The revamped Google Health app (formerly Fitbit) has arrived with the new Fitbit Air, and although not everyone is happy with the changes, my experience has been overwhelmingly positive.
I’ve been using the new UI for six months, looking forward to the Health Coach preview launch in late 2025, and while the upgrade to Google Health brings some useful changes and features, there are still some improvements I’d like to see. These are my biggest highlights after spending some time with the new Google Health app.
A welcome redesign and AI overload
Let me start by saying that, unlike some longtime Fitbit users, I wasn’t attached to the old Fitbit app design, which I found bland and uninteresting.
The new design is more colorful and animated, making the information easier to see and understand. Your Focus metrics are easily accessible at the top of the Today tab, or you can scroll down to dig deeper into today’s and yesterday’s activities.
The tabs are also clearer in their focus, with the navigation bar now featuring four tabs, including Fitness, Sleep, and Health. I find it much better than the three tabs in the old app, and I’m glad Sleep and Health have their own dedicated sections.
The app is very AI-focused, and if you’re subscribed to Google Health Premium, the Health Coach is present everywhere. I don’t really mind Health Coach too much (more on this later), but in an app it can be quite overwhelming. Each section is packed with information and large blocks of text to help you better understand your metrics.
Google says it’s working to make Health Coach messages “more concise without sacrificing helpful details,” while also enhancing the messages with “more visuals like charts, maps, and viewable statistics.”
I think this is a step in the right direction, but Google should go further and hide coach messages. Simply present the data visually on each tab, and add a small button to each card with the distinctive AI sparkle icon to expand it to view Health Coach messages.
This way, users aren’t bombarded with AI-generated text and can decide when they need additional information. Give us more control over the experience.
keep me on track
The Coach tab in the previous Fitbit app was quite weak Daily run recommendations are the only feature I found remotely useful. Google took this and ran with it, extending AI to underpin the entire app experience.
During the onboarding process, I told the coach about my goals, available equipment, and any illnesses that might hinder my performance. Even when I suggested limits on how much exercise I wanted to do each week, it provided some welcome feedback, warning that I might be overexerting myself. After setting a schedule, the coach has done a great job of keeping me on track week to week.
Part of this is thanks to a more flexible weekly cardio load, which basically measures how intense your activities are. This metric is available on the Today tab and is also easily visible in the Fitness tab for additional guidance.
I told the coach I wanted to gain muscle, lose body fat, and become more consistent in running so I could run my first 5K later this year. Since then, my weekly workouts have focused on these goals, with a variety of exercises each session and a weekly walk that includes different circuits at different target distances and speeds.
You can either follow the workouts to the T or edit them to your liking. I just do what the Fitbit tells me, making small adjustments here and there depending on how I feel.
You can also start in-app workouts or send custom runs to your Pixel Watch. Unfortunately, I’m still unable to send non-run workouts to the watch, which seems like either a bug or a mistake.
Another downside is that while the Workout UI feels more structured and easier to follow, the Pixel Watch still can’t automatically count reps or sets, which I like about Garmin and even Samsung smartwatches.
On the plus side, the workout can also automatically advance to the next exercise after the set timer expires, but it would be nice to see this implemented with auto repeat counting.
I also don’t like that the workouts are now listed as “suggestions” in the Fitness tab, which feels a little less committed. In the preview, there was a set workout or rest period for each day of the week, which provided a good structure.
Luckily, Google has already noted that users are demanding more structure, and it’s “bringing back weekly structured schedules in some way later this year,” which I’m looking forward to. Until then, this format isn’t terrible, especially for users who like flexibility.
encouragement goes a long way
Despite how underwhelming the AI ​​on the Google Health app can be, I actually find it quite encouraging. The messages are generally quite informative, taking into account your activity, sleep and metrics to properly prepare you for the day.
For example, I worked out a lot the first few days of the week, more than I usually do. As a result, I was encouraged to rest on Wednesday, which I did. Later that evening, the app told me that the rest was “exactly what your system needs” while keeping things “low key” with a light walk.
