Peloton today (September 3) is taking the wraps off a new app, Strength+, aiming to connect the 12-year-old fitness company with novice and experienced gym-goers alike.
Strength+ will exist entirely separate from the familiar Peloton app experience that’s been centered around the brand’s own workout machines like Peloton Bike+ and Peloton Tread+.
What is Peloton Strength+? Peloton Strength+ is a new Peloton app dedicated to strength training in gym settings. It's a separate app for Peloton that is launching in beta, with users invited to test and deliver feedback ahead of full availability.
Strength+ will launch first in beta, with interested users able to request an invitation to get started. Ahead of the announcement, Peloton gave me access to an early version of Strength+ so I could get a taste of how it compares to the existing Peloton formats — and whether it’s a viable answer to lost earnings (via Yahoo! Finance) and departing instructors (as reported by New York Magazine) as fewer people feel compelled to exercise solely at home.
“While Peloton is well-known for delivering a fantastic home experience, we understand that people crave flexibility in their workouts and that includes flexibility in a gym setting,” said Brent Tworetzky, SVP of Product for Peloton. “Peloton Strength+ is intended to be a standalone app built for an in-gym experience, whether that gym is in a commercial or hotel gym, or at a home gym.”
Tworetzky said through research and takeaways from the Peloton Gym feature that launched last year, the product team learned Peloton Members “are looking for a strength experience that supports them in the gym, including gym focus and gym flexibility.”
As a long-time Peloton Member trying out Strength+, I explored the two paths to using the app as an aide in my apartment building’s modest gym space: Create Your Own Workout and Programs.
The custom workout builder let me specify my desired workout duration, target muscle group, difficulty level, and equipment access. I was served up a one-off gym plan based on my settings, with the option to swap out moves one-by-one or entirely refresh my curation until satisfied with the routine.
As someone with a knee that needs low-impact training, I definitely appreciated the option to replace squat jumps with weighted squats.
"There's a huge community, myself included, of people who really just like training at the gym, and we want to break into that market."
Programs are a bit more tailored, with gym plans created and the involved moves demoed by Peloton instructors, complete with the kind of audio guidance you might get from an actual personal trainer moving around the machines alongside you.
Instructor Andy Speer, who recently developed an exclusive five-move dumbbell workout for Tom's Guide, is among those working closely with the product team to introduce this gym-centric initiative, bringing his 15 years of experience as a personal trainer pre-Peloton to the Strength+ platform.
“There's a huge community, myself included, of people who really just like training at the gym, and we want to break into that market,” Speer told me. “We know we have amazing instructors who can give you well thought out guidelines and workout plans to take to the gym.”
I gave Speer’s four-week Ignite Your Strength program a go for a few days, following a circuit designed to progress towards 'feeling confident' and understanding 'gym flow'. “What we are doing is programming in a way that gives the member the most opportunity for success in training,” Speer said.
This goes beyond simply showing users how to complete moves to embrace education on gym etiquette and proper machine use via a feed of shorts-style, instructor-hosted videos that feel more off-the-cuff than Peloton’s polished studio content.
Not only did I find it refreshing to see the instructors (including Rad Lopez and Assal Arian in addition to Speer) in a new setting, but some of the videos actually taught me things I didn’t know about navigating the gym.
“There’s a certain, you know, ebb and flow to the gym floor,” Speer said. “We were really thoughtful about not putting people in positions where you have to do something here and then run over there and then save your spot and run back.”
With that in mind, Tworetzky hopes users will be able to “put the phone down” and added that the app “allows for using all or some of the equipment found around the gym, including bars and machines,” opening Peloton’s figurative doors to categories of gym equipment that has never been seen in its content before.
“Over the years I’ve honed in on how to make the best possible workouts on the Peloton platform with dumbbells and body weight, but I was really excited to just get back to all these endless opportunities here in the gym,” Speer said.
Another first for Peloton? Users have the option to bring their own music to the Strength+ experience rather than relying on instructor playlists. This meant I could run my favorite workout tracks on Spotify (but you can use any music streaming service) without interrupting the app’s audio cues.
Then, after my workouts, I could review my performance based on the honor system of lifted weight and completed reps. Strength+ creates a progress dashboard that visualizes results over time, and it presents motivation for me to actually improve.
“Tracking what you're doing is critical for progress, right?,” said Speer. “At the end of the day, we really want to give people the ability to track what they're doing. They don't have to write it down in a notebook or in a separate notes app on their phone. It's all right there, and that's how you're going to make progress.”
Peloton Strength+: What we know about membership pricing and the release date
Peloton has not shared pricing or an official release date for Strength+ yet. From my conversation with Tworetzky ahead of the app’s reveal, it seems Strength+ will either come at a separate monthly cost for non-paying Peloton users or be offered as an add-on for Peloton All-Access users.
For now, Strength+ is available to try in beta. Interested users can request a beta testing invitation on Peloton's website. During the beta window, users will be encouraged to provide feedback, as both Speer and Tworetzky emphasized that the work-in-progress app will be tailored to meet user needs.
“It's going to be evolving over the years as everything does, just to really tweak it and make it the best app possible,” Speer said. “The best part is this is just the beginning,” added Tworetzky. “We are excited to hear from beta users and improve the experience even further.”
