Fitbit Air And Pixel Watch 5 Gain Automatic Detection For 100+ Workouts

Google is pushing a sizeable software update to its wearables in India, and the headline feature is one fitness tracker owners have asked for since forever: automatic workout detection that recognises more than 100 activity types, up from just 10. The rollout, detailed on Google's India blog, lands on the Fitbit Air and the Pixel Watch 3, 4 and 5 later this month.

The expanded detection now picks up strength training, swimming, racket sports like badminton, and team sports, categories the old system mostly ignored unless you logged them manually. Wear the device through at least 15 minutes of exercise with an elevated heart rate and it should log the session on its own, with a summary typically appearing in the Google Health app within 30 minutes. Google says the detection engine now factors in context, including location if a user allows it, and gets smarter over time as people confirm or correct what it logged. In Google's own internal testing, the changes made detection nearly twice as accurate and cut missed workouts by more than half.

A new way to flag health trends

Alongside workout detection, Google is introducing Health Guardian, a feature built to catch slow-moving changes in the body that people tend to miss day to day, specifically trends in blood pressure and insulin resistance. Set it up through the Google Health app and, with enough consistent wear across a month, it produces a report at the start of the next one. The Gemini-powered Google Health Coach can then walk through what shifted and suggest adjustments to a fitness or lifestyle routine.