Table of Contents
1. Introduction ...... 2 2. Health and Fitness App Market ...... 3 2.1 Global Overview ...... 4 2.2 Investments ...... 4 2.3 mHealth App Publishers ...... 5 2.4 Monetization of mHealth Apps ...... 7 2.5 Usage Patterns ...... 8 3. Health & Fitness App Categories ...... 8 3.1 Workout and Weight Loss ...... 9 3.2 Self- tracking and Monitoring ...... 10 3.3 Studio & Fitness ...... 11 3.4 Nutrition ...... 12 3.5 Healthcare...... 12 3.6 Meditation and Mental Health ...... 13 4. Top Healthcare & Fitness Apps ...... 14 5. Developing a Healthcare & Fitness App...... 19 5.1 Customer Segmentation...... 20 5.2 Need Analysis ...... 20 5.3 Competitor Analysis ...... 21 5.4 Some Common Functionalities of MHealth Apps...... 21 5.5 How much does it cost to build a Healthcare and Fitness App? ...... 23 6. Future Trends...... 24 7. Conclusion ...... 26
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1. Introduction
The number of fitness and health enthusiasts is growing day by day. Today you can see rising interest in fitness on social media and even around you. It is not just the athletes who take keen interest in training goals and diet plans; it is the common public that is taking up health and disease prevention activity with a goal for healthy and active lifestyle.
Yet, it is puzzling to see this peak in health goals alongside growing obesity, hypertension and other lifestyle diseases in the world. Perhaps it is these lifestyle diseases that have brought health and fitness to the forefront.
Amalgamation of health and technology was started as far back as in the 1960s. However introduction of mobile apps to health and fitness has given the public an accessible way to work on their fitness and monitor health.
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In this insight we will be looking at mobile healthcare and fitness apps, also known as mHealth apps. Today, there are more than 340,000 health and fitness apps on the leading app stores with more than 200 being added daily! These applications serve a variety of purposes from health monitoring to diet and weight loss. We will look at the mHealth app categories and the top 10 mobile applications in the world of health and fitness.
But first let's get a bird’s eye view of the market.
2. Health and Fitness App Market
According to Statista, the global mHealth market valuation reached 44.44 billion in 2019. A growing demand for fitness services and keen investor interest is luring entrepreneurs to launch health and fitness apps despite high competition.
Digital healthcare like wearable technology, mHealth apps and health monitoring devices are attracting billions of dollars in investments. In 2018 investments in digital healthcare stood at USD 9.5 billion, with mobile apps as the second highest category invested in.
Although 340,000 apps seem like a lot of competition, the reality is that more than half of them are dead apps with no update since one year or more. Many of these are also internal apps used for hospitals and research centres so they are not a direct competition to new businesses targeting the retail market. www.redbytes.in 3
2.1 Global Overview
Although most leading app publishers are based out of the USA, the majority of app usage growth is coming from the APAC market. Emerging markets of China and Japan boast a heavy usage of mHealth apps and are leading the global usage. In fact APAC accounts for 64% of app downloads while the American continent has only 17% of the share.
As lifestyle diseases catch in the APAC region, the huge population of this region will fuel future growth of mHealth apps globally.
Even though the USA lags behind in app downloads, it holds the leader position in app development. Most of the globally popular apps are published by American companies and they set the standards for app functionality globally.
2.2 Investments
As you will notice in the Top Apps section below, money has been flowing in the health and fitness app industry. Sports apparel brand Under Armor has bought mHealth app MyFitnessPal for a whopping USD 457 million in 2015. Similarly big brands and technology companies like Nike, Adidas, Samsung Next and NB Ventures are ready to invest in these apps.
The unique thing about mHealth app market is that investors are from different industries and ready to invest at different stages of start-up. It is not just the healthcare www.redbytes.in 4
and technology companies that are ready to invest; even sports associations, highly paid technology executives and business conglomerates are eager to get a share of this market.
An example is activity tracking company Whoop, which has raised USD 25 million in funding from NFL players Association, Durant Company and Twitter executive Jack Dorsey among others.
With the increasing investor interest, the healthcare and fitness app market is a rewarding option for an entrepreneur. Seed companies and early stage venture capitalists are ready to back fitness apps that have a little traction and show promising returns.
There are health and fitness start-up accelerators like Rock Health and Infuse Digital Health that provide funding and discounted resources to support technology start-ups in the health space. Most of them are based in America. However start-ups from all over the world can apply for support and funding with these accelerators.
