Stuck at home in isolation and don’t want your fitness to suffer? Me neither!
Isolation shouldn’t be all doom and gloom right? In fact, when you think about it, now is actually the perfect time to explore new opportunities and ways to achieve those fitness gains, and perhaps even take up some new pursuits that you have not considered before.
With these unprecedented restrictions now imposed to stay at home, you will probably be finding you have more time on your hands. Why not put that time to good use and focus on one of the most important things in your life…your very own physical wellbeing! To achieve this means adapting to the changes in your everyday lifestyle, setting new personal fitness goals and then finding the ongoing motivation in your home environment.
Finding your routine with home workouts
Once you get into your groove with a fitness routine during this new way of living as we see out the pandemic period, you’ll find that your self-reliance becomes stronger…and so does your body! The need for that tanned and rippling F45 instructor at your side to keep you motivated will fade; when equipped with the right tools and attitude you’ll learn learn to how keep yourself on track through discipline and balance in your own space. Believe me, this is such an important trait to develop during these isolated times and will continue to benefit you for many years to come.
Getting motivated, into a routine and exercising at home will also improve both your mental health during these testing times. Finding new ways to exercise at home is a great extension to your past and present fitness regimes, allowing you to find new motivation (and muscles!) where previously you may have struggled.
Recommendations for you
I’ve put together a list of some of the best fitness apps to help you find what works best for you at home. Each app I’ve selected as the leader within its fitness category (be it high-intensity training workouts, strength training, running, yoga, calisthenics or weight management) and provides its own unique methods for showcasing your progress and maintaining motivation. And the great news is; each app free to trial!
Of course, working out at home will be different for everyone, depending on what equipment you have at home and the level of guidance and structure you feed off.
So without further ado, check out these awesome fitness apps – I hope it helps you to find your very own home fitness routine!
1. Centr, by Chris Hemsworth
Centr is a place for you to gain access to some of the world’s best trainers, chefs and well-being experts all together in the palm of your hand. No matter your goal, gender, age or fitness level, this app is tailored to you. It can be your PT, dietician, chef and wellness coach all in one.
Centr works around a weekly planner, in which you can scroll through recipes you’ll actually love, workouts you’ll look forward to, and practical techniques that will keep you focused. Check out the weekly plan, switch activities to suit your needs, get new workouts and life hacks, all the while being simple and easy to use.
With access to workout videos including HIIT, boxing, strength and more, and healthy meal plans to suit any diet, you can plan your week all in one place.
With a 7-day free trial through the Apple App Store, and reasonably priced monthly plans at $29.99, quarterly at $59.99 or a yearly plan at $119.99, this could be the all-in-one app to replace your gym trainer (and it’s with Chris Hemsworth, of all people). Get you kick started on your home-fitness journey today, download Centr through on the Apple Store or Google Play.
2. MyFitness Pal
MyFitnessPal, now proudly brought to by Under Armour, is another great option when looking for support on your fitness journey. Whether you want to lose weight, tone up, get healthy or change bad habits, MyFitnessPal will keep you on track to kicking goals.
Voted #1 Health and Fitness App for 4 years straight, and PC Magazine Editor’s Choice Selection, MyFitnessPal has a reputation that makes it one of the most loved apps for fitness. Also featured in NY Times, Wall Street Journal, Wired, USA Today and many more, once you download it, you’ll see for yourself why this app has been rated one of the world’s most popular health and fitness apps.
I’ve been using this app for a couple of years now, and I can definitely vouch for it being the perfect vehicle for assisting with conditioning and weight-loss goals.
The way MyFitnessPal works is simple. You enter your vital details, your weight goals and exercise regularity. The app then calculates your recommended daily calorie intake in order to achieve your specified goal, whilst also providing you with an ongoing health and fitness diary to track the calories coming into your body and the calories you burn. It celebrates your little wins and milestones with you along the way, and doesn’t make you feel too bad about the occasional blow-out either.
What makes MyFitnessPal so unique, is its huge database of over 6 million consumable items including everything from a tin of Greenseas tuna in brine, to a Starbucks caramel latte, through to those Harvest green pea snacks everyone seems to be munching on right now! You can literally monitor your dietary intake down to the calorie, and the integrations with fitness apps like Apple Health Kit and Strava allow MyFitnessPal to monitor your energy consumption too, allowing you to see the full picture.
