I always wait for bqt to be up to date.
I'm just testing right now
within 2 blocks 24584 satos
full fast 373 satos (It's telling me smart fees not initialized yet. this usually take a few blocks, what does that mean ?)
It means that you need it to gather several blocks (which can take sevreal hours) so that it has enough data to estimate fees properly. This means that you need to leave it on for a few hours before sending a transaction. Just starting it up and then sending a transaction when everything is synced will not work and will result in bad fees.