Wanting to be in the best possible shape doesn’t have to mean shelling out for a high-paid personal trainer. As the 21st century saying goes, “there’s an app for that.”
Whatever your fitness goal is — stronger arms, a 5K personal best, abs you can eat cheese on, replacing Big Macs with healthier options, or even a more scenic bike route — there’s an app to help you achieve it.
And technology is better than ever, with apps getting smarter and customizable for workouts. The best fitness apps are also multifunctional—all at once offering instructional guides, exercise and diet plans, hardcore stats analyzers, and scientifically validated motivational tools. Whether you’re a fitness junkie who works out every day or a time-crunched family man who has to carve out a few minutes to work out at home, these apps are must-have tools.
But with so many apps to choose from, it can be hard to know where to start. So we did the research for you. Here are some of the best workout and fitness apps.
Calorie counting apps
My fitness partner
All the apps in the world can’t help you break a bad diet. That’s why you need one of the world’s top nutrition and calorie-counting apps—one of several from Under Armour that specialize in various areas of fitness and health (try MapMyRide, MapMyRun, and MapMyHike for biking, running, and, of course, hiking).
MyFitnessPal provides a weight and progress management system by tracking your meals. You click or scan the barcodes of all the items (that means everything) and the system subtracts those items from your daily total. Exercising adds the subtracted items to your total.
It has a database of over 11 million foods, including nearly every brand name food, so you get instant calorie and nutritional information. You’ll be surprised how calorie-dense your current diet is. Food tracking is scientifically proven to help you lose weight because it motivates you to make that extra effort to exercise or exercise at the deli counter to balance your weight.
Free on iOS and Google Play
Fitbit
You don’t need a fitness watch to enjoy the benefits of FitBit. Its mobile app offers the standard FitBit activity and sleep tracking features, but the app’s best feature is the one thing the wearable doesn’t track – your diet.
You can pair with the Aria WiFi Smart Scale to upload (or manually add) your weight stats and track calorie intake by scanning the barcodes of anything you eat, while the Calorie Coach feature tracks calories in and calories out. But it’s not necessarily for weight loss—if your goal is to maintain or gain weight, the app can also help you work on that. You can also measure your hydration levels by tracking water intake before a workout and throughout the day.
Free on iOS and Google Play
Running and Cycling Apps
Strava
Probably the world’s most popular running and cycling app. Strava measures all the usual metrics – elevation, speed, time and heart rate, and provides audio feedback as you ride – but also uses a feature called “Suffer Score” that measures time, distance and effort expended to assess your efforts.
But Strava is more than just an app, it’s a social network for runners and cyclists. Not only can you track your performance and progress, you can share it. Strava ranks your performance in its built-in social community, and there’s also a “beacon” feature that lets others see your exact location in real time. With millions of athletes on its network, it also has the world’s largest resource of tracks and trails, which are recorded in its database – or you can add your own.
Free on iOS and Google Play
My Virtual Mission
For mapped routes and general stats, Strava or MapMyRide are your standard choices. But My Virtual Mission gives you something different – a motivational tool to help you (sort of) achieve your big cycling goals. So if you’ve ever wanted to cycle from Land’s End to John o’Groats, it will create an exact map of that journey – and check off equivalent distances each time you ride until you eventually complete the entire distance of your dream mission. Having your progress displayed visually – even for something as crazy as attempting to cycle the entire country – can be surprisingly motivating.
Free on iOS and Google Play
Nike Running Club
For a solid running app, who better to trust than the guys who outfit the world’s most serious runners? This isn’t just an app, it’s a training partner. It sounds like it’s designed for pros, but it’s great for beginners, too. Features include “guided runs” with audio coaching and downloadable instructions designed to improve power, speed, endurance, and technique — designed for new or out-of-practice runners.
Its My Coach feature gives you an ongoing training plan to reach certain goals, while other features help you discover new routes, pace yourself better, take on challenges, and log data. It also comes on the Apple Watch and syncs with many other smartwatches. Just do it.
Free on iOS and Google Play
Personal Training Apps
Free Sports
This app is essentially a digital personal trainer in your pocket. It has over 900 workouts based on high-intensity interval training (HIIT) and bodyweight training to build muscle and lose weight. No gym equipment is required, so you can create a workout plan from your own “customized training journey” anytime, anywhere.
The Freeletics method is designed to motivate you. Don’t let it go just because there’s no real PT standing behind you and telling you what to do. It gives you tough challenges (50 consecutive burpees, anyone?), and there are instructional videos for every exercise. It also has a premium coaching option that uses algorithms to create super customized plans and crush ever-increasing fitness goals.
Free on iOS and Google Play
8 Suitable
For overall health and wellness, this influencer favorite promises to give you access to fitness and nutrition experts at all times. You tell the app your health goals, measure your fitness level, and log dietary preferences. The app then provides you with a tailored daily workout based on your strengths and weaknesses — including muscle-building HIIT and fat-burning exercises — as well as a balanced, nutritionally balanced weekly meal plan based on more than 800 weight-loss and carb-controlled recipes. 8fit doesn’t offer a tracker, instead focusing on instructional guides and interactive videos to ensure you’re doing your workouts correctly and help you make progress.
Free on iOS and Google Play
Swakit
This app is for busy people who want to squeeze in some quality workouts in their packed schedules, because as we all know, exercise can easily get neglected in everyday life. There are hundreds of workouts to choose from, all divided into four categories: strength, cardio, yoga, and stretching. Depending on your schedule, you can create your own custom workout plan, even if you only have five minutes to fit in a quick office workout when your boss isn’t looking. The app even allows you to talk to a real personal trainer for advice.
Strength Training Apps
Jeffett
Jefit offers detailed workout plans and progress tracking. But the biggest selling point is its extensive library of workouts, broken down into all the key body parts. Whether you’re working your chest, forearms, biceps, abs, or calves (or anything else you might need a workout), Jefit has hundreds of real-person instructional videos on specific exercises—so you’ll never again be embarrassed to ask gym staff how exactly you’re supposed to use the equipment. It helps create custom plans, and also offers thousands of weekly plans and workout routines created by experts. With its progress tracking features, Jefit puts a heavy emphasis on stats-driven training and analysis.
fitness
FitBod focuses on weight and strength training, promising that no muscle group will be neglected. It takes into account various personal factors (such as experience, training style, and available equipment) and creates a workout plan in real time. During training, its artificial intelligence learns your strength training capabilities and adjusts your plan to change the weight and reps/sets to improve your fitness results and achieve your strength, toning, or muscle tone goals. FitBod is currently only available on iOS, but will be available on Android later this year.