2.3 mHealth App Publishers
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Most of the companies owning mHealth apps are not healthcare companies but technology companies who want a share of the digital healthcare market. The major players are -
● Traditional healthcare players like hospitals, health insurers and pharmaceutical companies hold 32% of the market ● Pure digital healthcare companies which focus only on digital health services hold 28% of the market. ● Surprisingly, technology and app development companies who have no previous experience in healthcare command 23% of the market. ● Remaining market share of 11% belongs to NGOs, Universities and standalone health and fitness professionals.
Also invested in health and fitness apps are big sports and fitness brands who want to gain mindshare of their retail customers. Sports apparel brands like Adidas, Nike, and Under Armour have acquired fitness apps to stay relevant to millennials.
Under Armour, an American fitness apparel company acquired MapMyFitness for USD 150 million in 2013. MapMyFitness owns health monitoring apps that will increase user engagement with Under Armour and also provide valuable user data to the company.
As you can see investments are pouring into the Healthcare and fitness app market from a variety of sources. For an entrepreneur who is looking for resources to launch or expand the reach of mHealth app, there is no dearth of options.
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2.4 Monetization of mHealth Apps
The good news is that people are ready to spend on health and fitness. Nearly two out of three Americans set weight loss and fitness as their New Year resolution every year. The story is the same in other regions of the world too. A healthy life is a priority for every human and hence health and fitness will always command a significant share of wallet.
In 2018, the average American iPhone user had an average spend of USD 2.7 on health and fitness apps which was a 75% growth over previous year spending. In 2017, revenue from health apps reached USD 2.1 billion and is expected to cross USD 11 billion by 2026.
There are a variety of ways to monetize your health and fitness app. The average price of health and fitness apps in Google play store and Apple app store is US$ 3 and $3.5 respectively. However, most apps are moving away from paid app versions to in-app purchases. Majority of apps in the health space are free for download and give limited content for free initially. For example studio workout app Plankk gives a 14 day free trial period before charging users for subscription.
In-app purchase is the prime monetization strategy for majority of apps today. These in- app purchases can be premium classes, customized coaching or continuance of www.redbytes.in 7
content with subscription model. Advertisement and sponsorship are also a viable option although most premium apps are subscription based.
2.5 Usage Patterns
Health and fitness app users are amongst the most loyal in the app industry. Users are known to stick with one health app in their smartphone and more than 75% of users login to it more than twice a week. A 2017 study by Flurry Analytics found that 25% of users check their health apps more than ten times a week.
As you would expect new registrations are highest during the first quarter of the year owing to health related New Year resolutions. Coming to daily activity, users are most active in the first half of the week and peak activity is seen either in early morning or at 10 pm in the night.
3. Health & Fitness App Categories
Healthcare and fitness apps can be categorized based on many parameters like - platform (iOS/ Android), geographies, device (smartphone, wearable or tablet) and purpose. Here we will segment applications based on purpose of usage and look at key trends within each category. www.redbytes.in 8
Health and fitness goals can be numerous and mHealth apps target varied goals of users. A user may want an app to support weight loss goals, monitor health markers, follow nutrition based approach to diet or for booking healthcare services. In any case there are a plethora of apps available to serve users. Let's look at each segment.
3.1 Workout and Weight Loss
This is a major chunk of the market and the number one goal users have. Accordingly, workout for weight loss and body transformation is the most crowded segment of all. However the user base is so large that even small players can expect to have decent revenue with a good quality app.
As of 2018, workout for weight loss accounted for 73% of all fitness sessions. Workout category has grown from 44 per cent of all user sessions in 2014 to 73 per cent in 2017.
Workouts on these apps can either be recorded sessions or live workouts with trainers. The app is essentially providing digital content to users and is fairly simple compared to other category apps. Paid app and subscription model are most common monetization methods for these apps. www.redbytes.in 9
3.2 Self- tracking and Monitoring
Image Credit: Health Tracking App Concept by Minh Pham This is the second biggest category in health and fitness apps. Self monitoring apps allow users to keep a log of their physical activity and health parameters like heart rate, sleep patterns, daily steps, etc,. This also includes calorie counting apps like MyFitnessPal which keep a log of user food and give a breakdown of calories.
Advancement in wearable technology has made this segment exciting and it is set to grow at the fastest pace among all categories. A lot of technology startups are actively leveraging wearable devices such as smart watches, accessories and even digital clothing that closely monitors user health data. Innovation in data analytics and AI can further boost the return on these categories.
