We could all do with getting a bit fitter and losing an inch or two off out waists, but we never find the time or the enthusiasm. These Android apps provide exercise plans and motivation.
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Home Workout - No Equipment & Meal Planner
Price: Free | By: Simple Design Ltd | Size: 15 MB | Android: 4.0 and up

Home Workout has a home screen that highlights around a dozen activities that are designed to get you fitter and healthier. There are workouts organised into sections, such as Full Body, Abs, Upper Body and Lower Body. The time for each workout ranges from three minutes to seven and all can be done at home without gym equipment.
Select a workout and there are a number of exercises to perform, sometimes more than a dozen. Each one is short and may only last 30 seconds and the aim is to work through them all. Select an exercise and there are written instructions, an animated image showing what to do and a video clip on YouTube.
In addition to the exercises, you can set a goal and choose the number of days a week you want to work out. There is also a Better Me four-week challenge to help motivate you and these are a series of daily workouts with various exercises.
There are meal plans for a whole month with suggestions for breakfast, snacks, lunch and dinner, with a vegetarian option. A shopping feature helps you to buy all the healthy foods needed for the meals.
The app is ad-supported but is otherwise excellent. The workouts, exercises and meal plans are all good.
Home Workout – No Equipment
Price: Free | By: Leap Fitness Group | Size: 15 MB | Android: Varies

This Home Workout is so similar to the previous app I had to check the developer to see if they were the same. They aren't, but the apps are so similar there must be some connection between them. Everything can be done at home with no equipment.
At the top of the home screen is a button to set a goal. This is the number of days a week you aim to train. Then there are a couple of challenges consisting of a Full Body and Lower Body challenges.
They are four week exercise plans designed to get you fitter day by day. Each day has a series of exercises and some are for a certain length of time like 30 seconds, but others are based on repetitions, such as 20 jumping jacks, 8 push-ups, and so on.
If you don't want to tie yourself to a schedule, the home screen has workouts in sections for the Chest, Abs, Arm, Shoulder and Back, and Leg. There are beginner, intermediate and advanced workouts in each section.
There are a lot of exercises in a workout and sometimes over 20. Each one has an animation showing what is required of you and there is a text explanation too.
This Home Workout has more exercises for people who can dedicate more time to working out and those who want to focus on a certain part of the body. It is ad-supported but it is a great exercise app with a lot of content.
101 Fitness - Personal coach and fit plan at home
Price: Free | By: Ultimate Party Apps | Size: 73 MB | Android: 4.1 and up
101 Fitness starts off by asking your gender, age, weight, height and overall aim, such as losing weight or getting fitter so that it can personalise the app for you. The first two apps feature exceptionally muscled men even though the exercises can be done by anyone, which could put women off using them, but this one has both men and women in the artwork and will appeal to both.
Speaking of artwork, the app title says 'fit plan at home' but the photos are in a gym.
The home screen has three sections with Workouts, Programs and My Workouts. Select Workouts and there are Sharp abs and flat belly, Perfect legs workout, Upper body workout, and Full body workout. In each of these four sections there is just one free workout and the rest are locked. You need a (UK) £9.99 monthly or £49.99 annual subscription to unlock them.
The four free workouts are good and you have a choice of 5, 10, 15 or 20 minute workouts. The exercises don't change but the length of time you do them for does. You can start with five minutes and work up as you get fit. Each exercise in a workout, and there are 10 of them, are timed and if you are not sure how to do them, there is a video clip of each one featuring both men and women performing them.
There is a Nutrition section that has a selection of healthy meal recipes and a calorie counter that tells you how many calories are in foods. It is useful if you are short of ideas for meals.
For some strange reason the Back button on the phone would not work in this app and the app's buttons had to be used to navigate. This was irritating.
Four workouts each with 10 exercises for free is OK, but are you willing to pay the high subscription fee? It is a great app and perhaps paying will give you the motivation to use it that isn't there in a free app. It is a bit too expensive for me.
Home Workouts Personal Trainer
Price: Free | By: Fitness22 | Size: 60 MB | Android: 4.1 and later
Home Workouts Personal Trainer starts off by asking you to choose Male or Female and this selects the appropriate photos used in the apps and it also affects some of the exercises and plans. The screenshots above are from selecting Female and choosing Male shows muscled men in the photos.
There are five categories of basic workout on the home screen and they can all be performed in your home. There are easy and intermediate versions of each workout, so there are 10 in all.
Select a workout like Full Body Intermediate and there are eight exercises that include things like incline pushups, Alligator walk, Dips on chair, squats and so on. There is no timer and you perform a number of repetitions for each exercise. After a brief rest, which you can skip, you move on to the next exercise.
There are photos, videos and text descriptions of each of the exercises throughout and you can simply copy the person on the screen as you work out.
All 10 basic workouts are free, but there is a Plans section in the app with a collection of several 12-week exercise courses - enough to last you a year or more if you did them all. These are all locked and require a subscription of (UK) £7.49 a year or £9.49 for a lifetime's access. This is pretty cheap and it is a great price for a workout app with so much content.
- Details
- Written by Roland Waddilove
- Created: 21 April 2018