Reach your goals with goal setting steps, personalisation just for you, habit support and nutrition coaches. Log your exercise with step counters, find easy sync workouts, tracking and compatibility with Fitbit, Garmin and more. Get support and motivation by adding friends to keep you accountable, join communities and see newsfeed updates for inspiration. Celebrate your success with friends, follow your charts and track your progress.
It gets better; MyFitnessPal is free to download and use! Personally, I’m content with the free version but you can also choose to upgrade to MyFitnessPal Premium which allows you more access to greater support within the app, for $9.99/month or $49.99/year. You can download the MyFitnessPal app from the Apple App Store or Google Play Store .
3. Seven – 7 Minute Workouts
Seven, a series of 7 minute workouts, is the perfect app to shake up your exercise regime with new and interesting routines. Seven aims to make getting fit easy and fun, offering short 7 minute workouts based on scientific studies to provide the maximum benefit in the shortest time possible. This is a great app if you usually find exercising for long periods of time to be boring or if you simply can’t squeeze longer periods of exercise into your schedule (those with kids may relate to this).
Seven offers personalised workouts for you, to make sure you get the most out of your short bursts of exercise. No matter whether your goal is to get fit, lose weight or get stronger, with Seven you just set your goal and fitness level, and let the app do the rest. Pretty cool, huh!
Seven’s workouts allow you to work out anywhere, anytime, with no equipment needed. The Seven daily challenge is another nifty feature within the app which encourages the habit of exercising everyday. You can also compete with friends for extra encouragement and support, earn achievements as you vary your routines, create your own workouts and keep it fun with instructors like Drill Sergeant, Cheerleader and more.
You can trial this app for free, and if it’s the app for you, subscribe for one month at $9.99 or one year at $59.99. Download Seven via the Apple App Store or the Google Play Store.
4. Daily Yoga
The perfect app for beginners and seasoned yogis alike, the Daily Yoga App provides various guided classes to learn the basics before progressing through to more advanced classes and flows. For those of you who may be more advanced – there are heaps of the world class teachers for you to follow.
Voted “Best Yoga App” of the year 2016-2019 by Healthline, and awarded by The Wall Street Journal as one of their “5 Addictive Fitness Apps” the Daily Yoga app is in a league of its own.
Having practiced Hot Yoga for several years myself, I find it to be a great for both mental and physical health. Yoga forces you to free your mind from outside distractions, and is the perfect antidote for muscle tension caused by stress and sitting at a computer all day. It’s also great for improving balance and flexibility, the perfect compliment for sports such as surfing.
With various classes to suit your level of confidence and capability, the Daily Yoga app could well be the perfect option to change up your fitness routine while at home. You can follow along with 20 globally respected yoga masters and smart coaches to help you pick the right classes each day, and stay motivated by rubbing shoulders with the entire community of Daily Yoga users who are able discuss their practice and experiences within the app. Meditate, adjust your habits, feel more in-tune with yourself and track your activity all in the one app.
Daily Yoga is free to download and to access introductory classes. You can explore more yoga classes by signing up to the 7-day free membership trial, and after the trial period, it’s $81.99 a year or $30.99 per month.
You’ll find Daily Yoga here for Apple devices or here for Google devices.
5. Couch to 5K Runner
Apparently 4.2 million people have successfully done it, are you next? Couch to 5K runner is an 8 week get-in-shape and weight loss app that has been featured on CNN, FOX, USA Today and more. Get ready to start your new healthy life, 8 weeks, 3 times a week, 30 minutes a day!
This multiple award-winning app is said to be the most effective ‘zero to five kilometre’ app, coming highly recommended by a range of health and fitness experts. It’s popularity is attributed to it’s simplicity, being based on a simple activity with nothing new to learn. Purely by using the Couch to 5K Runner with reasonable consistency your stamina and weight will improve measurably, just download the app, press start and follow the guide to get moving!
If running is of interest to you but you’re struggling to get started then this is the app for you! With alternating walk/run intervals, gradually increasing run segments over 8 weeks and a human voice coaching to guide you through your sessions while you listen to music at the same time. No matter if you choose a treadmill or outdoors, you will earn achievements, enjoy GPS compatibility and integrated Facebook and Twitter technology so you can share your journey as you go from couch to 5K!
This app has a free version with all features fully enabled and programs including only the first four runs – that’s week one sorted! Test it out with the first four levels and once you’re sure this is the app for you, subscribe to the full version for $79.99 per year or $14.99 per month to utilise the full range of content and workout plans. Check it out on Apple or Google.