Two important points to tackle for start-ups in self-monitoring are security and accuracy. Health apps have been accused of sharing user data with third parties without explicit user consent. Some studies have also shown that monitoring of BMR on such apps can www.redbytes.in 10
be upto 90% inaccurate. A robust data and privacy policy and sophisticated technology for better accuracy is the need of the hour for this segment. App developers that solve these problems can expect a lion’s share of this growing category.
3.3 Studio & Fitness
While fitness app use grew by 330% between 2014 and 2017, the studio and fitness segment has grown a massive 830% in growth.
These are applications that manage gym memberships and studio schedules for users. It also includes studio apps that give out digital content on their apps. In 2014 studio and fitness content was only 2% of total sessions, whereas by 2017 it grew to 5%.
An example in Indian market is the fitness app Fitato that allows its users to visit hundreds of gyms in their city against a credit purchased on the app. This gives users a variety of studios and gyms to choose from. The monetization for this category is mostly through the subscription model again.
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3.4 Nutrition
Nutrition apps help users to manage their diet for weight loss or other health goals. In addition to tracking calories these also give healthy recipes and diet charts to meet weight loss goals. Free app Fooducate rates food items for its users. Users can simply scan barcodes or enter food names manually to get ratings for foods and choose what's good for them. The app also gives alternative food choices for unhealthy food items.
3.5 Healthcare These apps digitalise healthcare services such as doctor consultation, hospitalisation, and diagnostics. The slow and cumbersome service of the healthcare industry has seen a rapid shift with technology applications.
Today doctor’s appointments can be booked in seconds and waiting time cut to half, all thanks to technology infusion in healthcare. An article by Businesswire claims that 79% of respondents prefer a digital healthcare service provider that allows online interactions on mobile devices. 50% of respondents also said
Image Credit: Dribbble that they would leave their current traditional healthcare provider for a digital one.
Healthcare mobile applications lead to a better management of medical data and simplify life for doctors, patients and insurers all at once. Most of the healthcare providers are investing in a healthcare app for this very reason.
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3.6 Meditation and Mental Health
Mental health and wellness category is the top grossing among all health and fitness apps. As a greater number of people experience high amounts of stress in today’s modern lifestyle, they are willing to take up meditation practice. Also the increasing number of cases in depression, anxiety and trauma are making communities aware of mental illness and bringing mental wellbeing to the forefront of health and fitness goals.
Two meditation apps namely, Headspace and Calm, dominate this segment of the market. These two apps together control more than 70% of the mental wellbeing category featuring among the top 5 apps in health and fitness apps consistently.
Mental wellbeing apps also command a premium and have high subscription charges which the users are ready to pay. These apps tend to attract the higher income population who have time and money to spare on mental health.
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4. Top Healthcare & Fitness Apps
Here is a list of most popular apps across various categories of health and fitness apps.
mHealth App Download Category App Publisher s
Equinox 50K+ Studio & Fitness Equinox Fitness
Step Tracker 5M+ Self-Tracking Leap Fitness Group
Better Me 10M+ Workout & Weight BetterMe Limited Loss
My Fitness Pal 50M+ Self- Tracking MyFitnessPal acquired by UnderArmour
Runtastic 50M+ Self-Tracking Runtastic acquired by Adidas
Google Fit 50M+ Self-tracking Google LLC
HealthifyMe 10M+ Workout & Weight HealthifyMe Health & Loss, Self-tracking Fitness cure.fit 5M+ Workout CureFit Healthcare Pvt.Ltd
Strava 10M+ Self tracking Strava Inc.
Calm
4.1 Equinox
Originally just a chain of luxury gyms in the East coast of the USA, Equinox group has expanded its reach in fitness with Equinox App and acquired companies like Rumble Boxing and Soul Cycling from different verticals of fitness. The group also envisions entering the lifestyle space with its uber luxury hotel chains soon.
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With a group-revenue of USD 1.1billion, Equinox is ready to invest more in the online app space of fitness. The premium app helps members plan their workouts and see better results in the gym. It tracks workout progress and suggests changes in plan to meet your goal. Users can also schedule classes with world renowned athletes and trainers with the app. However the app is only available for members of the Equinox club and not open to the general public.
With their app, Equinox has access to its member’s data and is at the forefront of using customer data for predictive analysis and customer profile building. These helps the club offer relevant services and customise their offerings. Equinox is a good case of a fitness company adopting cutting edge technology to stay ahead of the game.
4.2 Step Tracker
Step Tracker is a free pedometer and calorie counter app. The app is one of the 37 apps in the fitness app portfolio of Leap Fitness Group . Leap fitness has been developing fitness apps since 2011. Today their apps range from home workouts to fasting apps and list in the Top 100 apps in more than ten countries. This is an example of a pure technology start up that built a portfolio of profitable health based apps.
