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I use an Apple Watch 5 and the Strava app to track my activities and everything works fine -- distance, heart rate, etc. shows up every time and seems basically correct.

I recently started cycling. The tracking works fine, but for some reason there's no heart rate data -- that section of my cycling activities says I should use a heart rate monitor if I want heart rate data. Why would this be happening? Do I need to somehow switch "on" the heart rate data for cycling somewhere? (The heart rate data is still showing up for running, and when I look in Apple's native health app, I can see that the watch has recorded heart rate data while I was cycling, so it's not that the watch is not recording it.) Thanks!

P.S. And yes, I have the most recent version of the app.

Hey @begun,

Thanks for taking the time to write in and I'm sorry to hear about the heart rate issues with the Strava Watch app. Would you mind confirming if you've allowed Strava access to Heart Rate data? You can verify this by going to:

Settings app > Health > Data Access & Devices > Strava

Heart Rate should have a green toggle to indicate that we are allowed to read this data. I have provided a screenshot of how this should look:

If these settings have been enabled,

  • Please force close the Strava app on your Apple Watch and iPhone; confirm the applications are closed.
  • From there restart your Apple Watch and iPhone.
  • When your devices have restarted, can you see if this behavior persists when you record different activity types on the Strava Watch app?
  • Lastly, when you're recording with the Strava Watch app, is the heart rate icon just grayed out or are you seeing two dashes?
  • If you have Workout Power Saving mode enabled, please disable this feature as it can affect how often your Watch collects hr data. Watch app on the paired phone > Workout > Power Saving Mode(toggle should be off, no color)
  • Please note: during a recording, the iPhone and Watch apps behave independently. Activity stats will not appear on your phone if you're recording with the Strava Watch app and vice versa. If you're using your Apple Watch as a heart rate monitor, you'll need to record your activities with the Strava Watch app.
    If you'd like to connect a heart rate monitor to the Strava iPhone app you can learn more about pairing a Bluetooth device on our support page here.

Hey @begun,

  • Please note: during a recording, the iPhone and Watch apps behave independently. Activity stats will not appear on your phone if you're recording with the Strava Watch app and vice versa. If you're using your Apple Watch as a heart rate monitor, you'll need to record your activities with the Strava Watch app.
    If you'd like to connect a heart rate monitor to the Strava iPhone app you can learn more about pairing a Bluetooth device on our support page here.

So if I want to follow a route from Strava that means I cant record my Heart Rate. Seems silly that a large number of people will have a perfectly good Heart Rate monitor on their wrist but there is no way to use that in the iPhone app. AND no way to get route prompts on the watch so I have to keep stopping to look at the app on the phone.  Strava Devs if you are monitoring this chat please do the needful. Thanks.

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