Obama still wears his Fitbit Ionic, long after burn risk recall

Former President of the United States, Barack Obama is thought for his love for Fitbit smartwatches. Obama first commenced the use of the Fitbit Surge, which become launched lower back in 2014, before switching to the Fitbit Ionic.

Former President Obama is on the campaign trail ahead of the midterm elections and still wears his Fitbit Ionic, which was recalled due to burn risks. As seen in a recent public appearance, and there are no plans to switch soon.

Fitbit Ionic

Relaunched in 2017, the Fitbit Ionic was Fitbit’s second smartwatch to come with a color display and the first to run Fitbit OS. The watch had 2.5GB of internal storage, that can shop as much as 300 portions of music.

The Fitbit Ionic includes a suite of health tracking features. These had built-in GPS tracking, unlike the Blaze, which depended on a nearby smartphone signal. The watch become waterproof as much as 50 meters. Which means Fitbit has added a swimming mode that can track calories burned, elapsed time and laps. The new Run Detect feature meant the Ionic was smart enough to know when you were taking a break. The watch can automatically stop and start tracking a run, swim or cycle by sensing your movement status.

Ionic also supports NFC for wireless mobile payments. Fitbit’s relationships with Accuweather, Starbucks, Pandora and Strava mean that the Ionic supports a lot of third-party apps. The battery lasted 4 days per charge or 10 hours of continuous GPS use or music playback on a single charge.

Starting at $299, the Ionic become Fitbit’s first well-rounded smartwatch and a right away competitor to the Apple Watch Series 3.

Why was the Ionic recalled?

After the initial success of the Ionic, Fitbit began receiving reports of burns among its users. According to the CPSC, upon further investigation, it was found that the battery in the Fitbit Ionic was overheating. So, in March 2022, there were 1.7 million Ionics sold worldwide recalled.

Fitbit received at least 115 reports in the U.S. and 59 internationally. There were 78 reports of burns in the United States, including two reports of third-degree burns and four reports of second-degree burns, as well as 40 reports of burns internationally.

Fitbit asked its customers to immediately stop using the watch and contact Fitbit to obtain prepaid packaging to return the device. Fitbit issued a $299 refund to all users. Giving participating customers a discount code for 40% off Fitbit devices, bands, and services.