Differentiating Fitness and Routine objects

This article pertains to: Legacy API (V1)

What is the difference between fitness and routine data objects?

Fitness data are activities that are undertaken with the express purpose of exercising. These activities have a defined duration (time, distance, elevation, etc.). Often, these activities are logged manually, either on the app’s website or their mobile application. There are many devices that also generate fitness data, usually when a user has to "start" an activity on a fitness watch or tracker, and then purposefully "end" that activity once they've completed it.

Routine data, on the other hand, are activities that occur regularly throughout the day, without the specific goal of exercise. This type of data is usually generated by some kind of wearable fitness activity tracker, like the Garmin Vivofit or Fitbit Flex. The data retrieved from these devices include aggregate number of steps taken over a day, and the calories burned while taking those steps. It may also include # of stairs climbed, etc. as this is aggregated data collected by the device over the course of the whole day, there is only one "Routine" record retrieved from the source per day.