What Makes an App Effective?

The researchers noted that any kind of intervention aimed at improving health needs to be based on behavior change in order to be effective. One of the key components to an app’s effectiveness is the behavior change techniques it uses. Without these components, change is a lot less likely to occur, as indicated by the masses of people who ignore advice on how to become healthier every day.

A further boon to effective apps is tailored feedback. One advantage an app offers, as opposed to reading a book or writing in a workout log, is that an app can actively use your own characteristics and workout data to customize its responses. Customized data isn’t just a fun feature – it’s also been shown to be more effective than generic information.

Research Focus and Results

The focus of the research was on whether or not the existing apps employed behavior change techniques and personalized feedback. To do this, the researchers scoured iTunes and Google Play to find fitness apps. After searching, they downloaded and looked at the features of 64 apps, both free and paid. Only apps that included tailored feedback were included, so that base was covered. The apps were then rated based on the number of behavior change techniques used. There are a total of 23 techniques.

On average, the apps used five of the 23 techniques. 91% of the apps scored within one point of this average. This should tell you that each app was similar in terms of promoting behavioral change. Indeed, this held true no matter which online store the app was purchased from or whether it was paid for or not.

The greatest disparity in score was also only a difference of three points in either direction. In other words, the lowest score was two, and the highest score was eight. The app that had the most features promoting behavior change was RunKeeper, with a score of eight. Incidentally, RunKeeper and the six apps that scored a seven were all free. Here’s a list of the seven best-scoring apps:

1. RunKeeper
2. Big Welsh Walking Challenge
3. GymPush
4. Hubbub Health
5. My Pocket Coach
6. Sixpack
7. Teemo

The lowest scoring app was Activious, with only two behavior change features. Out of the nine apps that scored a three, four cost money.

The most commonly used features were providing feedback on performance (used by all the apps), self-monitoring, and goal setting. Several techniques, like stress management and identifying barriers to success, were not used by any of the apps.

Conclusion

In theory, apps can be useful for promoting health and fitness. This is true whether you’re just getting started or need to adjust your existing health and fitness habits. This study helped identify which apps will help you be most successful.

Bear in mind that the number of behavior change features is not the only way to rate a fitness app, nor does a greater number of such features necessarily ensure you will like one app more than a lower scoring alternative. However, it does help us determine which apps are most helpful in the long run. And one thing is for sure – when it comes to fitness apps, you don’t necessarily get what you pay for, as the best apps in this study were free.

References:

1. Anouk Middelweerd, et. al., “Apps to promote physical activity among adults: a review and content analysis,” International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity 2014, 11:97

Photo courtesy of Shutterstock.

The post The 7 Best Apps for Changing Your Fitness Habits appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

Sworkit, as stated on their website, “…builds randomized circuit training workouts that you can do anywhere. You just choose which part of your body you want to work on and how long you have to work out, and Sworkit takes care of the rest.”

I was traveling last week and decided to test the above claim. It was a good time to do so, since the workouts on Sworkit are all bodyweight and require no equipment. I traveled with just a carry-on and, of course, had a lackluster gym at my hotel. My findings are below.

Variety is a Plus

When you start up Sworkit, you get a basic instructions list, along with some features for the Premium version. Hit Continue and you’ll be brought into a screen where you can choose to do strength training or “Yoga, Cardio & More.”

Strength

The strength screen first gives you the option of selecting a specific part of the body you’d like to work out. “Full Body,” “Upper Body,” “Core Strength,” “Lower Body,” “Anything Goes,” and “Custom Workout” are all options here. As with most bodyweight strength exercises, you will end up using muscles in the entire body in most movements, but they do categorize the primary movers (for example, arms for push ups and legs for squats) fairly well for these options.

The only category I found unnecessary was the “Anything Goes” category, as it truly randomizes all the movements. You can end up doing five variations of push ups in a row, which can be frustrating, especially since you have to stop and press a button if you want to skip an exercise.

Yoga, Cardio & More

The “Yoga, Cardio & More” section provides some warm ups, a few options for yoga (which seem to be a vinyasa style), and stretching. I used the yoga options on my rest days and found it to be sufficient for myself, since I’ve been to several classes and have some experience. The fact that it does not show or explain the transitions from one movement to another would possibly be frustrating for someone newer to a yoga practice. The stretching options seemed a bit more straightforward, as they were standard stretches I’ve seen in track and other sports, and the illustrations are well done.

