Fitbit Air just picked up a Pokémon-themed sibling, aimed squarely at the people who wear their tracker to bed. Google is launching the Fitbit Air Special Edition Pokémon Sleep at $129.99, a band that turns your overnight data into progress in a game, and it works whether your phone is a Pixel 11 Pro or an iPhone.
Pokémon Sleep gets its own Sleepy Blue Fitbit Air band
Google announced the special edition today, and the whole thing is built around a serene Sleepy Blue colorway with a custom silk print label of a sleeping Pikachu sitting right on the strap. It arrives during Pokémon's 30th anniversary year, and the hardware underneath is the same screenless pebble with the same micro-adjustable fit.
Sleeping Pokémon surround the Sleepy Blue band in Google's own artwork. | Image by Google
Pricing is $129.99 in the US, which is $30 over the standard Fitbit Air's $99.99 and the exact same premium Google charged for the Stephen Curry edition it put out alongside the tracker back in May. Every purchase includes a three-month trial of Google Health Premium, which renews at $9.99 a month unless you cancel.
Preorders open today online and in store at the Google Store and Target, with shipping starting September 15. It should be noted that this is a US and Japan release only, and Google lists the product for ages 13 and up.
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Would a game get you to wear a tracker to bed every night?
Pokémon Sleep already works with the Fitbit you own
We asked Google whether the Pokémon Sleep integration was exclusive to this edition, or whether it would reach the original Fitbit Air at some point. A Google spokesperson told us the app is compatible with all Pixel Watch and Fitbit wearables, so the tie-in is not locked behind the Pikachu strap.
That makes the extra $30 a design premium and a Premium trial rather than a feature gate, which I think is the honest way to read it. If you already own a Fitbit Air, you can sync it to the game tonight without spending anything.
The silk print label of a sleeping Pikachu sits on the same woven strap. | Images by Google
The app's own device list runs wider than Google's wearables, too. Pokémon Sleep supports the Galaxy Watch, Galaxy Fit and Galaxy Ring, along with every Apple Watch from the Series 3 onward, all syncing through Health Connect on Android or Apple Health on iOS.
So if you wear a Galaxy Ring, there is nothing to act on here, because the game already meets you where you are. The Fitbit Air's pitch stays exactly what it was, which is the cheapest way into decent sleep tracking without a monthly bill, and that is a big part of why it turns up on our roundup of the best budget smartwatches.
Once the data is flowing, the Pokémon Sleep app handles the rest. Pokémon whose sleep types match yours gather around Snorlax when you wake up, and researching their sleeping styles fills out your Sleep Style Dex.
Your Sleep Score then multiplies Snorlax's Strength to produce what the app calls Drowsy Power, and the higher that number climbs, the rarer the sleep styles that show up the next day. Daytime naps count toward it as well as overnight sleep.
Sleep type, sleep styles and Drowsy Power all feed off your tracker data. | Images by Google
Here's how to sync your Fitbit Air to Pokémon Sleep
Open Google Health, head into settings and allow it to link with Health Connect on Android or Apple Health on iOS, making sure it has permission to write your sleep data.
Open the Pokémon Sleep app, go to Settings and More, then Pair a Device, and select Google Health.
Wear the tracker to sleep, and your sleep stages and duration will sync over on their own each morning.
The setup screen walks you through the Health Connect handshake in two steps. | Image by Google
The Fitbit Air finally has a reason to stay on overnight
Sleep tracking was always the strongest argument for a band you can genuinely forget you are wearing, though the part nobody really solves is the habit itself. A sleep score is a number, and numbers get easy to ignore after the first week.
A Pokémon waiting for you in the morning is a sillier motivator than that, and I suspect it works on more of us than we would care to admit. Of course, $129.99 is a lot to pay for a paint job when the game runs on the tracker you already have.
Still, I like that Google is willing to be this light-hearted with a health product, which is not a sentence I expected to write today. Hopefully this is the start of more collaborations like it, because I would happily wear something goofier to bed if it kept me consistent.
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Johanna Romero is a Senior News Writer at PhoneArena, covering mobile technology news across Android, iOS, wearables, and the Google ecosystem she knows best. Drawing on 15 years in IT and tech support from 2007 to 2022, she brings a user-friendly eye for the practical features and lesser-known tricks readers care about. Google named her an official #TeamPixel member in 2022, and she also reviews the latest devices on her YouTube channel, JoJo the Techie.
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