Apple Fitness+ Makes Home Workouts More Fun and Inclusive

With over 200 on-demand options, a diverse cast of trainers, and a wide variety of music as motivation, there’s something here for everyone.The Takeaway: One of the most uplifting and approachable ways to work out at home (for Apple Watch owners).More information hereIn the era of COVID-19, streaming workouts at home is nothing new. The service launches today, December 14; here’s what to expect.Join Runner’s World+ for the latest training tips and advice!Within the app, you’ll find high-intensity interval training (HIIT), yoga, core, strength, treadmill (walking and running), indoor cycling, rowing, dance, and mindful cooldown workouts ranging from 5 minutes (like quick cooldowns) to 10-, 20-, 30- or 45-minute options from 21 trainers. Since we tested the platform with pre-released software and were some of the first users in the world to try the workouts, we didn’t have access to a Burn Bar, but we look forward to seeing how it will motivate us in the future.The Fitness+ program will is compatible with Apple Watch Series 3 and later. An Apple Music subscription is not required to enjoy the music in the workouts, but for those with a subscription, you can download favorite songs or full playlists from Fitness+ to your Apple Music library to listen to any time, making it a fun way to discover new artists and music you love. Whether one is better depends on your personal preference, but the Fitness+ workouts remind me of a more colorful, cheerful version of what you’d find on the Nike Training Club app rather than what you’d find on say, Peloton Digital.For us runners, all treadmill workouts offer both run and walk options and cues, which makes the class less intimidating overall compared to some more intense options out there. If you have two household members who both own Apple Watches and want to do the same workout together, you’ll select one watch to display the metrics on screen.You can also access it anywhere there is an Apple device, so if you travel to a hotel that has Apple TV, you can access your Fitness+ app on the road.Finally, for those truly immersed in the Apple world, the Apple One Premier plan includes Apple Fitness+, Apple Music, Apple TV+, Apple Arcade, and Apple News+ for $29.95 per month. On an occasion when you don’t, like if you forgot to charge it, for example, the program will be able to find an Apple watch nearby and allow you to do the workout without it (and the metrics), but it is optimized to be used together.The experience gets maximized as you use different devices. Apple is known for launching products and services that set the bar high, and they are also known for gathering user feedback and quickly pivoting to create an enhanced or improved version (does everyone remember the first Apple Watch?), so we suspect this will be just the start of an interesting play in the world of streamed fitness content for the company.That said, I don’t think home fitness apps will cause gyms to lock their doors for good.