Other Features

When doing either strength or the “Yoga, Cardio & More” option, you can choose a length of time to perform movements, starting with five minutes. Then, while working out, you can pause, skip exercises and movements, and turn sound on and off from the workout screen.

When you finish, Sworkit invites you to challenge a friend by posting to Facebook or Twitter, or by sending an email. I did appreciate that they let you challenge someone, or perhaps send your workout to a coach, without broadcasting it to the world if you don’t want to.

My one complaint when using the app is that if you want to watch the video of a movement, it has to take you out of the app to a video viewer. It does pause the workout while you do that, but the transition is jarring and could be better.

Summary

For a free version of an app, Sworkit is excellent. It has a large library of movements, and is easy to navigate. I’ll be putting it on my list of apps for clients to install when traveling, and most likely getting the premium version myself. If you’re traveling this summer and need a hotel room workout option, I recommend it.

Sworkit is available for free for Android or iPhone.

The post Sworkit Circuit Training App (Tech Review) appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

If you are starting out with a fitness regimen and finding it hard to keep track of all the different elements of wellness via several different apps, there’s an app for that. Nudge was created with the idea that you should be able to view all your fitness data – from sleep, to food, to running mileage – in one spot, and be able to get a little social with it, too.

After hearing about the new Nudge app several times from my editor, a few online reviews, and a promotion or two, I realized I should take a look myself to see what all the fuss is about. While the idea seems to be far from fully realized, Nudge has promise, and could be useful now for a number of different applications.

The Basics

Download the app from the website and create a user account. Yes, it does require registration, but you can use your Facebook account if you like, and it only requires some basic information to get going. Once you’ve got your account up and running, you can swipe to the right and connect to all your fitness apps.

Left: Registration screen; Right: Swipe to sync screen

That is, you can sync as long as you have an app from one of the six groups that Nudge currently supports. Currently Fitbit and Up by Jawbone seem to be the only devices supported for importing activity. As a Withings user, this created some extra effort in my testing, and was a bit disappointing. With a lot of other contenders on the market as well like Nike, Polar and Garmin, one would think this would be a priority.

The other supported apps include MapMyFitness, Moves, RunKeeper, and Strava. These are all GPS-type trackers and make sense for synchronizing outside of the time and distance tracking provided by the app.

Daily Tracking

The daily tracking screen has you track basic information about beverages, food, and activity. It includes indulgences like alcohol and cigarettes, which I’ve never seen before, and may make it good for tracking smoking cessation programs. I was surprised that the food tracking was not more robust, though it was very easy to input data across the different categories with the tap of a finger to add a new vegetable, fruit, or grain.

Left: Sync screen; Right: Daily tracking screen

(Even More) Social Media

Nudge includes a section called “Clubs” where you can sign up for different interests and be involved in discussions. It also lets you “friend” people to compare your wellness points and have a little healthy competition. The app asks if you’re part of a club or organization when you start, so I can only assume they’re hoping employers pick this up as a central tracking app for healthcare incentives.

The Final Verdict

If you’re not looking to do a food diary, this is a great app to start off with, provided your activity tracking device is supported. I found the interface to be easy to use, and the general nutrition tracker gave me a general idea of the day’s intake without getting too involved.

Personally, I’ll keep using MyFitnessPal, which integrates more apps and devices and has better food tracking. But as they say, something is better than nothing, so if you find a full food diary to be a bit much, this app may be the something you need.

Nudge is available for free at NudgeYourself.com.

The post Nudge App (Tech Review) appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

It can seem impossible to not only find good apps, but also to actually use them consistently. Think about it, if I told you to go look for a fitness app to download right now, how would you go about doing it?

The fitness app industry is booming. Companies are trying to be where people are all day long – on their phones. So, instead of aimlessly scrolling through social media, you can pull out the best piece of workout equipment you have – your phone. Whether your phone acts as your personal chef, personal trainer, GPS, fitness tracker, or fitness diary, using the right apps can help you reach your goals faster than just doing it on your own.

If you want five apps that will cover every aspect of your fitness here are our choices:

Best App for Goal Setting: Lift

With anything you do in fitness, if you don’t actually set goals then you will be less likely to stick with it and see results. The Lift app helps you build healthier habits by providing you guidance along the way to your goals.

