10 Best Workout Apps to Hit Your Goals, Tested and Personal Trainer–Approved

As a certified personal trainer and fitness instructor, I’m a big fan of IRL classes, but the best workout apps can be a great substitute. They provide smart, science-backed programming and motivational coaching that help you reach your wellness goals—without maxing out your credit card. They also offer the advantage of squeezing in sweat sessions when it jives with your schedule, which can make all the difference in your overall adherence to a program.

After having a baby last year, I finally embraced the convenience of workout apps myself. And I’ve been surprised (in a great way!) by the results. (The BODi app is my personal fave at the moment, as it helped me finally develop a consistent strength training workout routine.) To help you find your at-home fitness flow, I tapped my network for the best fitness apps–the ones that are actually effective, led by qualified instructors, and above all enjoyable, and Glamour reviewers also put some of the most popular options to the test. So whether you’re total beginner, wanting to gain muscle, or simply looking to incorporate some low-key exercises into your day, here are the best workout apps worth a download. All of them work whether you have an iPhone or Android and all offer a free trial period so you can test before you buy.

The best workout apps, at a glance:

• Best Workout App for Women: Obé
• Best Workout App for Pilates: Melissa Wood Health
• Best Workout App for Weightlifting: BODi
• Best Workout App for Beginners: Sweat
• Best Workout App for Low-Impact Exercise: Barre3
• Best Workout App for Weight Loss: Future

Brie Schwartz, Glamour’s commerce director, discovered Obe during the pandemic and found the cardio dance videos to be “such a daily bright spot.” All the workouts are tailored for women specifically, with features including cycle tracking, pelvic floor exercises, pre/postnatal workouts, and more.

But the app’s “true beauty,” Schwartz says, is its community. “You truly feel like you’re getting to know the instructors, even though they’re just in a little white box (it helps that during the live workouts they’ll say your name, if you’re lucky, which is always a rush),” she says. With pretty much any workout type you can think of—from kickboxing to strength training, barre, Pilates, and cycling, in increments ranging from 5 to 60 minutes—”each class is a jolt of joy,” Schwartz says. “The whole little ecosystem feels like a party and makes me dread going to the gym a little bit less. And yes, I did lose weight at the time, and gain muscle. Now I use it for sculpting and weight training. (Shout-out to the delightful Spencer—his classes go so quickly and always leave me sore and smiling, and Alex’s boxing classes are great stress relief).”

• Pros: Tons of options for every type of workout; upbeat community vibes; live streaming
• Cons: Not ideal if you’re looking for more structure; your favorite instructors might release classes infrequently

Most of us don’t have the budget for a fitness coach or personal training. But this app makes that service more attainable to the masses–a feature that strongly resonated with Glamour contributor and mother of four Brigitt Earley. “After taking a short quiz about your lifestyle and your fitness goals, the app matches you with a selection of trainers (real people, not AI!) that they think would be most compatible with you,” Earley says. “You can then read about each person and their own interests and specialties, plus watch a short video before choosing who you want to be your trainer.”

The app relies heavily on data and feedback to create a customized home workout plan: “Not only does your trainer see all of your workout data via a report from your Apple Watch, but you can also rate the workout and provide any feedback. Each movement also has a video that you can watch if you don’t know how to complete the move, and you can even record a video of your own form to send to your trainer for specific feedback.”

After using Future for nine months, Earley says she’s only missed two or three workouts—an impressive stat considering each week her trainer uploads six made-for-her workouts. “I’ve never been so disciplined, and I 100% attribute it to the gentle accountability aspect here,” she says. “I really look forward to showing up every day, and as a nice bonus, I’ve lost more than 20 pounds and feel so much healthier and energetic overall.” (Of course, if your goal is to lose weight, it’ll take more than just a single fitness app to get you there—factors like genetics, underlying health conditions, and your meal plans and calorie intake play a role too—but the right training program can be one helpful piece of the puzzle.)

• Pros: Scalable to all fitness levels; fully customized to suit your own needs and preferences; one-on-one communication with a trainer of your choosing
• Cons: Expensive compared to other training apps; you’ll get the most out of it with an Apple Watch

Glamour contributor Macaela Mackenzie says she tried a half dozen workout apps—and this is the one she’s consistently returned to. Melissa Wood’s workouts are “crazy effective. Her postpartum program helped me heal my core after a C-section and got rid of the lower back pain that had been plaguing me for months. I particularly love the strength classes she’s recently added using heavier weights. The secret sauce that keeps me coming back is that all her videos are extremely calm—not at all jarring to one’s nervous system (even at 6 a.m. when I typically squeeze a workout in).”

Sam Emrich, another Melissa Wood fan, loves the wide selection of brief workouts and meditations that are 15 minutes or less. “As someone who travels frequently and has a packed work schedule, I can filter workouts by duration and fit them in anytime, anywhere,” Emrich says. “Whether it’s a quick ab workout in between meetings or a five-minute meditation to start my day, this app helps me stay physically and mentally balanced.”

• Pros: Wide selection of workout types and lengths; great for travel
• Cons: Tracking isn’t the best

My husband has been a fan of this app (formerly known as Beachbody) for years and I always dismissed it as too bodybuilding-focused for my taste. But after having a baby last year, and realizing I needed to get serious about strength training if I wanted to safely haul my daughter around, I begrudgingly joined him for an at-home strength session. I was instantly hooked: The workouts I’ve tried—all part of trainer Amolia Cesar’s six-week program “The Work”—are thoughtfully designed, challenging yet doable (he offers lots of modifications, which I generously accept), surprisingly good at elevating my heart rate, and most importantly, effective if you want to build muscle and improve your overall functional strength. After a month of consistent effort, I noticed I could lift heavier dumbbells and crank out more reps. I’ve also come to look forward to the workouts—even though it’s just me exercising alone in my basement, Cesar and his crew do a great job of injecting humor and levity into the training sessions, which provides a quasi-community feel to it all. I’m excited to try more of the programming (beyond pure strength, there are also bodyweight cardio, HIIT, and yoga classes) and watch my fitness continue to grow.

