Hi, I’m trying to make Zwift and the Apple Watch Ultra (first generation) working together but it seems impossible.
The first thing I tried was:
Zwift running on iPad
Zwift Companion on iPhone
Zwift Companion on Apple Watch to get heart rate.
My problem was the the watch kept disconnecting and the heart rate was almost never showing.
So I tried:
Zwift on iPhone
Zwift (not Zwift Companion) on Apple Watch to get heart rate.
I completed the running workout without any heart rate disconnection but when I saved the activity the distance was missing even though on Strava was saved.
Are you aware of the problem? Do you have any suggestions?
I route data via Garmin app. That way I get complete HR data (shame on you Zwift) and rings updates in Apple health. You don’t need any Garmin hardware, just account. So ma data goes Zwift → Garmin → Apple Health
Well I just did like you said (Zwift > Garmin > Apple Health ) and I went for a treadmill run without wearing my Apple Watch Ultra because I wanted to see if the rings actually updated.
After everything was synchronized I was pretty disappointed because even though my run was in Apple Fitness the rings didn’t changed.
Then I picked up my watch and put it on my wrist and started receiving rings notifications of completed goals: I looked at Apple Fitness again and rings did actually updated!
Now a couple of details.
Previously I was using RunGap to have my indoor run in Apple Fitness and
RunGap show the indoor run map in Apple Fitness the run map, Garmin doesn’t
I still have to try a run with incline to see if Garmin does sync the elevation too!
I‘m new to this discussion, but have the same issue.
I‘m using AppleTV for Zwift and the Companion on my iPhone:
When I use my Watch as heart rate monitor, everything gets synchronised well. This would be the easiest solution, but unfortunately, to pair my Watch and Companion is each time a nightmare.
Because of that, I bought a polar chest strep and connected it to my Zwift Hub. With this, the connection is up super fast, I can sit on my bike and just ride on. With this combination I had to results:
with Zwift running in parallel on my Watch, but not selected as heart monitor: COMPLETE synchronised to Health.
without Zwift running in parallel on my Watch: Missing Heart data with a result in just closed the Training but not the Activity ring.
So, do I really need to throw away my Polar monitor and fighting each time with my Watch?
I really don’t want to synchronise through different apps, just to collect everything in health.
Any Idea how to use the Polar chest band and to get all Information anyhow to Health?
Apple Watch won’t reliably connect to Zwift Companion
Polar HR monitor can connect to either Apple
TV or Companion, but the uploaded Zwift data no longer closes Apple Fitness rings or uploads heart rate.
What I have found that works for me is to go into Apple
Health and to shut off all sharing from both Zwift and Zwift Companion, and enable all sharing to/from Strava. Connect Zwift account to Strava on the Zwift website. Then Zwift will upload to Strava and Strava will upload to Apple Health. Heart rate info uploads and rings will now close.
I do have an app called Health Fit installed on my iPhone with all sharing permissions enabled in Apple
Health, and I have it connected to Strava on the Strava website. I’m not sure if this app is helping to facilite the data transfer but it’s a free app and just runs in the background.
My solution to getting the move ring to close in the interim (while waiting for Apple Watch full support) is as follows: (for Zwift on PC)
You need an external heart rate monitor over Ant+, and your trainer needs to be running over ant+. If you use Bluetooth, the data doesn’t seem to transfer.
Ensure companion app (watch and phone) are running
The watch won’t pair, but it still seems to work to track data
You need to start an indoor cycle workout on your watch when you start riding, and the data will be shared between the workout and the zwift app.
You will show two workouts at the same time, but it’s not double counted. Tracks heart rate, power, cadence, distance.
Seems to work well, even if a little redundant and you need to remember to start the workout on your watch.
I find it absolutely nuts and also unacceptable that 2 years on this feature is still not possible in Zwift and that we have to rely on 3rd Party apps to sync workout data from Zwift to Apple Health / Apple Fitness. Come on Zwift, surely you can do better than this for your community / users?!
While the Zwift Companion app is writing workouts to Apple Health, it does so incompletely. A few issues:
It does not write recorded power data at all, pretty glaring!
While it tags the activity with “Total Active Energy” it doesn’t actually write that entity (leading to multiple bug reports in these forums), see this by clicking it under “Related Samples” and observe “No Data”
Same problem as #2 with “Total Cycling Distance”
It doesn’t write speed, elevation or GPS coordinates…so no map either (for whatever that’s worth in a virtual world)
It’s like the most minimal effort was made, and unfortunately this is a case of a partial implementation being worse than none at all.
The indie RunGap app is surprisingly capable of reading Zwift activities and then writing them to Apple Health with all the correct entities. So I’m using that for now, but this is a very basic feature for a paid fitness service and needs to be implemented properly.
This feature request should be considered still open. As I detailed in forums.zwift DOT com/t/zwift-companion-not-writing-data-correctly-to-apple-health/635429 (I’m really annoyingly not allowed to put links in my posts…) it’s woefully incomplete.
You ask the question as if it’s inevitable. I wouldn’t assume that to be the case. Apple have shown that they are not “open” to integration with fitness apps (their refusal to broadcast a standard HR signal is a perfect example). Zwift could pour many hours/dollars into integration only for Apple to move the goalposts.
I’m no tech wizard but I use many other fitness apps that integrate with Apple health and/or the workout app. Some of these are pretty small compared to Zwift so I’m sure it’s not that difficult.
@Andy_Jordan_BFAST - Can you outline the workflow you are using? Is there a way to automate this with RunGap? I have an app called HealthFit and can’t figure out how to automate the workflow in a way that will get a Zwift workout into Strava, TrainingPeaks and Apple Health correctly. I’d love to know how you are doing it if you have a good workflow.
In Zwift account, click Advanced Settings, toggle on Use as Source (under Auto Sharing)
Go back, under Accounts and Settings, click Apple Health
In Apple Health account, click Advanced Settings, toggle on Use as Destination (under Auto Sharing)
Go back, under Accounts Settings, scroll to Additional Settings
Enable Auto Sharing by setting to Past 7 Days
Enabled Refresh on Open and Background Refresh
I usually open RunGap after I save my Zwift ride so it goes to Fitness immediately and I can give it an RPE score. Sometimes I’m in a rush and within a few hours I get a notification that it did it in the background.
I also setup Garmin Connect as an upload source and set it to filter out Zwift activities sent to it by manually selecting all the cycling activity types except Virtual Cycling. That way I get the full proper sync that RunGap provides for my outdoor rides into Fitness too (since Garmin also fails to do this right, even though the small team behind RunGap has it perfect) and can keep Zwift sending to Garmin Connect. Why I bother with that any more, I’m not sure. Just in case I ever want them there it’s easier to have them than add them later. I try to leave TrainingPeaks and now Apple Health as the “sources of truth” for my activities…it was Garmin Connect for a long, long time but now I’m starting to be tied into that ecosystem less. Apple Watch is just so much better.
Apple should just hire the RunGap team and loan them out to the fitness companies to fix their garbage implementations.