You start off with picking a habit you’d like to work on. In this example, I chose “Drinking More Water.” Lift then let’s you set reminders and track your goal. Every goal you set is public and other users can cheer you on, provide encouragement, or even hold you accountable to keep you motivated.

Next Steps:

1. Address what part of your fitness journey is toughest, i.e. diet, going to the gym frequently, or smoking.
2. Only choose two or three habits to address at one time.
3. Get some of your friends involved to download the app and help cheer you on. It’ll mean more to you to have them on there.
4. Pick a time everyday to check-in to the app and set reminders beforehand so you don’t forget.

Unlock you potential. Change your life with Lift.

Best App for Nutrition: Yummly 

I think we all know by now that without a healthy diet, the best workout program in the world will get you minimal results. The problem is most people don’t know where to start. Should you do paleo, low-carb, or vegetarian? And then once we choose, we get bored because we end up eating the same five meals taught to us by a friend who talked us into switching our diet in the first place.

Yummly let’s you browse personalized recipe recommendations, find ones that match your diet preference, and build your grocery list. Not only does the app list all of the recipe ingredients, it also shows you how many calories are in it, and how long it takes to prepare.

Next steps:

1. Choose which diet you’re going to be following.
2. If you’re not going to follow any particular diet, that’s fine, type in “healthy” in the search bar and over 211K+ results will pop up!
3. Start building your healthy grocery list
4. Use this for all of your meal planning.

Discover the world’s recipes at Yummly.

Best Apps for Workouts: Gain Fitness 

Ever wanted a personal trainer? Well, Gain Fitness is your very own digital personal trainer that will set you up with customized workouts to help you reach your goals. The workouts will progress, never get boring, and keep you seeing results – just like having a personal trainer in your pocket. The best part is that you don’t even need to go to a gym to do the workouts.

Next steps:

1. Designate when and where you’ll be doing your workout, i.e. at home (once a week), in the gym (every time), or just on rest days.
2. Choose a difficulty level and address an area you want to work on i.e. Fat Loss, Muscle Gain, etc.
3. Track your results!

Start your workout with Gain.

Best App for Cardio: MapMyRun

If you enjoy running, jogging, or walking or want to get into any of those, you will love MapMyRun. Not only does it track everything so you can see your progress, but there’s an awesome community of people to interact, compete, and become friends with. MapMyRun has tapped into a great social aspect by allowing users to share about a run they did to their social media sites.

Think of it as your running diary, offering GPS tracking, time logs, daily activity, and calories burned, and that can all be done while you’re listening to music, on the phone, and going about your daily routines.

Next Steps:

1. Pick one or two days a week to go out for a run or jog.
2. Choose a route that you know and get comfortable with that at first.
3. Once you get comfortable use the app to explore new running routes.
4. Start tracking your daily activities as well to actually put an actual number to how active you are throughout the day.

Make every mile count with MapMyRun.

Best New App: FitTag

If you have ever felt overwhelmed by dog videos, political rants, and weird memes on social media, then FitTag could be the place for you to start hanging out. The app builds a place for you to go if you just want to be around fitness-minded people.

The mission of FitTag is to create a visual guide for everything healthy going on around the world. FitTag uses their #100FitDay Challenge to see if users can capture a healthy moment they’ve experienced each day for 100 days. Users can share workouts, diets, and recipes, while getting tips along the way helping them to reach day 100.

Next Steps:

1. Each day capture a photo or video of you making a healthy choice.
2. Encourage friends to take the challenge to see who can last until the end.
3. Inspire everyone around you.

Discover new fitness at FitTag

If you’ve ever said, “I don’t have time,” “Working out is boring,” or, “I don’t know what to do,” then fitness apps can do a great job for you in squashing all of those excuses. But don’t get paralysis-by-analysis when it comes to choosing one. Use apps as tools in your toolbox to help keep you on track, discover new ways to get fit, and inspire those around you.

The post The 5 Best Fitness Apps appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

One of the recent trends in mobile applications has been the “gamification” of content, which means to literally add competitive or play mechanics and context to things such as: todo lists, health tracking, learning to make cocktails, and even reading a column.

