Use These Apps to Track Strength Training
There are many great apps for tracking your mileage , and the clear winner when it comes to cycling ( Strava , yes). But when you work out in the gym, picking a winner is a little more difficult. Until recently, all applications were awkward and inconvenient. Now … well, just a few of them.
Our favorite: strong
Strong (free for iOS and Android ) is the clear winner. It is easy to use even if you get tired during your workout. With the free app, you can create three workouts and mark your sets as you complete them.
The app fills in your previous weights and reps so you don’t have to mess around with numbers every time. It syncs with Apple Health and Google Fit, which means that if you spend 45 minutes recording exercises in the app, you’ll automatically be credited with a 45-minute strength workout. Strong also keeps track of your personal bests and calculates your theoretical maximum of one repetition of each exercise based on the reps you’ve completed. (For example, if you bench 90 pounds five times, it lets you know that you can probably do one rep with 100 pounds.)
The pro version is well worth it if you are at the gym a lot. For $ 4.99 per month or $ 29.99 per year, you can save as many workouts as you want. (I updated when I switched from a 2-day regimen to a four-workout regimen.) You also get a cymbal calculator that tells you how many and what size cymbals you need to add to each end of the plank to achieve what you want. weight. (For this 90-pound bench, you’ll add two 10-pound plates and 2.5-pound plates to each end of the 45-pound bar.) A subscription also gives you access to a warm-up calculator, body measurement tracker, and analytics kit to track your progress.
More options
JeFit for iOS and Android is another app with a free mode and more advanced features if you pay for a subscription ($ 6.99 per month). It works seamlessly on Apple Watch, so this is our pick if you love exercising on the watch. It also has a built-in interval timer and a directory of workout programs to choose from if you’d rather choose one from the app rather than looking for your own somewhere else.
SmartGym (iOS only) has the same features as JeFit and Strong, with two tiers of subscriptions priced at $ 6.99 or $ 9.99. It has HIIT timers and customizable rest timers between sets, and can sync with your Mac and your Apple Watch.
Fitnotes (Android only) is a little clunky than Strong and doesn’t have as many features, but it gets the job done and won’t force you to buy a subscription (although there is a $ 2.99 version of the app that includes some graphs to track your progress. )
Progression (Android only) syncs everything to Google Drive. The professional version, a one-time purchase for $ 5.49, gives you access to some analytical features.
Intensity (Android and iOS) focuses on your total weight for the day (summarizing all your exercises) and progress charts, and has popular lifting programs like 5/3/1 and Stronglifts built into it. The basics are free, but you’ll need a $ 3.99 / month subscription to unlock some of the features.
This post was first published in December 2018 and was updated on March 15, 2021 with more information.