The Best Workout Apps of 2026: For Any Fitness Goals

However, you must bear in mind that you are not going to be able to run right from day one. A sub 3 marathon runner, Ironman finisher, 3x Boston Qualifier, David Damron looks to help every other runner feel the overwhelming sense of accomplishment of achieving one’s running goals. By teaching and sharing what he’s learned from 17+ years of running, he’ll help you achieve your goals. He’s not the fastest out there, but he’s always gets to that finish line. It is also important to start slowly, incorporating short walk-run intervals, and gradually increasing the duration and intensity of the runs over time. Finally, it is essential to ensure the right fit and comfort when choosing running shoes.

Home Workout by Leap Health

Wall sits are low-impact, making them an excellent option for beginners. They also require no equipment, making them perfect for a calisthenics workout at home. Camaraderie is important; an in-person workout class or buddy can often motivate you. If an app is your go-to workout, you need to hold yourself accountable, but that’s the case with exercise of any type, soit’s not just specific to workout apps. You could risk injury if you’re unfamiliar with certain exercises and how much weight you should use.

Core Exercises for Beginners (with sample beginner core workout)

Gone are the days of tired gym memberships and dog-eared exercise DVDs – the future of fitness is now firmly in the palm of your hand. In recent years, the app store has become a veritable playground for fitness enthusiasts. From AI-powered personal trainers to immersive virtual reality studios, the options for leveling up your fitness routine are both diverse and delightful. Are you aiming to lose weight, build strength, or improve your overall fitness?

Supportive Community or Coaching

Each workout is like a gentle nudge towards better health, perfect for those just starting their fitness journey. When it comes to fitness, we often think of intense workouts, heavy lifting, or long runs. But what if I told you that a simple exercise like arm swings could be just as effective in improving your overall fitness? Arm swing exercises are easy to do, require no equipment, and can be done anywhere. Whether you’re a beginner or a fitness enthusiast, arm swings can help you improve flexibility, strength, and even cardiovascular health.

Incorporating Strength Training and Stretching Exercises

Grokker is a subscription health and fitness video company with over 3,700 expert-led video classes available anytime, anywhere, and on any device. There’s a large library of exercises, it’s easy to navigate, and it’s great for traveling. If you want to try the paid version of the app, it’s $29.99 for a three-month subscription or $79.99 for an annual subscription. Mutasim Sweileh is a seasoned cyclist and avid adventurer with a deep passion for biking. With years of experience exploring various trails and pushing his limits on two wheels, Mutasim has developed a wealth of knowledge about bikes, gear, and the biking community.

• The ability to track the time, location, distance, elevation and speed of your workouts really sounds interesting.
• For these reasons, we score the accountability at 2 out of 5.
• Before you know it, those baby steps snowball into huge progress you can see and feel!
• Once you reach better shape, add some strength training to your workout schedule to strengthen your muscles and protect your joints.
• Your doctor will perform a complete physical examination and check your vital signs such as blood pressure and heart rate.
• However, we would recommend using another app for workout programs, as the app has a limited library of about 50 workout routines.

We took our real-life experience and in-depth testing methodology to score 10 different categories on a 1-to-5-star rating. We went through the download process, app setup, payment, and of course we tried a variety of workouts (or long-term programs if applicable). Using Aaptiv gives you unlimited access to 8,000 workouts and tons of structured programs.

Safe Tips on How to Get Back Into Running After Gaining Weight

The free version includes in-depth trail information like reviews, conditions, and even directions. You can also save your favorite trails or share your adventures with friends on other social media. ClassPass has some community and interactive features you may enjoy. You can invite friends to class and earn rewards or connect with friends on the app. The app also rewards you with badges to celebrate fitness milestones that you can share with your friends. You can even view your friends’ training and compete alongside the entire Flex community while maintaining your workout streaks and charts to monitor your progress and personal records.

Why Beginners Love Programs That Combine Workouts and Education

The Bodyweight app might be the best option for travelers looking for quick, effective workouts that they can do anywhere. The free version is a fitness training program with minute bodyweight workouts that require no equipment. A full-body workout for overweight beginners is an excellent way to start your fitness journey no matter where you are in your wellness. While aerobic exercise has a reputation for burning calories, strength training helps maintain or build muscle as a person loses weight elsewhere. By committing to a tailored exercise and diet plan developed by you and your doctor, anyone with life-threatening excess weight can make great strides with their health.

