Challenges - Compete, Get Fit Reviews

The this app App is very motivating and I participate in several this app every month. Now and then when maximum points are achieved the next day points disappear and are not always retrieved by syncing. Filing a ticket is useless, the reply blames your other apps. You have to increase move points above and beyond the required threshold to avoid getting your points stolen by Challenges . One (1) point loss can put you way behind in a competitive group challenge where 20 or more have perfect scores. If your progress is not recorded in the Activity App it won’t be in this app either. If your watch and phone Activity App isn’t syncing that can be troublesome. I have had to find and use a variety of troubleshooting methods to stay in sync and avoid losing points.
1geraldine

Challenges has basically changed my life. I am a participant in WW (formerly known as Weight Watchers). Although many of the uninformed think of WW as a mere diet— the reality is it is a lifestyle choice. It’s not just what you eat but how you think about eating. And it’s also about staying active. That’s where your App comes in. I have the Apple Watch and iPhone, but these tools really spring to life when you connect them with the this app App. Every month I compete with about 10 other WW members in all parts of the United States and we have a blast. I never win, but that’s not the point. I try to close my rings every day to stay competitive. It’s addicting.

The only improvement I would request is to integrate FitBit into Challenges for my WW friends who prefer that device to the Apple Watch. I’ve noticed there is a link to that in the settings and I have asked a few folks to try it out since I don’t own a Fitbit. I’m looking forward to the possibility of adding them into the next Challenge.

Thanks again for this amazing App.

I REALLY wish that the competition metric could be set to steps or calories instead of points for closing rings. The concept of rings is too abstract. Why do competitions use a 370 calorie daily goal, and why is this not adjustable? You should be able to edit the name and description of teams and this app after creating them. Names and descriptions should also be optional. The requirement to have teams is confusing in competitions with just a few people. There should be a way to search for this app or to make a challenge public so that others can join without being explicitly invited (they would still need to be approved).

Update: Fantastic! My friends and family and I have all switched to Rove but Rove doesn’t send any notifications so it’s not very motivating for us. My crew will be anxiously awaiting a step challenge app that can send us a ton of notifications throughout the day. I haven’t used the Fitbit app in several years but it sent the notifications that we’re wanting. E.g. “Matt just took the lead! Go get some steps!”

I was searching all over the Internet in different apps for fitness this app I could join. Challenges has been the absolute easiest way to find compete. I really like that I can Join a Team or create my own very quickly and easily whether I invite others to my team or strangers join. I also enjoy the social aspect of Challenges. So be sure to check the “Comments” section of each challenge you join for even more challenge codes or just to communicate with other people competing.

I really like the idea of being able to create and join this app with my friends to keep me motivated. There are a few things I’d like to see added in future updates:

1- I’m not sure why it only allows you to have four people on a team. I’m guessing it’s to keep things fair amongst all the groups in the challenge. My suggestion would be to leave the group size open and then allow groups of the same size to compete with one another.

2- My second issue kind of ties into the first one. Since I can only create teams of four, I can’t be in a group with all of my friends. This would be fine if I could just join multiple groups. Since I can’t do that, I have to encourage my friends to create their own teams, which can be confusing for people that have never used Challenges before.

LoseIt! has apparently dropped support for in-app this app, replacing it with this this app app. Unfortunately it appears that some of the best (most motivating) features did not carry over. It compounds other issues in LoseIt like the fact that even “verified” foods are often incorrect. In LoseIt, the challenge showed WHAT points were earned for. So if for example “spinach” was not counting toward veg points, it was possible to choose a different “spinach” option that did count. This was annoying but at least allowed users to get the points that help motive them to eat plenty of fruit and veg. In this new app, there does not appear to be any detail. So a key motivator for many users has vanished. So, so, so disappointing. I’ve used the LoseIt app since it was first launched and saw it develop in really wonderful ways. But in the last couple of years it gets less and less useful, and this new this app app is unfortunately part of that decline.

Challenges means well but lately I have been having issues with the way they do the point system. I set my goal which is different to the one that is used per day for the week using the watch. I almost closed that move circle on the 22nd of February of the year of 2022. Meaning I almost burn 1,000 calories for the move circle. In challenge the move goal is 430 calories. Before going to bed it claimed I maxed out the points when I view the history they took points away from me for no reason what so ever. It can be fun to use but they don’t seem to be honest about what you earn! And I have proof that it actually happens where they are taking away points for no reason.

I have seen this company try to restore the points only to have them taken away again. I have taken screenshots of everything as proof of this company running Challenges doing this. I have the proof.

Dec 1, 2020: I’ve been using for many months now a d it’s working better each time. It helps once you get the hang of it. Would love to see it allow more than four people. Also it would be nice to have a challenge where the goal was to close all the rings and it tallied that instead of points. This is fun for variety.