It then started preparing me to return to the gym the next day, suggesting I set an alarm, pack up my gear, and drink more water as it noticed my resting heart rate was increasing.
Coach typically provides practical messages like this, often delivered as notifications to my phone throughout the day, after a workout, or when I wake up. And if need be, he’ll change his tune if he senses things are off, like if I didn’t get enough restful sleep.
If you want more information about your sleep, workouts, or other metrics, you can definitely chat with a health coach. A few times, I had to ask it to adjust my workout schedule and cardio load because I was traveling for work that week and knew I wouldn’t be able to go to the gym. The coach will then work with me to change my goals based on when I can go back to the gym that week or completely eliminate my workout plan for that week. It is quite flexible.
You can also ask for advice on how to improve specific metrics, and it will respond with suggestions about what you can do, along with links to the sources from which it comes.
This is the kind of experience I’d expect from a personal trainer, so it’s great that I can get it through a relatively inexpensive app subscription. That said, I still don’t think it can replace having a real person train you.
Virtual replacement of MyFitnessPal
Food logging is a Google Health feature I’d love to have, but it doesn’t work that well. When logging food, you can either tell the coach what you ate or you can take a photo of it. Surprisingly (or perhaps, unsurprisingly), object recognition is very good, and the app can figure out quite accurately what your food is by simply taking a photo.
Another option is to take a picture of the barcode, if there is one, MyFitnessPal offers an option of its own barcode-scanning feature, which requires you to subscribe to access.
The downside to any of these methods is that even though Google Health knows what you’re eating, the information it logs is still inaccurate. For example, I took a photo of a meal I made, which only includes four scrambled eggs and about 2 ounces of ground beef. The app knows its fried eggs and ground beef, but the nutritional value was quite low, with the app overestimating the amount of protein.
I tried to make it easier by scanning the barcode of Barbell protein bars, which have the nutritional value clearly listed on the wrapper. The app recognized the bar, but the calories were still under 10, and this was one of only a few inaccuracies I noticed with food logging.
Luckily, Google Health syncs with MyFitnessPal, so I can still log my meals in that app and the correct nutrition values ​​will appear. Still, I’m hoping Google can step up its game here, as it would bring the Google Health app a huge step closer to becoming my one app to rule them all.
My health in one place
Speaking of one app to rule them all, it’s clear that this is Google’s goal with the Health app, especially now that You can link your medical records. I’ve linked my past and present medical providers to the app, and now I can see my condition, medications, travel history, vaccines, and even lab results, all in one place.
I really find it to be a convenient way to not only see everything in one place, but also bring more context to the coach for your overall health.
You can also log them in the app if new lab results don’t sync automatically, although the app seems to do a good job of syncing the information. I just wish the data was presented better; Looking at historical data for 788 lab results, 95 medications, and 71 conditions seems overwhelming, especially since I currently take only a few medications and have few diseases.
You can also ask the coach about some details of your medical history, and the coach even warned me that the results of a recent test were “out of the normal range” (don’t worry, I’m fine). And while some may find this access useful, others will undoubtedly find it intrusive.
You can choose what to sync, and Google says All you need to do is verify your identity with CLEAR when any of your information is shared. Otherwise, it assures that your synced medical history is “stored securely” in the app. But still, it depends on you whether you want to provide additional information to Google Health or not.
more to come
Obviously, Google Health is not perfect and there are many things that either need to be fixed, changed, or that are Just plainly missing. Many users have complained about this AI Heath Koch is hallucinatingAlthough I have not intentionally experienced this. Sleep Profiles are something I miss from the old Fitbit app, which matched users with cute animals based on their sleep style.
Luckily, Google is already hard at work preparing updates for the app, and has provided a list of updates coming sooner or later this year. Sleep profiles still aren’t among them, but I hope so.
Still, it’s a good sign that Google is listening to users’ feedback to create a comprehensive health app for everyone, and I, for one, am all for it. If you really like something or things don’t seem right, remember to give a thumbs up or down for any feature or AI response in the Google Health app.
