HealthNews Dozen: Top 12 Health & Fitness Apps for iPhones

The iPhone has swept the nation in a wave of popularity unlike many others in the history of modern technology. While this is not an advertisement for the iPhone or any associated products, it is only fair to note that millions of people have bought them in the few years they’ve been available, and not just for their phone and internet capabilities, but for their applications. It is now possible to track nearly every aspect of one’s life via the proper iPhone applications, including health and fitness.

An iPhone application, or app for short, is a program that is easily downloaded and linked to a customer’s phone that performs a particular service or provides specialized information. Downloaded apps may be free or require a fee, but once a part of one’s phone experience will automatically notify the customer of updates.

One of the most popular categories of applications is health and fitness. For the busy lifestyle that most people lead, there is little time for spending hours on the internet to tally calories long after a meal is over or research a term that a doctor throws out at a medical appointment. Applications provide for quick answers, easy-to-follow charts, and tools for tracking important health and fitness goals. Thus, for the hectic lifestyle, having specific tools on a phone saves time.

The top item on the list is iFitness, the most popular application in the health and fitness category. Not only can a person keep a list of his or her own custom workout, but it helps add or subtract from the workout based on one’s wants, i.e. it will suggest exercises if a person indicates the want to work more on abs rather than arm muscles. A person can record notes from each workout, including the number of reps for each weight routine or the length of time spend on cardio equipment. This particular app costs a one-time fee of less than $2.

MyTrainer is similar but gives fewer choices as to each exercise chosen. This app comes with pre-set instructional videos from certified personal trainers, and once a person has chosen a particular training path, new videos will be uploaded with that same fitness goal in mind but new moves to keep the workout fresh.

Apps like Calorie Tracker and Nutrition Menu allow people to monitor their dietary intake on the go. At a restaurant and don’t see anything on the menu that your diet would allow? Open the app and plug in other items on the menu to check their calories and nutritional value. The calorie application is particularly beneficial to those on diets because it not only allows one to enter meal calories as soon as possible, but it calculates and gives suggestions for the remainder of the day, week, etc.

Some of the apps are very specific in their uses. White Noise is simply a relaxation tool, and many people use it during individual workout, yoga, or meditation sessions. iPeriod is solely to keep track of menstrual periods each month, but it is specifically helpful to women in the process of trying—or trying not to—become pregnant. And the medical terminology app is handy when it comes to any disease or condition, even just for parents who like to research any medical change or stage in their children’s growth.

All of the applications have specific purposes, and all can be found on the most popular iPhone apps for health and fitness. The iPhone can make life easier. Why not allow it to aid in your health and physical fitness as well?
 

What's your favorite health and fitness iPhone application? Let us know in the comment section below.