This was original review:

Created one challenge for closing the rings and it worked pretty good. The instructions to do so are less than ideal and quite confusing and cumbersome. But, I’m slogging through and trying to give it a good try. I tried the nutrition challenge and couldn’t get it to work. Never could get the meals to synchronize from LoseIt to this app. With some work this could be a very nice app.

I did a couple of late night workouts and noticed that my iPhone Activity App (to which Challenges syncs) tally for move (calories) and exercise (minutes) did not match what was in Challenges. It fails to update the data for any activity that happens between the last sync of the day and midnight. In other words, if it syncs at 11:40 pm, and again at 12:01 am, the activity that occurred between 11:40 and midnight is not updated in Challenges, no matter how many times I try to sync. Now that I am aware of this issue, I will manually sync just before midnight when I am working out late at night. However, it would be nice to see this issue addressed in future updates.

The latest update seems to be causing all kinds of problems. Several people in our challenge can’t get their points to reflect steps even though Challenges shows they have the steps. We’ve tried to sync data, signing out and back in, uninstalled and reinstalled, turned off permissions and turned them back on. It’s become a pain to try and figure out. What once was a fun way to motivate one another to get moving has become a source of frustration and disappointment. Not sure what was broken, but I sure hope you fixed it because if we’re having these kinds of issues and the original issue wasn’t taken care of then what was it all for?!

I just found Challenges a few weeks ago and it has been AMAZING! I’ve been a LoseIt user for almost a year and now being able to link that into this app with other folks on the same path has been so motivating! I love it!!

The only thing that makes me sad is that the this app app is not currently available on iPad. I do most of my logging on LoseIt on my iPad and I love seeing the this app there too. But for any challenge created in the this app app instead of the LoseIt app, I can’t open them to see my progress because there’s no iPad support. I really hope this is added in soon.

Thanks for making awesome apps!!

Challenges is a great motivator and works well most of the time. The major problem I see is not really with Challenges , but with people who cannot follow directions. Challenges needs to be updated so that this app set as individual this app do not support teams. Right now, all of the individual this app I have been a part of are completely invalid because people sign up in teams and invalidate the challenge. Truly losing my motivation to sign up at all because of this problem. App developers, please find a way to distinguish between individual and group this app in Challenges . If that occurs, Challenges would be 5 stars for sure!

Love Challenges ! Definitely very motivating! The only issue I have is more with the group with some people changing and lowering their daily goals in order to close the rings with lower effort and get more points which is frustrating. I do wish we could still see team members move calories to see if everyone on the team were being fair but hopefully that will come back. Because of Challenges I work so much harder and actively do more like walking my dog further etc to get more points!

Because of Challenges, I have been way more active than I was before, so for that I’m
Extremely greatly! I’m a highly competitive person by nature, and this is a great way to stay active while still competing with others. There are a few things I, along with many others, think could greatly improve Challenges :

1. Make it an option to have individual this app. Currently when we try do this, we end up arguing with teams of multiple people for the duration of the competition because they don’t follow instructions, or lock their team to only one person.

2. Allow whoever created their team the option of removing their team member. There are often people who drag a team down and there’s nothing they can really do about it unless they all leave them behind and start a new one. By giving the team created that option, it would alleviate that issue.

Hey, I started using Challenges on Feb, 15 with the starting weight of 275 lbs. today after 22 days, on March 7th, I got to 258 lbs. l understand that losing weight is not easy especially when you kept the high weight for long time. Using Challenges, I am educated on what to eat and how much and most of the benefit are showed up after tracking my nutritions. I am happy with Challenges. I am sure that I will achieve my goal I.e. 187 lbs (high side for my height) sometime very soon.

Challenges keeps reducing my prior day points. I have synced my app on the history page but that doesn’t update prior day points. I have deleted Challenges and reinstalled which worked once but hasn’t worked since. This seems to be a bug that happened in the March Challenge.
In addition to Challenges deleting my hard earned points, there are days that I clearly exceed my point goals (based on Apple Rings app) and this app does not give me the full points earned. Very Frustrating!
I have been using Challenges since June 2020 in a very competitive group competition. I have been happy with Challenges until March 2021 when these bugs appeared. Please fix!

I would give this 5 stars if there was a team chat feature. If we could talk to each other as a group, it would be more motivating. I am only able to send my team messages that are predetermined. I can only talk to them one on one. If someone tells me they have an issue or need some help, why can’t they tell our whole team? Why can’t we talk as a team? If I knew my teammates personally, I would set up a group chat some other way. This would be a great modification to an already fun and motivating app.

Great! Was looking for something like this. Apple watch only does one one one completions and this does it via groups which is perfect.