Bodyweight Strength Training

Yangzey Sherpa leads content strategy at FitBudd, overseeing content planning and execution across fitness-focused digital channels. With over five years of experience in SEO and content, she works closely with the fitness industry to ensure content aligns with the needs of coaches, trainers, and gym owners. Her role keeps her deeply connected to fitness business workflows, coaching models, and how professionals use digital platforms to grow. Proper form is their top concern, especially in strength training and bodyweight exercises. After weeks of at home workout routine practice, beginners feel prepared to explore gym workouts or join group fitness classes. Beginners often start with home workouts because the environment feels comfortable.

The 10 Best Fitness Apps for Home Workouts

Hypertrophy (muscle size increase) comes through progressive overload, so weight training is typically more effective. However, hypertrophy takes a long time and progress takes resellerratings time too. As long as you’re consistent, both forms of exercise will be ideal for building strength. Strength training can help build muscle, improve posture, and reduce the risk of injury.

For these reasons, we score the accountability at 2 out of 5. Nike Training Club is basically a digital personal trainer that will travel anywhere in the world with you. Get fit on the go with 160+ free workouts full of everything from yoga to strength training. Training and nutrition cost $3.35 a week, while training only costs $2.30 a week. With the purchase of either one, you’ll get access to personalized training plans in the Bodyweight, Gym, and Running apps.

Turning Workout Apps Into a Marketing Tool

This makes them an ideal audience for your coaching because they are already taking action. If you have been on the fence about purchasing a Peloton and starting a workout plan, read on to see the advice I followed when starting my weight loss and health journey. This side-by-side comparison shows how None to Run offers a more gradual, sustainable approach for people who’ve found traditional Couch to 5K programs too aggressive.

We know that a subscription fee of $199 per month is nothing to sneeze at. We also know that most personal trainers charge between $50 and $150 per hour, depending on your area. Motivated to kickstart your weight loss journey but dread the thought of crowded gyms or lengthy commutes?

Your preferences are your own, but whichever way you lean, these picks should help guide you toward a healthier body or your next personal record. Our Fitbit Sense 2 reviewer noted that despite the “baffling” cutbacks in smart features, he valued the improved interface, a light version of Wear OS. The new physical button for selecting widgets is more reliable than the capacitive touch button of the last generation. The Withings ScanWatch Light and Amazfit Active 2 balance simplicity and value. Oxiline’s Pressure XS Pro and Pulse XS Pro stand out for focused, medical-grade tracking. The Amazfit Bip 6 is another outstanding budget tracker that directly competes with the Huawei Watch Fit 4.

The best walking app overall

“You can follow people on Strava just like on Instagram or Twitter.” Along with that, Strava encourages group challenges and interaction  with other athletes through clubs. If you’re a cyclist, or any endurance athlete, a great app for tracking your bike routes is Strava. Not only is the GPS tracking pretty accurate, but there is a social element that separates it from most other free cycling apps. Boostcamp provides over 1,000 workout plans through the Boostcamp app.

Top pick: Fitbit Inspire 3

This option can be helpful during workouts when you want to immediately check your metrics, but it can drain your battery. However, the third-generation SE has quicker charging capability — over several tests, we averaged anywhere from 50% to 60% more battery after 30 minutes. When it comes to tracking distance, the Fitbit Charge 6 performs well and has built-in GPS, which the Inspire 3 does not. You’ll need a Google account, though, even if you already have the Fitbit app. The Charge 6 added a helpful haptic side button for easy screen navigation.

Nike Training Club – Best Free Guided Workouts

This tracker is capable of providing a plethora of data, analytics, and even predictions & recommendations on all of your training activities in a user-friendly wrist-based device. The Forerunner 265 is our top recommendation for athletes looking to up their performance monitoring capabilities. Sport tracker integrates maps, time and distance calculator to ensure you get correct training record. Install this app if you really want to track your calories burned, training speed, running pace and altitude. Hevy combines serious strength logging with a community-first approach — public workouts, shared routines, and gym-based social discovery.

