Let’s be real: smartphones have become an essential part of daily lives. In today’s hustle and bustle, a day without your smartphone would be unimaginable. As we come to rely on our smart devices more and more, those same devices get tied up into our health and well-being.
Whether it’s connecting with family and friends, forging new relationships, scanning for healthy dinner recipes, or finding the right playlist for the gym, smart phones and apps play an integral part in feeling healthy.
Thanks to the rise of fitness and wellness apps, there are many new and creative ways to experience a healthy lifestyle — often through the convenience of your smart device.
If you have the next great app design idea in the health and wellness space, you might be thinking — how do I develop an iOS app that will capture the attention of users? Here are some of the most popular health and wellness apps on the Apple Store, and some of the more unique iOS features to get you moving — and give you the inspiration you need to find the right developer to help you design your own.
The Most Popular Fitness and Wellness Apps
In-person yoga classes can be pricey. If you’re interested in yoga, want to save a few bucks, and are looking to build more strength, Asana Rebel brings yoga-inspired fitness to the comfort of your own home.
Asana Rebel takes traditional yoga practices and combines them with strength training exercises from HIIT classes (like those dreaded but effective burpees). All you have to do is choose the yoga category you want, such as strength, fat burn, or flexibility. In addition to its exercises, Asana Rebel offers quizzes to keep your mind sharp, music for focus, sleep sounds, and guided meditation.
SWEAT describes itself as “The World’s Best Female Fitness Community.” Created by Kayla Itsines, who already had a loyal fitness following on Instagram (known as “Kayla’s Army”), SWEAT creates programs for women who want flexibility, variety, and a supportive community in health and fitness.
The concept behind the SWEAT app is that you can choose your trainer and fitness style, led by some of the best female personal trainers in the world. These types of programs include yoga, post-pregnancy workouts, weight training, power training, or high-intensity workouts. Plus, SWEAT is continually adding new exercises and features to the app.
Fitness and Wellness Apps with Unique iOS Features
As one of the most sophisticated running trackers, the Strava app has state-of-the-art features that bring out a runner’s competitive edge. This app provides leaderboards, achievements, and challenges, and gives you the opportunity to race against your friends. Also, it records your running speed, distance travelled, and time.
Plus, Strava is on team iOS since it syncs up with the Apple Watch. With the premium subscription tier, Strava Summit, users can customize their training and workout plans and get into more in-depth metrics for exercise performance.
Getting a good night’s sleep is essential to anyone’s wellbeing, especially after a challenging workout. Sleep Cycle ensures your rest is where it should be by utilizing the capabilities of your phone to monitor the quality of your sleep.
So how does this app measure your sleep, exactly? Sleep Cycle uses the unique feature of your phone’s accelerometer as a way to track your sleep. The app also uses a feature called “sleep cycle theory” to wake you up during light sleep. As a result, when morning comes, you feel more refreshed upon waking.