Strength trainer UI
complete
David Weinberg
I’ve noticed that there are many feature enhancements planned (soon) for strength trainer. Many of which are essential like supersets. However, I haven’t seen any discussions on UI.
I feel the UI could be improved. Compare the attached images of Bevel to Hevy (which I feel is the best AW strength logger).
Bevel:
- too much screen real estate dedicated to HR and time. I don’t care about HR while performing a set. HR lag makes this metric pretty useless intra-set. Likewise time isn’t important within a set (mostly) I just care about reps.
- I have to “stop” the set then enter weight info. Then confirm. Too many steps
- can not see what I did previous set
- I won’t mention the other features like auto-progression, rest timers etc as I believe these are being addressed.
- can’t see set number
Hevy:
- I just see the exercise with reps and weight on one screen. Big, uncluttered.
- I can see what I did previous set and which set I’m in (2 of 5)
- most of the time I just need to tap tick or make a minor rep adjustment and I’m done. Rest timer starts.
Overall I find the Bevel interface too cluttered and finicky to use during strength training especially heavy, intense sessions.
One suggestion (that someone else also made), rather than copying an existing solution (Hevy has a ton of great features) why not allow people to complete a post training survey on strength training activities not recorded with Bevel? If you tap a strength activity being able to add:
- total sets (could be estimated from peaks in HR chart)
- total weight
- RPE (could use RIR to be fancy but RPE is simpler so better)
This should go a long way to estimating load (given you already have time and HR).
I don’t think you really need every exercise etc because that isn’t accurate anyway when people start adding custom movements. Whoop asks you to link a custom exercise to an existing one to overcome this buts it’s a bit of voodoo in my opinion. Just take time, total sets, weight and RPE and I think it would be amazing.
If I had my wish I could continue using Hevy and complete a short survey in Bevel on the completed activity to be awarded appropriate strain.
Amanda
marked this post as
complete
Many of these suggestions were implemented in 2.5.0.
Amanda
Merged in a post:
Need a ui like strong for workout in apple watch
manish RAO
Please make a ui like strong in apple watch very useful your thing seems to overwhelme me a little biy
Carles S.
Hey Amanda!
I also agree with David Weinberg points.
To add (in order of importance as I see it):
- Statistics and achievements per exercise (new PR, best 1RM, best volume, etc.). This is what really encourages people to use the app.
- I don't want to see the preconfigured weights and repetitions from the template during my workout. It's much more useful to see those from the previous session so I can gradually increase the weight; otherwise, I have to constantly update the template.
- The ability to start a strength training session without a template and add exercises on the fly. Sometimes I don't know what exercises I'm going to do until I get to the gym, and I don't want to waste time creating a template.
And again, as other users have commented, I think it would be easier if you integrated more data from Hevy. After all, it would increase adoption. I want to use Bevel as my health assistant and Hevy as my strength training logger! The two together would really make a great combination!
Amanda
Merged in a post:
Exercise Icons too small
Marschant Probart
Can the icons sizes for muscle workouts be increased? Very small.
Stephen Amos
Totally agree with many of the above points (mainly UI and layout of the in-workout pages; I don't really need to see time or HR, just sets and reps - and possibly an easier way to see what exercise is coming up next too) and have been waiting for an update to strength builder with these changes!
In the meantime I have also still been using Hevy but would much prefer to have everything in the one app!
Amanda
marked this post as
planned (tbd)
Amanda
Thank you for the feedback, David Weinberg! We are working on a major update to Strength Builder, including many of your suggestions. Stay tuned!