The best walking app for weight loss

Plus, there are new programs added every month, so you’ll never get bored. Unlike many other apps, each course contains anywhere from four to 64 videos, giving you more control over how much time you’d like to invest. The best way to keep track of your fitness is to use a dedicated fitness tracker or smartwatch and their respective apps. Along with the Mi Smart Band 7, we also tested the Garmin Venu Sq 2 and Garmin Vívomove Sport in 2023. Both devices underperformed in our step count tests, but they do have perks, such as accurate heart-rate readouts and integration with the easy-to-use Garmin app.

Google Play – Health & Fitness

Finding your favorite workout app may require a bit of trial and error since you’ll want to see if you’re looking for a personalized experience or are comfortable with a cookie cutter plan. When I tried out this app, I signed up for a kettlebell class called Body & Bell, and what’s great is you get video demonstrations for the different exercises you’ll be doing. The videos also tell you the type of weight you should be using (light, medium, heavy) and the length of time of the exercise. You can also connect with your coach via the chat in the app if you ever have questions about your training or want to chat with other members on your team. Nike Training Club is a free fitness app with a robust workout library that includes one-off workouts as well as periodized programs led by certified instructors.

How to Pick the Right Workout Tracker for You

The app includes Live tracking tool that allows your friends watch your fitness activities while you are working out. Apple’s Activity app tracks your move, exercise and standing goals, closing a series of colourful rings to show progress. The Workout app tracks a vast array of individual sports and activities, including running, walking, hiking, swimming, cycling and yoga. Then there’s the Noise app to monitor your hearing health, the ECG and Heart Rate to monitor your heart and the Breathe app to help you de-stress. The Balance 2 builds on the original Balance with new features, including HYROX training, scuba support, insightful AI-powered coaching that actually works, and a brighter sapphire-glass display. The large 1.5-inch AMOLED display is bright enough for outdoor use, and the upgraded sapphire glass and aluminum frame give the watch a premium, durable feel.

Ladder Strength Training

Android smartphones consist of a wide range of sensors that store data from the installed applications and show us only valuable and informative data. Just like our wearability metric, we evaluated the battery life of each tracker since they’re designed to be worn continuously. In most cases, you’ll need to remove the device to charge it, so a reasonable battery length is an important feature. The unimeal review Venu 3 also has a lovely and large touch screen that makes it very pleasant to use.

More features, more fun. We strive to deliver an experience to match their enthusiasm.

• When you’re finished with your run, it shows how you’ve improved in both aerobic and anaerobic, along with a customized recovery time before your next session.
• It gives so many amazing workout options like kickboxing, running classes, walking classes, yoga, pilates, and HIIT workouts.
• Local running and cycling clubs organize through Strava, coordinating group workouts and challenges.
• It’s one of the best health and fitness app you can find on Google Play.
• We loved the Amazfit’s Personal Activity Scoring Intelligence (PAI) for scoring our fitness, but in order to access more detailed analyses, a subscription is required.
• Nike + integrates in-run audio feedback to track your running performance.

In a one-mile test of how accurately it recorded distance, the Inspire 3 had one of the better tallies, being over by only 0.03 mile. Because these devices are meant to be worn all day, every day, we put a lot of emphasis on comfort, wearability, and user friendliness — of both the device and its companion app. Apple’s foray into fitness apps is great for beginners on a fitness journey. There are streaming classes available in 12 different disciplines, from yoga to strength training to cycling—and you no longer need to have an Apple Watch to use it. Apple product owners can access Fitness+ built into the new Fitness app, with the latest iOS update.

Google Fit- Fitness Tracking

What really matters is having a device that acts like a personal health and fitness coach, guiding your workouts, tracking your progress, and helping you stay on top of your goals. A great fitness smartwatch should do all that; the best ones make it feel effortless. We’re including a second Garmin on our best fitness watch list because the Forerunner 265 delivers training tools that few others match. Runners, cyclists, and swimmers benefit from precise coaching, recovery insights, and detailed post-workout analysis that push them ahead of the pack. Unlike many other Forerunner models that rely on low-resolution, non-touch MIP displays, the 265 features a vibrant AMOLED display. It’s easy to read; whether you’re tracking intervals or checking a message mid-run, Garmin is a great option.