• Pros: Thoughtfully designed, effective training plans that strengthen your full body
• Cons: During the workouts, the trainers frequently plug BODi’s line of recovery shakes, which can get annoying

Best Workout App for Pregnancy: Down Dog

Yoga is a great form of low-impact exercise for those who are expecting, and this app provides a ton of personalized content to choose from. Petra Mendoza, a fan of Down Dog, used it for prenatal yoga throughout her pregnancy. “I like how customizable it is,” she says. “You can tell it which trimester you’re in and specify what you want to work on from a relaxing flow with sciatic stretches to pelvic floor strengthening or even labor prep stretches.” Pick between five styles—vinyasa, hatha, gentle, restorative, and yin—and curate a flow based on your experience level.

• Pros: Highly customizable; less expensive than other apps
• Cons: Doesn’t offer other workouts types besides yoga

Best Workout App for Stress Relief: The Pilates Class

Not all workouts need to be high-intensity. In fact, penciling in lower-key sessions is an important part of a balanced exercise routine, and you can reap some pretty great mental health benefits as a result. With that in mind, the Pilates Class app is a great way to fit in “low-pressure movement, especially for the days when life is busy or stressful and working out feels like another thing on the to-do list,” says Emily Werner, a fan of the app. “The workouts on this app often help me feel like I’m just being mindful and moving my body to feel better rather than ‘fixing’ or ‘improving’ anything,” she explains.

Werner, who is going through IVF, shares that she did the stretch classes and some of the meditation/light movement classes during her last IVF cycle. “During egg stim (injections) you can’t work out very hard (not that you’d want to!), but it felt good to at least center myself for a bit and think about my body in a different way during a very body-focused time,” she says. “These classes were especially helpful after egg retrieval when I was working my way up to abdominal exercises again.”

• Pros: Classes focus on both physical and mental benefits of movement
• Cons: None of the classes are set to music, which Werner notes is demotivating for her

As the app of the popular barre studio franchise, this option provides a wide selection of high-quality, low-impact workouts you can do at home—ideal for anyone wanting to up their strength while going gentle on their joints. “Barre3 is a great intersection of Pilates, barre, yoga, and strength,” says Allie Hester, a Barre3 app fan for five years now. “The workouts are approachable, customizable, and challenging (if you want!).” Hester especially loves the instructors—describing them as “so positive and supportive.” Pick from more than 2,300 workout options and filter by length, type, instructor, and equipment needed to find the right vibe for you.

• Pros: Wide selection of low-impact workouts
• Cons: Annual subscription is a lot more expensive than others on this list

Most Motivational Workout App: Alive

Rebecca Ravee Norris, a freelance journalist, has been using this app for three years now and rates it as a surefire 10 out of 10. “It showcases dozens of different workouts organized by muscle groups, as well as various types of resistance training, including push, pull, and HIIT,” she says. “While these one-off workouts (and warm-ups and cool-downs) are great, my favorite aspect of the app is the Challenge section. Over the years, I’ve done the Begin Again, Alive & Thrive, and New Beginnings challenges to keep me on track with easy-to-follow weekly breakdowns. Currently, I’m working through the 3-Week Refresh Reset Intermediate challenge.” Plus, the workouts are really customizable, allowing you to tailor them to your fitness level, whether you’re a new exerciser or advanced athlete, Norris notes.

• Pros: Offers structured programs and regular challenges; scalable to all fitness levels
• Cons: Doesn’t offer gentle forms of movement, like yoga, Pilates, or stretching

“I've been using the Sweat app consistently since 2020. It started as a way to stay fit during lockdown with no equipment, but I ended up loving the app so much that I use it literally every week to this day. I particularly love the trainer Kayla Itsines and her High Intensity Zero Equipment program. The workouts are around 40 minutes in total and always leave me feeling challenged, stronger, and yes, dripping with sweat. The workouts are usually broken into a few circuits to keep things interesting and fast paced. The app shows you exactly how to do every move with a looping video of the trainer demonstrating. You can also play your favorite music simultaneously with the app going. Overall, the app is really well designed, easy to follow, and has managed to keep me motivated for the last five years!” says Glamour reviewer Rachel Inman.

• Pros: Extensive variety of classes for all ability levels; strong community feel
• Cons: Not the best for tracking runs; many classes require equipment

Best Workout App for Variety: Peloton App One

Peloton is way more than a cycling brand. Their app offers nearly a dozen different types of workouts for pretty much every vibe and ability level, with new workouts and on-demand classes added daily. Glamour reviewer Gabriella Cuzzola used the app mainly for yoga throughout her first pregnancy and found it to be “very user friendly.” “The videos are well produced, and the offerings are extensive,” she says. Beyond a large catalogue of workouts, you can join live classes if you’re craving the camaraderie of group fitness or sign up for challenges (for example: cycle 50 miles in a month) if you need extra motivation. Plus, there’s a strong community component. “You can set your own goals, find friends who are also using the app, and join various hashtags,” Cuzzola says. “One my best friends lives in Pennsylvania and I’m in New Jersey, and we will sometimes plan to ‘meet’ on the bike at a certain time so we can take a class together. We can see each other’s progress and text while we work out!”

• Pros: Extensive variety of classes for all ability levels; strong community feel
• Cons: Not the best for tracking runs; many classes require equipment

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