People keep telling us how technology and mobiles are slowly ruining our lives. Yes, they are addictive and yes, they tend to disrupt our sleep or make us anxious. However, they are created with the goal to help us and, if we use them right, our phones can help our lives tremendously.
Instead of scrolling social media platforms over and over again, you should start looking at your phone as a tool that will help you become stronger, fitter, relaxed, organized, and whatnot. In the hassle over which social media network to use, we often miss to see the marvellous things that phones offer to us. One such thing is the top fitness apps that can help you turn your life around – for the better.
So, if you are ready to fight the many ills of today’s Information Age, it is time to make some eliminations and install new apps. The information-rich world of today can be extremely beneficial, but you need to learn how to take advantage. If you want to live a healthier life, your phone can become your trainer or a coach, providing you with custom workouts right there at your fingertips. You can use it while you pump iron at your neighbourhood gym, do some aerobics at home, or take a run around the block.
With their reminders and quality guidelines, the best fitness apps will hold you accountable when you miss a workout, keep you in track with a healthier nutrition act, and simply be your key to a healthier and better lifestyle.
In terms of apps for workout, there are five main types of fitness apps that busy people can use to make their lives better.
1. Fitness Tracking Apps
You can’t just go running or visiting the gym any chance you get, hoping that your lifestyle will get back into shape. If you really want to make a change but don’t have the time to track everything, there are apps that can do this for you.
Fitness tracking apps are much like professionals you hire when you need to delegate something. For example, if you don’t have time to do sports or exercise when you have too many research papers and essays to write, you will hire an essay helper to do it for you without asking where can i buy a research paper for a reasonable price. You can use this same approach with exercising when you can’t track your calorie goals.
Tracking your fitness is crucial since it lets you see your progress, encourages you to work out more, and tells you how successful your current fitness strategy is. These apps need only your honest input and will instantly and constantly provide you with accurate and helpful information. It’s the perfect tool for workout for busy people.
Without tracking your success, you can’t see if your efforts are getting you good results. By tracking your calorie intake and nutrition, you can see when your numbers get better or worse, what you need to change, how you need to tweak your exercise or nutrition etc.
The best free fitness apps and paid apps for tracking are:
FitNotes
This is a free, basic fitness tracker app. You can use it to track your exercise styles like cardio, bodybuilding, running, etc. Without any expense, you can create your custom exercise routines, use their calendar features, as well as use the cloud storage for restore and backup. It’s a great app for those who don’t want to bother with many features, but still need to keep track of the exercises they are doing.
If you want to support the development of the app, you can choose to give a $4.99 donation. Otherwise, it’s a free to use app.
GoogleFit
Google seems to have a solution for everything today, including fitness tracking. It has just become available on iOS too, which means that everyone can use it on their phones. By using a Wear OS smart watch or your mobile phone, you can track things like heart points or move points. The app will instantly tell you if you’re doing the exercise right or you’re getting enough exercise.
By using this app, you’ll get points by getting the heart rate up. It can also be set to track certain exercises.
MyFitnessPal
This app can be either free or paid depending on the features you want to use. The tool provides you with a variety of tracking features for both the exercise and nutrition. It supports 50 different exercises, as well as nutrition apps. It’s a bit more complex to use than the other two options, but it does literally everything related to fitness tracking in a single app. The free version combines just a few features, but the paid one tracks everything from what you eat to how you exercise.
2. Workout Apps
Everyone loves a good workout app! It isn’t just good for workout novices who aren’t sure how to exercise, but also for people who don’t have the time to plan their own workout step by step, or those who want a strict routine to follow.
Thankfully, there are some amazing workout fitness applications available on the market that will fit right into your busy schedule and provide you with great lifestyle guides. Here are some of them:
Map My Fitness
This free app has over 600 different activities you can use. It synchronizes with over 400 devices and creates an entire athletic guide for you to follow. You can use it to find a running route nearby, share your favourite running spots, as well as track your distance, pace, and calories. With this data in the app, you can set realistic and personalized goals, join challenges, and even exercise with friends.
In addition to the free app, there’s also a premium version that includes a more personalized training and a chance to monitor your heart rate.
Workout Trainer by Skimble
If you are looking for a more visualized experience, this workout trainer has thousands of free-to-use exercises and workouts with step-by-step video and audio instructions. All you have to do is set your goal, select a routine, and start exercising. Moreover, you can use the library of the app and create your custom routine, share it online, or try something others in the community shared.
Nike+ Training Club
Available on both Android and iOS, the Nike+ Training club app is one of the most popular exercise apps. It features sessions that professional athletes and celebrities created. Moreover, the app combines the exercises with audio cues and can be stream onto your TV by using Chromecast and Apple TV, or your regular HDMI cable. Finally, the app synchronizes with the Nike+ Run Club that lets you keep track of the runs and other activities.
JEFIT
JEFIT is a great source for body building and strength training. If you decide to use it, you’ll find thousands of different routines for different body parts, as well as a workout planner, instructions, progress tracker, exercise log, different types of timers, etc.
3. Social Fitness Apps
When you feel lack of motivation for exercise, you need something that will keep you going. Who better to do this than other people such as your friends or other social media users? This kind of fitness apps allows you to share your workouts and data with other users, connect with them, and even communicate about your fitness regime and progress. Moreover, users use such apps to create competitions and challenges that will definitely keep you going.
Generally speaking, there are three main kinds of social fitness apps: the ones that connect you to your offline friends, the ones that connect to the social media accounts you use, and the ones that help you meet with strangers who share similar fitness goals.
Of course, overlap between the three happens all the time. Here are some of the best apps you can use:
Fitbit
Fitbit connects to your electronic pedometer wirelessly and is used to compare your movements and stats to that of other Fitbit users. It will check how many steps you’ve taken, how many calories you’ve eaten, and how many stairs you’ve climbed.
