Fitness has always been a cornerstone of health and well-being, but the pandemic has highlighted its importance. As brick-and-mortar gyms were forced to close due to COVID regulations, virtual workouts stepped in to fill the gap. This has resulted in a surge in global downloads of fitness apps – from 1.97 billion in 2019 to 2.48 billion in 2021. Although the growth rate may not be as high as when gyms reopen, virtual fitness is here to stay – 80% of gym members plan to continue utilizing digital workouts after the pandemic ends.
Given this, it’s no surprise that business owners are taking advantage of this niche opportunity. This article will provide information on how to create a fitness app and the most popular solutions on the market.
What are the leading types of fitness apps?
Activity tracking apps
Activity tracking apps can help users promote a healthier and more active life. By leveraging geolocation and accelerometer technology, these apps track and calculate users’ daily steps, exercise information, calories burned, sleep data, and more.
Popular examples of such apps include ASICS RunKeeper, designed specifically for runners and provides tracking features for running, walking, swimming, and more. In addition, many of these apps are compatible with wearable devices such as Apple Watch or Android Wear.
Workout applications
The development of workout applications provides fitness fanatics with personalized workout routines, instructional videos, and other on-demand fitness activities. In addition, these apps are often compatible with numerous tracking devices, smartwatches, smart scales, and other smart gadgets, providing users with an all-encompassing look at their fitness progress.
Core features of a workout app usually consist of the same components of any other fitness app, such as gamification elements to inspire users to exercise, calorie and water intake tracking, personalization of workouts based on user preferences, and the ability to share daily fitness results with others.
An illustration of a popular workout app is Planet Fitness, which had the most downloads in the US in the first half of 2022, reaching 12 million users.
Smart coach apps
Smart Coach fitness applications leverage AI-powered computer vision to make exercising safe and injury-free. By utilizing motion tracking, 3D pose estimation, and machine learning algorithms, these solutions are able to analyze users’ movements and give feedback on their exercise technique. For instance, apps like Tempo utilize in-app 3D sensors to count reps, correct form and recommend the right weights for users during more than 2,000 guided workouts.
Diet and nutrition apps
Nutrition and diet apps have seen tremendous growth in recent years, as they enable people to maintain a balanced diet and lead healthier lifestyles. App features such as a food database, barcode scanning, food logger, meal planner, calorie calculator, water consumption tracker, shopping list organizer, and recommended recipes have all contributed to their success.
MyFitnessPal is one of the most successful diet apps, generating $171 million in revenue in 2021 through its premium subscription service.
Meditation apps
The global market for meditation apps was estimated to be worth $1.1 billion in 2021 and is projected to reach $6.8 billion by 2030. This can be attributed to increasing levels of stress around the world, with data showing that 87% of adults in the US feel overwhelmed due to prolonged stress and economic crises. Meditation and mental wellness apps offer users a range of features, such as integration with wearables to track sleep data, gamification rewards, tailored recommendations, geo-location services to find fellow users, and live streaming of meditation classes and audio content.
Calm, one of the leading meditation and mental wellness apps, has surpassed 100 million downloads and reported consumer spending of around $119 million in 2021. This app is an example of the success that this niche can bring and the potential it has to continue growing in the years to come.
Yoga apps
These mobile solutions provide yoga sessions and practices tailored to both beginners and longtime yogis, on-demand. Yoga-Go is one of the most downloaded yoga apps in 2021, with over 5.2+ million downloads. It offers users home-based yoga and pilates workouts to help them tone their body and manage their emotions.
Other popular yoga apps offer audio-guided yoga sessions, structured yoga training plans, and pose reference guides. Similar to meditation apps, these apps also feature live-streaming, geolocation, gamified elements, and personalized recommendations.
Move-to-earn apps
Apps that offer rewards for exercising have gained traction due to the crypto craze. Move-to-earn apps are game-like and users are compensated with either crypto or tokens for working out. These rewards can be used to make in-app purchases, traded on exchanges, or invested in other cryptocurrencies.
