←back to thread

Show HN: Workout.cool – Open-source fitness coaching platform

(github.com)
827 points surgomat | 5 comments | 18 Jun 25 12:33 UTC | HN request time: 0.64s | source

I was the main contributor to workout.lol, an open-source fitness app to easily build a workout routine. The project had traction (1.4k GitHub stars, 95 forks, ~20K visits/month), but was eventually sold due to video licensing hurdles. The new owner stopped maintaining it, and the repo went abandoned.

Over the next 9 months, I sent 15 emails to try to save it : no replies. Feature requests & issues were ignored. The community was left with a "broken" tool let's say.

I couldn't just let it die So I built the new version from scratch with the same open-source spirit, but a better architecture long-term vision, more features and no license problems.

It's called : Workout.cool (https://workout.cool). What it offers: 100% open-source, MIT-licensed - 1200+ exercises (with videos, attributes, translations) - Progress tracking - Multilingual-ready - Self-hostable

I'm not doing this for money. I'm doing it because I believe in open fitness tools, and I’ve been passionate about strength training for 15+ years.

If this resonates with you, feel free to: - Star the repo - Share with fitness/tech friends - Suggest features - Contribute code/design/docs

Together, we can build the open-source fitness platform we all wanted to easily build a workout routine and get in shape

Website: https://workout.cool GitHub: https://github.com/Snouzy/workout-cool

Show context
toyetic ◴[18 Jun 25 13:37 UTC] No.44309787[source]▶
This is cool, as someone whose been lifting for ~5 years its nice to see a fleshed out opensource tool for weightlifting.

The main problem with any app I've tried is that after enough experience the bells and whistles of the app don't really matter and mostly what you care about is consistent tracking for progressive overload.

I think this is a good app for people who want to get started weightlifting I would say the two main things needed for wider adoption would be 1. A mobile app ( or pwa, I've made and used my own personal workout app for a while as a PWA and its been just as good as any native app I've tried) 2. A way to save specific workouts as routines and track those for long periods of time

replies(3): >>44309958 #>>44311877 #>>44313959 #
LostMyLogin ◴[18 Jun 25 13:59 UTC] No.44309958[source]▶
Hesitating to write this because I don't want to push back at all on OP but I'm not sure I agree that something like this is a good option for people wanting to get started in weightlifting. I'm not sure it's a good option for anyone really. I applaud OP for the effort but this is recommending some pretty awful workouts. For example if I select back and bi, it's giving me nine different exercises with complete disregard for the order they are in or what other exercises are in the workout.

Why are compound lifts in the middle of the workout and why am I doing three different types of chin ups? There are also no reps / sets calculated nor are there 1RM percentages for weight.

Bro splits are some of the lowest quality routines you can use and this somehow makes them worse. You could replace all of this, remove the bells and whistles, and create a bare bones PPL app that determines exercises based on equipment available and it would be light years better than this.

replies(3): >>44310132 #>>44310861 #>>44311536 #
duxup ◴[18 Jun 25 14:18 UTC] No.44310132[source]▶
Were those intended to be "do it in this order" or were they just options?

I got the feeling they were more options and you could reorder them if you wanted or shuffle or just do one or another.

To me a more casual / getting started is just about doing the thing.

replies(1): >>44310631 #
1. LostMyLogin ◴[18 Jun 25 15:15 UTC] No.44310631[source]▶
I'm not sure a beginner would know what order to place them in nor would they recognize the potential injury risk associated with stacking some of these exercises.

Beginners should be focusing on form and simple compound lifts. Throwing them into things like heavy accessory lifts with no regard for exercise choice or format is a quick way to get hurt. Again, I want to applaud OP for doing this. The fitness industry is in a terrible place and tools like this have a great place. I just think it needs a ton of work to make it useful. Maybe if I find some time, I'll try and contribute but in it's current state I would never recommend something like this to anyone.

replies(1): >>44311187 #
2. duxup ◴[18 Jun 25 16:19 UTC] No.44311187[source]▶
What are the odds someone is going to get hurt?
replies(3): >>44311644 #>>44313656 #>>44316010 #
3. SoftTalker ◴[18 Jun 25 17:15 UTC] No.44311644[source]▶
Pretty high if you don't know what you're doing with a weight that you're not strong enough to handle.
4. LostMyLogin ◴[18 Jun 25 22:02 UTC] No.44313656[source]▶
Pretty high.
5. terribleperson ◴[19 Jun 25 06:27 UTC] No.44316010[source]▶
Even without weights, you can permanently injure yourself with bad form. Bringing weights into the picture makes it much easier.