Need to get moving but can’t get to a gym? These top workout and health apps will help improve your fitness and general wellbeing from your own home.
Health apps
Apple Health
You know what they say, “An apple a day, keeps the doctor away.” Well, one Silicon Valley juggernaut has dragged that old idiom into the 21st Century thanks to its Health app. Apple automatically installs the digital doctor onto every device, which then syncs to all your devices. It’s a combination of stealthy, healthy tracking and manual input – it will automatically measure your step count, stair count, distance covered and even hours slept on your iPhone or Apple Watch, before you’re able to input additional information. This includes meals eaten, exercises completed and even medical test results. You can also create a Medical ID, which will provide information about yourself, such as allergies, to emergency services. It can be accessed without unlocking your phone.
Free (automatically installed on all devices). Available on App Store, www.apple.com/ae/ios/health/.
Google Fit
More into Android than Apple? Then this is for you. Google worked with the World Health Organisation and the American Heart Association to create the app. It focuses on two light activity goals called Move Minutes and Heart Points. Move Minutes rack up when your device registers your activity – initially set at 100 minutes per day. This can be altered. While one Heart Point is earned for each minute of moderate exercise such as brisk walking, or double points for more intense activities like running. You can set goals, get expert tips and sync it with wearing sports tech from Nike+ and others to track your all
of your good progress.
Free. Available on Google Play, www.google.com/fit.
Sleep Cycle
You’re going to need some energy to power all of these workouts, and that starts with a good night’s sleep. The Sleep Cycle app analyses your sleep and wakes you up at the perfect time so you feel rested and energised for the day ahead. It works by tracking your sleeping patterns and waking you up during light sleep by monitoring signals from your body to wake you up softly at your desired time when you are in the lightest possible sleep stage – without that horror of the daily alarm.
Free. Available on App Store and Google Play, www.sleepcycle.com.
Healthy diet
HealthifyMe
The team behind this free-to-download app are based in Bangalore, India, and pride themselves on having the largest database of Indian foods to keep track of calories – with a total of more than 55,000 foods. You can input your daily intake, receive real-time insights on your food choices and instructions on 1,500 different exercises from coaches. While scoffing on curry and naans isn’t going to help you lose weight anytime soon, HealthifyMe will go a long way to making sure you’re at least cutting back on the bad stuff. Goodbye creamy kormas, hello pumpkin bhaji.
Free (premium option available). Available on App Store and Google Play, www.healthifyme.com.
MyFitnessPal
MyFitnessPal will help you track your daily nutrition – and probably lead to the realisation that you such a good secret eater that even you had no idea. The aim is to track everything you eat and set targets for calorie intake, weight loss, or nutrition goals – so no more head in the fridge shovelling wedges of brie into your mouth. There’s a handy scanner device to pick up information from barcodes if you can’t face painstakingly entering every last crouton from your Caesar salad, or you can add ingredients more precisely if you’re making a home cooked meal. Even if you’re not intending on losing weight or bulking up, it’s good to see what you’re putting in your body – 540 calories in a Big Mac? Who’d have thought it?
Free. Available on App Store and Google Play, www.myfitnesspal.com.
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