Get fit with a little help from your phone!
Fitness doesn't have to mean going to the gym anymore, and that's because of the great fitness apps available on our phones. Now you can bring the feel of the gym to wherever you are, which means more easily fitting it into an overburdened schedule. We've found some of the best fitness apps out there, and we've collected them for you. Whether you are looking to track your progress or find the perfect workout, we've got five apps that are worth checking out.
Pocket Yoga
Yoga has been around for centuries, and it's health benefits are no joke — yoga can help with flexibility, muscle strength, posture, and much, much more. Not everyone has the time or money to make it to classes at a yoga studio though, and that's where this app comes in. There are five sets of workouts, each one in a different background, which they call "environments". You choose the duration, your difficulty level, and your environment. During each workout, there is a running animation showing you proper posture, along with audio instructions as though there was a yoga instructor there with you. If you want to practice specific poses, there is a massive list to choose from. Each pose includes an infographic listing off category, difficulty, description, and benefits. For every 15 minutes worth of practice, you'll earn a Karma point. These points are used to buy new environments, each for between 3 and 27 Karma points.
Finding a few minutes to be with yourself and concentrate on your health and fitness can be difficult. More to the point, not everyone is in a place where working out in a gym is feasible. Spending some time working on yoga poses each day has measurable health results without being high impact or stressful on your body like some workouts. You also get the added benefit of a little slice of peace of mind while you go. This app runs in at $2.99 and is definitely worth taking a look at.
Progression Fitness Tracker
The gym isn't a scary place for everyone, and for those who like to keep track of all their workouts, Progression Fitness Tracker is a great tool. Build customized workouts for from hundreds of exercises, which can be filtered alphabetically, by equipment required, or by muscle group targeted. There are also pre-built workouts if you don't want to build your own from scratch. Each exercise has an infographic page which includes instructions on the proper form, equipment required, links to videos on YouTube of the exercise performed correctly, and the muscles targeted. The app is certainly meant to be used during your workout since it tracks how long it takes you to complete each rep. It also clocks in your full workout duration, and your calories burned and can be synced up with Google Fit.
This app definitely seems developed for people who already have some idea of what they are doing at the gym, especially with their emphasis on including equipment heavy exercises. However, with the instructions and links to videos, it's still friendly to novices. If you're going the gym route then Progression is a fantastic choice. Progression Fitness Tracker comes in two forms. We've been talking about the free version today, but for $3.99 you can go pro. The Pro version lets you see stats from every workout session you've ever input, all of your statistics, the ability to import and export data, and the knowledge that you will have a pro membership forever. If you've been looking for a good tracking app for your workouts, Progression is a fantastic app to take a look at.
Download: Progression Fitness Tracker (Free)
Calorie Counter-MyFitnessPal
Whether you're trying to lose weight, gain weight, or just maintain where you are at currently, tracking your calories is definitely advantageous. You could be working out like a beast 6 days a week, but if you don't know what kind of calories you're eating each day, you're probably not going to hit your goals — which is where the Calorie Counter from MyFitnessPal comes in. When using the app, it'll ask you to sign up or log in to my fitness pal, and then gets your height, weight, and activity level. From what you input about your fitness goals, the app will come up with a calorie goal for you to try and hit each day.
You can log all your meals, as well as snacks, and can get the app to remind you about logging your meals each day. You can add your favorite foods or recipes so you can add them to your daily count. If you aren't motivated enough to input your own recipes, there are hundreds upon hundreds of foods, each with a breakdown of its nutritional information for you. There is even a tracking tool to help keep you on track for your weight and measurement goals.
This Calorie Counter also connects with plenty of other fitness-related apps like Fitbit Tracker, and RunKeeper, as well as Misfit devices. We're not sure anybody ever has fun tracking their calories each day, but this app definitely makes it simple and easy to do. No charts necessary here, just find your food, add it to your meals for the day and you're done. Counting calories can definitely help to keep you on track to meet your fitness goals, and Calorie Counter from MyFitnessPal does an excellent job of it. The app is absolutely free, but you can upgrade to a pro membership for $9.99 a month or $49.99 a year.
Calorie Counter-MyFitnessPal (Free)
Beachbody on Demand
When it comes to getting into shape, not everybody wants the same thing out of a workout program, and gyms aren't always the most welcoming for newcomers. Whether you're just starting out on your fitness journey, or you're just trying to get past that recent plateau in gains, Beachbody on Demand has options for you. There are well over a dozen different programs to check out, with everything from low impact yoga to the insanity of P90X.
Beachbody on Demand does require a subscription, but it's affordable at about $30 for three months. When you open up a workout program, you'll be able to see all the materials for that program, which include equipment and occasionally, food plans. You can choose to stream the videos directly from your phone, use a Chromecast to view them on your TV or set up your tablet on a table. This means you can take your workout plan to an empty room of the house, a park, or the gym to get everything you want out of that new program. You can even download all the videos to your phone so that using data isn't an issue when you are making new habits.
Download: Beachbody on Demand (Subscription after Free Trial)
Sworkit Lite
Sworkit brings you circuit training in bite-sized pieces. Sworkit is designed to fit into your schedule, which means that you can set how long you'd like to workout—whether you've got a full hour to spare or just 5 minutes. They have pre-made workouts in 4 main categories: Strength, Cardio, Yoga and Stretching. You also have the ability to build your own personalized workout from dozens of exercises or copy a popular workout from one of their lists. There are over 160 exercises to choose and build with, and over a dozen workouts you can copy and customize. If you choose from the Sworkit workouts you have several options like what part of the body to focus on, and how long you'll be going for. During the workout, you'll get a video of each exercise to help ensure you have proper form.
Sworkit Lite is the free version of the app and is fantastic in its own right. You can also pick up Sworkit Pro for $2.99 which gives you more exercises, the ability to save more custom workouts, adjustable interval lengths between exercises, a complete workout history, and the ability to sync with MyFitnessPal or Google Fit. This app is fantastic for anyone with a busy schedule since it's designed to get your workouts in just five minutes. If you're just getting started, this is a great place to get moving with.
Questions?
Fitness definitely doesn't have to be difficult when it comes to keeping track of things or getting started. You're supposed to sweat while working out, not beforehand! Hopefully, these apps can help to track your fitness and help you to meet all of your goals whether you're just getting started, or you're well on your way. So what do you think, did we hit the nail on the head or are we missing a few? Let us know in the comments!
Updated January 2018: We've added Beachbody on Demand to this list of awesome apps!
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