Now I don’t know about you, but I hate to lose games, and I’ve learned to leverage this pride in all physical activity. The guy next to me burning through pull ups makes me kip faster in CrossFit. My 60-something, 90-pound jiu-jitsu instructor makes me improve my technique after she mops the floor with me. The 9-year-old boy ahead of me, running the 5k in loose-laced skater shoes makes my pace faster.

Which is why I’ve taken a liking to gamification in workout apps. If I don’t have anyone around to help harness my pride, I might as well leverage social networks or play against myself! So here are three awesome apps that are either gamified or good for gamifying your workouts.

Fleetly, Fleetly Corporation, Free

The free app Fleetly, accomplishes gamification by using a point system to help you achieve your goals. The app functions both as a workout logging system, as well as a coach if you need one. Now, another person’s goals may not necessarily be your goals. Olympic weightlifting, bodybuilding, tempo running, and a 400-yard swim sprint are all very unique activities with special logging needs. Many logging apps fail to meet diverse activity needs by fencing you into too narrow of a template. This is why until recently my logbook has always been a blank page moleskin. I guarantee, all of you multi-sporters are going to be pretty impressed with Fleetly’s attention to logging detail.

Fleetly offers a list of challenges to join such as 100 Workouts in 2012, 100-Mile Running Challenge, Six Pack 2012, 500 Miles (Bike), and more. The people tab allows you to check in on your fleetly friends activities and – here’s the pride part – monthly leaderboards! As you log your workouts Fleetly assigns a point value based on exertion. It turns out this 1-to-50 scale isn’t exactly arbitrary either. If you take your fitness score and multiply it by your body weight, you’ll have yourself a good indication of the calories burned that week.

It’s Fleetly’s simple competitive point value system that had me and my weekend warrior buddies hooked.

RunKeeper, FitnessKeeper Inc, Free

There are certain activities, such as running, cycling, hiking, and skiing, that have the benefit of being logged automatically based on time and GPS locations. RunKeeper is one of the first apps to utilize the iPhone’s GPS and network to accurately map outdoor runs (as well as cycling and even swimming with proper water proofing). If you upgrade to Elite, you can update an online map with your live, current location in order to let friends and family know exactly where you are. This was a godsend for my cheerleaders when I ran my first marathon last year. They even made a game out of having a margarita between every five miles I ran. I’m not sure who looked worse at the end of the run: me or my inebriated cheerleaders.

RunKeeper has privacy settings if you want to keep your live view limited to your “street team.” The app also includes challenges and coaching from professional athletes. These tips will run you $10 or, if you subscribe to their Elite service ($20/year or $5/month), they’ll only cost you $5. Want more detailed data? Attach a compatible heart rate monitor to hit your desired exertion zones.

There’s another big brand GPS running app out there from a company with a swooshy logo, but after months of testing, I found the coaching and run history a tad more reliable with RunKeeper. The best thing about RunKeeper? You can transfer data directly into Fleetly to keep all your logs consolidated!

Hundred PushUps, SoftwareX, $1.99

What better way to reflect the popularity of casual games than to get a little casual workout in. Pushups are a simple compound exercise you can do just about anywhere, and they’re a good reflection of general fitness. The goal of the Hundred PushUps app is to train you to successfully pull off 100 pushups in a row with no rest. Yep, 100. In a row. Like a boss.

When you first open the app you’re going to enter your baseline, an initial pushup test to properly place you into a training regimen. If you need a refresher on good form, 100 Pushups offers you an animation demonstrating a great planked body position, as well as a few other tips.

Once you’re placed into an appropriate training week, you’ll begin your daily pushups with a timed rest between each set. The specific rest time is going to assure these sets tap into endurance building, by limiting your ability to recover. As the weeks progress you’ll find yourself easily pumping out 30 in a row, 50 in a row, 80, and eventually, all 100 pushups without stopping to hug the floor for a spell.

When you’re done with each day’s set, you can share you performance over Facebook, Twitter, Evernote, Tumblr, even email and SMS. This makes for great “Beat That!” competitions amongst friends.

The range of gamification varies in all these apps. Fleetly is going to track your logs directly into a point system game, RunKeeper uses “everyone is watching you” live updating to motivate you into moving, and 100 Pushups acts as a friendly game of “lets see you top that.”

Some of you may not need to leverage pride to get the best out of your workouts. For those of you who do – game on, my friends.

The post Tech Review: 3 Apps to Gamify Your Workouts appeared first on Breaking Muscle.