Since our mental health is connected to our physical well-being, these FREE fitness apps will help motivate you as we head into the holiday season, whether or not you are avoiding the gym.
These free fitness apps offer at-home exercises including yoga, measure your walks and hikes, and meditation to help you sleep more restfully when day is done.
Unless otherwise noted, they are all available on both iOS and Android, and several also coordinate with your health and fitness wearables.
Best Free Apps for Walks and Hikes
I’ve been using StepsApp for more than a year, and love it. The app tracks my steps, calories, miles and time, and shows you a week at a time.
You can set your daily goal – 5,000 steps or 10,000 steps, or anything in between, and the app tells you how close you get. There’s no judgment – just numbers.
There’s also a paid version with additional features, including integrating with your heart and blood pressure monitor or app and your fitness wearables.
AllTrails also maps your walk, with an emphasis on hiking trails. It locates nearby trails, and is a great tool to find trails in an area you’re visiting away from home. So it’s an app for motivation, as well as for discovery.
- Download Wikiloc Outdoor Navigation GPS for detailed trail maps when you are off the grid somewhere without internet, or if you just want to save your phone battery.
Best free workout apps
Best Free Workout Apps
- Do curls in your kitchen with two cartons of milk.
- Use a chair as a ballet barre.
- Do sit-ups holding a can of beans or coffee instead of the yoga block you don’t own.
Wakeout! was named one of the 20 best Apple apps of 2020
7 Minute Workout guides you to brief, healthy workouts. Choose from general workouts, power butt workouts, power chest workouts, etc.
There’s also a feature to compare – or compete – with friends. Virtually, of course.
lets you choose from preset workouts or create your own workouts via a library of more than 800 moves. But that’s just the start.
This comprehensive app also tracks your weight/set/rep progress, and share it with others. It also syncs with most fitness wearables and connects to MyFitnessPal, so even if you aren’t training for a marathon or the Olympics, you can combine multiple data points for a comprehensive look at your stats.
It also syncs with Under Armour running shoes, to track such details as the length of your stride, elevation and more.
Nike Training Club offers more than 200 workouts ranging from 15-60 minutes, focusing on everything from bodyweight-only to full-equipment workouts for everyone at all fitness levels.
Multi-week programs include a prescribed series of workouts, nutrition tips, and wellness guidance to help you build healthy habits and see results that last.
Each program is led by a Nike Master Trainer and is designed to be flexible enough to fit into your busy life.
Best Free Yoga Apps
Yoga for Beginners is exactly what its name says – for beginners who need expert guidance.
Workouts are divided into three types of yoga: vinyasa, hatha, and restorative. Each video guides you through the poses and breath work to help you learn and develop your practice. iOS only.
Down Dog Yoga is an app that lets you specify the parameters of your yoga practice, including type of practice, level, length and more.
Then it puts together a video for you. This way you’re not just watching the same video every day.
Best Free Meditation Apps
Insight Timer is an app for meditation, with hundreds of short recordings to help you sleep, and to deal with anxiety and stress.
Because we all know that when you sleep better you feel better the next day.
Best Workout Apps That Are Not Free
Peloton App gives you 30 days free, after which it is $12.99 a month.
- NYCOTC Tip: Set a reminder to cancel at day 29 so your credit card is not charged
It includes thousands of live and on-demand classes to help you meet your goals, including running, strength, toning, cycling, yoga, meditation and outdoor workouts.
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Evelyn Kanter is a native New Yorker who has written for the NY Times, NY Daily News, NY Post, New York Magazine, and is a former on-air reporter for WCBS Newsradio 88 and WABC-TV Eyewitness News.
NYCOTC Editor Evelyn Kanter also is the author of several NYC and Hudson Valley guidebooks, including my latest, 100 Things to Do in NYC Before You Die.
Purchase autographed copies by emailing evelyn@nyconthecheap.com
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