6. Nike Training Club
Nike Training Club is a comprehensive all-round fitness app, designed to be your ultimate personal trainer. This app is a clear leader in offering incredible value without subscribing; there are currently 185+ free workouts available with unlimited use to target strength, endurance, mobility and yoga. Featuring world-class Nike Master Trainers to coach you through every step of the way.
Perfect for those looking to add structure to their workouts, Nike Training Club offers personalised training plans adapted to you and your schedule. No matter if you’re just getting started or a training athlete, this app could be your one way ticket to reaching new fitness goals.
Looking for a guided workout that you can do from home that still keeps your routines interesting everyday? Short bodyweight-only workouts are one option within the Nike Training Club app and are also an ideal way to get results. With guidance from the Nike Training Club app you can easily find time and complete them at home.
Make the most of recommended workouts and expert advice to help you focus your routine and make progress towards your goals. The more you train with Nike Training Club, the more personal your recommendations become.
Find your 185+ free workouts in this App on Apple or Google.
**UPDATE 14th April: The premium version of Nike Training Club (NTC) offers even more workouts, and normally $23.49 per month or $184.99 annually, but thanks to the kind folk at Nike the premium version is free until further notice. More details here.
7. Strava
Strava is here to help you track your fitness goals each day. Record your run, map a cycling route or (my personal fave) track your standup paddleboard session. Whatever your outdoor pursuit, you can trace your path with Strava and then analyse all the stats from your performance – for free!
No matter if you’re training for a triathlon or just love taking your bike out for a ride, with Strava you can turn your smartphone or GPS watch into a sophisticated tracker. Millions of athletes and active people are already using Strava, and you can connect with friends through the app to compare your workouts and best times. Nothing like a bit of friendly rivalry to give you that extra little push!
With Strava you can track and analyse your stats like route, distance, pace, speed, elevation gained and calories burned, for the entire journey as well as each segment. You can find new routes and maps to mix up your training with the world’s largest trail network, and compete with others to push yourself that extra step further!
The free version is capable of all of the basic functions and also integrates with Apple Health Kit and MyFitnessPal. If you want to go premium, subscribe to the pack/s that suits you best, or go the whole hog by adding all three:
- Training: All the tools and insights you need to reach your goal and train smarter.
- Safety: Explore new roads and trails, all with peace of mind from Beacon.
- Analysis: Get more insight from your dedicated GPS device, heart rate monitor or power meter.
Strava is available on Apple and Google devices.
8. Calisthenics Mastery
I’ve been intrigued by the concept of calisthenics for a while now. Calisthenics is a form of exercise focused on utilising your body weight as the basis for the training, and at times like this it makes more sense than ever to minimise the amount of equipment you need to stay fit from home. The Calisthenics Mastery app will teach you how to work out your full body with exercises that require minimal equipment. Calisthenics Mastery is the perfect companion for tracking, motivation and education of Calisthenics from beginner to advanced levels.
Once downloaded you easily set up a personal plan with routines that you can easily and effectively add to workouts that you schedule. The free version includes all the basic moves to start bodyweight workouts at home. Fun, challenging and motivating workout modes will help keep you on track and coming back for more each day as you progress.
Within the premium version of Calisthenics Mastery you’ll find ‘Tabata’ style workouts, an essential when creating high intensity interval training. You will also be introduced to ‘Bring Sally Up’, a workout challenge so addictive you’ll want to do it every single day! Also you can try ‘Deck of Cards’, set an exercise to each suit and shuffle the deck performing them according to the value of each card… it’s one heck of a workout! Another great feature, your workouts can feed into Apple Health so you can track your total exercise each day.
Calisthenics Mastery Free Version has 50 exercises in five categories, with enough functionality for you to try the app and start making some gains. You can then unlock the advanced exercises, workout plans and motivation workout modes as you progress with calisthenics.
Try the free Calisthenics Mastery app with plenty of awesome content on Apple devices only, then go pro for a lifetime with one in-app-purchase for only $22.99 using code THEFREEDOMCHASER.
Get moving!
So that’s it folks. There are some super-cool apps out there to get you more buff than the president’s Bentley, but let’s be real….the first step is up to you!
With some extra time on your hands and these awesome free apps readily available to help you keep smashing goals through this isolation period, there is no better time than now to get in a new groove and reach new heights in fitness. And the best thing is, it’s from the most conveniently located gym of them all….your very own home.
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