If you do a challenge and do a solo team it works as intended. However you can do it 4 to a team but not what I use it for.

Think the interface could use a little cleaning. Would be nice if there was a buy in to compete for money etc.

I’d give Challenges 5 stars in a heartbeat with two changes....

1) PLEASE make an option for a challenge creator to select individual or group. It is beyond frustrating that there is no control of this and that people can create teams when the creator explicitly states the challenge is for individuals only. Whether people simply can’t follow directions or purposely sabotage a challenge, it’s very disheartening.

2) I noticed in my last challenge I had to sync several times for my data from my watch to match my data showing in Challenges . The sync feature is a bit buggy.

Other than that this is a great app. Very user friendly and I like the scoring system. Would use it a lot more and would even pay for Challenges if those issues were addressed. Unfortunately until the individual/group issue is addressed I won’t be using Challenges any longer.

App immediately opens to a screen to make a “Lose It” app logon. If I wanted to use “Lose it” or have an account, I’d of downloaded that app instead. Have found that most apps lately that require an account that needs to be logged into are data sellers, meaning everything logged about you is sold to “partners” and the company you’re dealing with will say they are not responsible for what the partners do with your info. Did not make an account in Challenges, so did not get to read the fine print, but it’s a good guess that’s where this was headed. Apps are what’s for sale anymore, you are. And your entire online world is tied to the email account you use, which is also tied to the real world.

One of the reasons I bought the Apple Watch is because I thought it was really cool to close the rings by staying active throughout the day. The Challenge app just takes that up a notch! You are accountable to others. Really. If you sign up, your team is counting on you to earn points. Every day since I joined a group I feel that and I’ve been dedicated to doing my part.

I love Challenges! It has really motivated me to keep moving. The display is quick and easy to read. The only drawbacks I have are: #1 at times, it won’t sync and I have to turn everything off and restart to get it working properly. #2 it is extremely difficult to earn move points. After a 4 mile brisk walk, I still cannot close the move ring. Each day, I try to close it 3 times and after working out for 2 solid hours, that still doesn’t happen. Great concept, because I love a good competition, but Challenges needs a little work.

Accepted a challenge invite so I installed Challenges . Went through the process of creating a profile and allowing access to Apple health info.
Tried to proceed to challenge, “create team” popped up, made team name and clicked enter and get an error popup.
Click this app, sends me back to create team. Endless error pop up cycle, inevitably making Challenges un-useable and useless.
Hopefully the developers can fix this bug because the premise of Challenges is what is lacking on apple’s end. Fitbit has nailed it with their community and this app and Apple has nailed it with design and function, if only I could have both!!! Was hoping Challenges would solve that. Still hopefully. Please fix and I’ll update this review.

Oh also, “teams” is kind of a lame premise. The goal is to beat your friends in competition, which inspires competition. Can you please set an option to just compete against friends and not have to be a part of a team at all?

I’m not sure why the option to have control of the challenge/teams had never been implemented, but it is SO frustrating when you try to set up an individual challenge and people don’t follow directions on how to do that and run it for everyone else. It would be nice if wet had the ability to remove people from our teams and also remove teams from our this app. 🤷🏻‍♀️

Other than this, I love Challenges.

I just started my first challenge through Challenges today! So far I am loving it. It is giving me the motivation to get moving and stay moving! I just wished you could write a message to all my teammates at once instead of selecting a pre written message or writing it individually one at a time. Perhaps the option is there and I just haven't figured it out yet!

Only issue is people don't understand when a challenge is created and their asked to do individual they make teams. Needs to be able to let challenge creator choose that option

Challenges is much improved over the last time I tried it. It’s now got the option to add individual groups for competition with friends and family who have the Apple Watch.

It’s still slight confusing and needs cleaned up so that it has the ease of software like Fitbit.

It’s going to be a great app when flushed out. Very impressed with the progress, as this is just the sort of competition based app the Apple Watch needs.

I love the idea of Challenges. If you work out near midnight though, even after manually syncing prior to midnight, you do not get all of your points. When trying to contact support, they just tell you to manually sync and update Challenges , then ignore you when you tell them you’ve already done that. This is a huge flaw in Challenges , as I work out very late in the evening and am tired of not getting my due points.

The idea of Challenges is cool, to bring together communities and have them compete in fitness competitions. But the problem is, Challenges aggregates points based on the number of members - so all you need is more members and your team wins. The correct way to do it would be average points per member, so that it doesn’t matter how many team members your team has.
Challenges also hasn’t seen an update in over 6 months.
I uninstalled after a week when the notifications got out of hand.

Challenges is great! But I used it for an Athletic Center holiday challenge and found the limitations of number of people on a team and made only for Apple Watch users. If in the next update you could change the team limit and have all smart watch users be able to use Challenges then this would be a better app.