The move-to-earn app category is characterized by blockchain and gamification, and some apps even incorporate immersive technologies to enhance the digital experience. DEFY is a noteworthy example; this location-based game utilizes augmented reality to create a virtual metaverse world where users fight an evil tech corporation while earning FCOIN rewards as they complete tasks.
Step-by-Step Fitness App Development
Start by determining what your fitness app is going to focus on. Will it be guided meditations or on-demand workouts? Once you know this, you can then research the niche to see if there is a demand for this type of app and if it is profitable. Look at the top-grossing apps in the niche and see what kind of features they offer, which could give you some insight into how to develop your own app. After this, pinpoint a problem in the niche that your app could solve. Once you have identified the problem and researched the niche, you will be more prepared to make the right decision regarding your fitness app.
Prior to beginning your fitness app development, it is essential to do in-depth market research. This will enable you to determine the key market players, what features are commonly found in fitness apps, and any mistakes and issues that have occurred. Additionally, you should gain an understanding of who your target audience is by examining the user base of your competitors, engaging in interviews, and creating user personas with distinct needs, problems, and interests. Ultimately, through competitor data and customer insights, you will be able to ensure that your app is meeting the requirements of the correct users with the correct features.
If you want to ensure a successful fitness app, it is important to hire vetted developers. It is a good idea to choose a tech partner that has a well-established experience of similar projects and shares your business goals. You have the option of either recruiting a team in-house or outsourcing the entire development process to a vendor. Outsourcing provides more cost-efficiency, quality assurance, and a faster hiring process.
With the team in place, it’s time to shape the concept of your business idea and define a set of features. Your development team will collaborate with you to form and solidify core app features, user personas, and customer journey maps. Additionally, this research process will provide an understanding of your competitors and target audience, as well as an outline of the main objectives of your solution, which will be summarized in brief.
It’s time to create a captivating UI/UX for your digital product. Your UI/UX designers will develop a few prototypes, based on user personas and market research, and test them with a focus group of target users. The prototype that receives the most positive feedback will be the final draft of the product’s interface, which will then be sent to the development team. It’s important to make the interface highly intuitive, without unnecessary screens and processes, such as a long sign-in process. The app should take the user directly to the task at hand and smoothly navigate them through the registration, onboarding, schedule, and goal screens.
At this stage, developers determine the technology stack necessary to transform a product idea into a fully-functional fitness app. The choice of the tech stack is based on the tech maturity of the company, the app’s requirements, and the cost expectations. The development team will plan the process of creating the app and document all milestones in the following materials: a technical design document, a product roadmap, and a technical requirements document.
The technical design document will contain a detailed plan with system architecture, business logic, interfaces, and all other necessary information to build the solution.
The product roadmap will be a shared source of truth with both short and long-term goals, timelines, and costs.
Finally, the technical requirements document will provide a complete description of all system requirements.
Testing and developing the MVP is a key step in the process of creating a fitness app. This allows you to test your product hypothesis without having to spend time and resources on the entire feature set. The QA team will ensure that the product meets the initial business objectives and tech requirements. Once the MVP is ready, developers can release it on the App Store or Google Play Store to get real-user feedback.
Once your mobile fitness app has reached the MVP stage, it’s time to add nice-to-have features and check for bugs and inconsistencies. To ensure your product’s long-term success, you should continually maintain and update it. This will keep your solution up-to-date with the latest platform versions, changing user demands, and competitive pressures. Additionally, use a built-in mobile analytics tool such as Firebase or Mixpanel to track your app’s performance and keep an eye on user reviews for bug reports and ideas to improve the app.
The bottom line
The fitness app market is ripe for the picking, and it offers considerable monetization potential for savvy business owners. But creating a wellness app can be difficult due to the complexity of features, technology, and design.
At Orangesoft, we understand the challenges of developing a top-notch fitness app and are ready to help you make your business idea a reality. Contact us to get a reliable app development team for your next project.