it to the list! Oh, and be sure to mention which device you are using to help others figure out the problem.