Look at this app as a form of a really healthy competition. It’s so motivating, companies even use it as a workplace health initiative for the staff.
Nike+
Yes, we already mentioned this app once, but it is also a competitive fitness app, too. Ever since they partnered with the technology of Apple, their features have started growing. Now there are many challenges that connect people who use the same social media platforms, pushing them to try more and live a healthier life.
Whenever you exercise, you can share your success through social media platforms like Twitter, Facebook, and Path. There’s also an in-app camera included.
PumpUp
PumpUp is something you use to connect to people you don’t necessarily know, but share the same fitness goals. It’s intended for use for those who want to discuss their workout on social media and want to learn about the methods and accomplishments of other people.
If you download the app, you’ll see that it looks much like Instagram. It also functions similarly. However, it has three diverse feeds. The ‘New’ feed lets you see the latest posts. The ‘Popular’ feed lets you see what people liked the most or interacted with. Finally, the ‘Following’ feed can be used to see what the people you decided to follow do on the app.
4. Competitive Apps
This is similar to the previous type of fitness app, but with one significant difference – competition. If you’re more of a competitive person and don’t just like to share your fitness, we have just the right apps for you. If telling people about your goals and progress doesn’t get your juices flowing, you can take it to the next level with the following fitness apps.
StrideKick
Do you own a smart watch? If you don’t, you sure own a smartphone or a fitness tracker! Just download this app, start moving around, and see where you get in the StrideKick challenge. You need to make a team and add some of your colleagues or friends to join you in your task to make your life healthier.
To track everyone’s progress, you can use a dashboard. Once you get to the top of it, you will be a winner and a healthier person than everyone else in the competition. It’s a win-win, right?
Spiff
If you like a good challenge, you’ll like having Spiff around. This one doesn’t just ask you to move around, but actually gives you a chance to customize the exercise that you’ll be competing with others with. For example, set a challenge of making 50 to 100 push ups daily for a couple day. If someone skips a push up, they have to give an actual dollar into the account you have on Spiff.
It might not convince everyone to work really hard, but it will definitely keep them moving. If it isn’t for the win, it will be for the money. After all, skipping on 100 push ups will cost them all $100. No one wants to give that up for a bit of exercise that can only do them good, do they?
Finally, you can turn this competition into something even more motivating. Give the reward to the person who hasn’t lost a dollar, or let them choose what you’ll buy with the money you earned.
My Virtual Mission
Now, this app is the definition of fun while exercising. You can use the app to set up a route for the team to follow. Once you add people to the challenge, they can all choose how they want to pass this route – by running, swimming, or walking. It might be a virtual journey, but it is definitely a great social activity, as well as a chance for you all to get some exercise.
5. Charity Fitness Apps
If winning a challenge or some money isn’t your motivational push, this might be it. Wouldn’t you like to help others while you help yourself? There are such apps that let you use exercise for a good cause – and not only for the benefit of your health. Such apps will track your activities and movements and prompt corporate sponsors to donate to a charity you choose, usually for a completed goal or a mile.
If this isn’t motivational, we don’t know what is. Being able to really help people by simply moving around is an excellent way to start your day. So, you better get moving!
Charity Miles
Charity Miles is the most rewarding fitness app you can find out there. Imagine this – whenever you do a mile of cardio, someone will give a charity some money. If you walk or run, you get $0.25 per mile. If you cycle, you can get up to $0.10. These money will go to a charity of your choice and probably change someone’s life, so you should definitely start doing your fair share today.
Charity Bets
Bets sounds a bit too ‘gambling-like’, but not all gambling is bad. You’re actually gambling your calories and turning them into money for a good, charitable cause. How do you do this? Well, when someone tells you that you can’t meet a fitness goal, you ask them to put their money where their mouth is. Then, prove them wrong. If people bet that you won’t run a full marathon, do it not only so that you can spite them, but also to change someone’s life. Giving the money to those who need it is fulfilling on its own, but giving the money of those who don’t believe in you can be an extra motivation, right?
Plus 3 Network
The Plus 3 Network app tracks and logs your exercise, but it also features a link that connects companies and charitable donations to the activities their staff performs. So, if your company partners with this app, you can track your nutrition, fitness, biometric, and even lifestyle activities and earn points. You’ll get some rewards, as well as give to charity by only providing your effort. It’s a great way to motivate employees and keep them active, so chances are your company has this app too.
StickK
All you have to do to donate to a charity is complete a challenge or a goal you set for yourself. That’s it! Once you’re done with your weight loss, have performed regular exercise for a specific time, or even quit smoking – you can choose a charity and donate to it by winning. The fact that you’ll have to provide that amount if you fail to achieve the goal you’ve selected is one more push toward the right direction.
So, you basically get three things. First, you get to improve your life and health. Second, you get to help others and donate without spending anything. Thirdly, you get the motivational boost because of the risk that you’ll lose some money.
Conclusion
Have you found the perfect app for you just yet? There’s plenty of apps at your disposal at this point, all created with the same goal and vision – to help you improve your life and change your lifestyle. If you think that a regular fitness app can keep you moving, download it. If you don’t have the time to track your workouts, find an app that will. Finally, if you don’t think that you’re up to it, find an app that will bring your competitive or generous self at the surface. By helping others, you’ll help yourself. By beating others, you’ll help yourself.
Basically, all you need is the desire and a bit of effort. And, of course, your smartphone.
Author’s Bio:
Elizabeth Skinner is a nutrition specialist and an expert fitness trainer. She creates custom training guides for people who wish to live a healthier life, but also contributes on many blogs and sites with her fitness wisdom. You’ll find her advice everywhere on the Web, telling you how and why you should change your lifestyle to improve your life.
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