The AirGradient Go has been in people's hands since July, and the feedback we've heard, both in public and in private, has been mixed. Some of you have told us how much you enjoy using it, while others, including several people in a thread on our subreddit, have told us it isn't yet at the level it should be. If I'm honest, I'm not completely happy with the Go myself yet, and that's what I said on Reddit too. I love its form factor, its display and how much you can do with the open firmware, but there are still things about it I want to be better, and battery life is the first of them.
This mixed feedback is why we decided to run a survey, so we could hear from as many Go owners as possible about where the device stands today, including the many of you who never post online. In the first five days, 122 of you answered, and many of you wrote long, detailed replies. Thank you to everyone who took the time to reply.
The short version is that most of you are happy with your Go, but at the same time, most of you also want to see it improve. Battery life is the most serious problem, and it's where we're putting the most effort. Beyond the battery, you raised a number of smaller quirks, and most of these can be fixed through firmware and software updates. Below, I'll go through the results in more detail and explain what we're doing about them.
If your Go isn't working the way it should and you'd like help, please email us at support@airgradient.com. We want everyone who owns a Go to be happy with it.
What You Told Us
We started by asking how happy you are with the Go itself. 71% of you are happy or very happy with it, 12% are neutral, and 16% are unhappy or very unhappy.
The other answers tell a similar story. 71% said the Go matched or beat their expectations, and just over half (52%) rated it good or great value for the price they paid, while 20% rated it poor value. When we asked whether the Go is working as it should right now, 39% said yes, half said "mostly, but with some issues", and 11% said something is clearly wrong.
In other words, almost half of you who are happy with your Go also told us it's working "mostly, but with some issues", or listed things you want improved. One owner put it well: "It's a great product and I use it daily. But I think it still needs substantial refinement which can be resolved via firmware and app updates." It's this group, together with the 29% of you who aren't happy with your Go yet, that we most want to focus on and give the best possible experience.
It was also great to see how you're using it. Two thirds of you use the Go to check rooms around your home, the same share use it for commuting and time outdoors, and around half take it to the office, to school, or on trips. PM2.5 and CO₂ are the measurements you care about most, with 85% and 84% of you rating them 8 or higher out of 10. Many of you also told us you value the open hardware and firmware, the design and the build quality, and that means a lot to the whole team.
Battery Life Comes First
No other issue came close to battery life. 73% of you find it disappointing, including 30% who called it "a real problem for how I use it", and when we asked what you'd most like us to improve, close to half of you named the battery without any prompting. Several of you told us that a short battery life changes how you use the Go, keeping it plugged in at home when you'd like to take it out.
One owner told us the battery is "short enough to change my usage style... I'd use it outdoors more frequently, or on trips, if I knew the battery would last more than 24 hours." Another wrote, "I would not mind if Go was a bit heavier, if battery life would be extended." We don't want the Go to constrain users, and we're looking into ways to address this issue.
The survey also told us what you'd be happy with, and what you'd be willing to give up for it. Of those who answered, most would be happy with somewhere between two or three days (36%) and about a week (37%). To get there, around half of you would turn off GPS or take readings less often, and a third would give up Bluetooth. 83% of you said you'd accept less live connectivity in exchange for a longer battery life.
These answers are exactly what we needed, because most of the battery drain comes from what the Go does and how often it does it, and that's controlled by the firmware. For the past week, our engineers and developers have been working incredibly hard on this, and we've made some promising steps.
Everything Else You Raised
After the battery, your answers fell into a handful of themes. Some of these are quirks, and some are larger issues. The chart below shows how often each one came up when we asked what you'd most like us to improve.
- Temperature and humidity. The Go's temperature reads high and humidity reads low, because heat from the electronics inside the case reaches the sensor. We already have a correction for this that's looking very promising, and we'll roll it out once we've finished testing it.
- The app, the dashboard and setup. Many of you found setup confusing, and the app and dashboard don't yet support the Go as well as they support our other monitors, particularly when switching between portable and stationary use.
- Data logging. Several of you want the Go to keep recording when it isn't connected and fill in the gaps once it syncs, which the Go has the storage to do.
- The display and menus. The full-screen e-ink refresh is distracting for some of you, the text is too small for others, and changing settings on the device takes too many steps.
- GPS. 61% of you use the GPS at least occasionally, and around a third of those find it slow to get a fix or find that it sometimes fails.
- Touch buttons. Three quarters of you find them reliable or mostly fine, while the rest run into missed or 'ghost' presses.
- Charging. Charging is slow, and the position of the USB port makes it awkward to charge the Go standing up with most cables.
Most of these are firmware and software problems, and that's where most of our fixes will come from. A few, like the position of the USB port, are hardware, and we're taking them into account as we work on hardware improvements to the Go. We also received plenty of feature ideas, from threshold alerts to using your phone's GPS to save battery.
We have all of these in mind, and every one of them is a focus area for us. We value the feedback from our community enormously, and we're working hard to address every concern you've raised.
What Happens Next
The Go is at the top of my list, and right now we’re putting more resources into it than into anything else. We’ve already released a firmware update that tackles the two issues you raised most often, battery life and the temperature and humidity readings, along with a number of smaller fixes. You can download it here: Special firmware versions.
This is a first step, and improvements to the app, dashboard, data logging and more come next, and we’ll keep releasing improvements as firmware and software updates. Firmware updates are also sent over the air whenever your Go is connected to WiFi, so they reach every Go that has already shipped.
For those of you still waiting on an order, outstanding orders are still estimated to ship in mid-November.