Step tracker has useful features for walkers and joggers such as real time map tracking, pace recording, intuitive reports on steps and power saving pedometer that works on locked screens too.
4.3 BetterMe: Home Workouts and Diet
This Ukraine based start up has seen a rapid growth in its users since 2018. Launched in 2016 as BeautyHub, the app failed initially only to learn from its mistakes and relaunched in 2018 as BetterMe. BetterMe Limited founder Victoria Repa started the health and fitness app with a mission to create a tool for people to find their ideal state of body and mind.
The free app provides video guided home workouts, diet plans, calorie tracking and even period tracker for women who want to target weight loss. The app is specifically focused on women who make up more than 80% of users of BetterMe. Although, www.redbytes.in 15
BetterMe has also launched a separate app for men with a focus to capture the remaining segment of the market.
The app has a total of five health and fitness apps that focus on different segment of the market. All of them use in-app purchases to earn revenue. As of today BetterMe's suite of apps has more than half a million subscribers and an annual revenue of more than USD 60 million.
4.4 My Fitness Pal
Undoubtedly the leader in the health and fitness app space, My Fitness Pal was founded back in 2005 as a calorie tracking website. Out of the USD 327 million revenue from wellness mobile application market in 2018, MyFitnessPal contributed USD 42 million in revenue by itself!
The app’s founder Mike Lee founded the website when he could not find a good calorie tracking solution to lose weight for his wedding. The app raised USD 18 million in 2013 and was acquired by American apparel brand Under Armour in 2015 for USD 457 million.
The top grossing app allows its users to track calories, log exercise and set personalised health goals. The app earns through a mix of advertisement and in-app purchases.
4.5 Adidas Running by Runtastic
Another self-tracking fitness app acquired by international sports brand, Runtastic was acquired by Adidas for USD 240 million in 2015. Austria based company, Runtastic was started in 2009 as a college project to help leisure athletes. Soon the app became a rage among runners, cyclists and leisure athletes.
Runtastic is a free app although premium services like personalised training plan require users to sign up for paid membership. However live steps tracker and calorie counting are free for all. The app uses social interactions and gamification to its advantage which keeps exercise interesting for its young audience www.redbytes.in 16
4.6 Google Fit
Google is at the forefront of every cutting edge technology and you would expect it to be in the health and fitness app field. With its self-tracking app, Google has partnered with World Health Organisation (WHO) and American Heart Association (AHA) to develop a heart point system that quantifies user health according to recommended daily activity. The app tracks your move minutes and hearth point system by tracking all your physical activities from walking to pilates to cycling.
Being from the Google suite of applications the app is compatible with all android devices, most smartwatches and even other apps like Strava, Lifesum, MyFtnessPal, Xiaomi MI bands, etc. Starting last year, Google has also introduced its app for iOS users, so even apple watch users can now see their progress on Google Fit.
4.7 HealthifyMe
HealthifyMe was started in 2012 to solve a self- tracking problem local to Indian market. Back then there were no health apps that could track calories in Indian food items which were very specific and unlike global cuisine. Founder Tushar Vaishisht and his co-founder started building the database for Indian meals and the app received good response.
Today the app is more than just a calorie tracking tool. It has coach based service, home workouts and health reports to meet weight loss goals. In 2017 the app launched its AI based coach bot service which has been seen a rapid rate of growth since last year.
So far the app has raised USD 25 million from investors like Samsung Next and NB ventures. With a steady base of 10 million users, Healthify is set to cross INR 100cr in revenue this year.
4.8 Cure.fit
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This is another Indian start-up that focuses on holistic health. Cure.fit is started by Myntra co-founder Mukesh Bansal and ex- flipkart employee AnkitNagori. Cure.fit started in 2016 with a vision to implement technology in all aspects of health. The brand has four sub-brands in various categories of healthcare and fitness namely- Cult.fit for fitness, Mind.fit for mental wellbeing, eat.fit for nutrition and cure.fit for personal healthcare.
Unlike other pure digital applications, Cure.fit is building its offline capabilities hand in hand with digital platforms. Cure.fit has more than 200 centres where it collects data, analyses it and designs workout programs based on data analytics. So far the company has raised USD 294 million in funding, the latest investors being Temasek Holdings and Vistra ITCL.
4.9 Strava
Strava is a global community of athletes which makes training for competitions more fun and interactive. Strava is a simple self- tracking app that works with any smartphone or GPS tracking device. Users can record their distance, speed, pace and routes. The app also has a social feed feature where users can share routes and progress with their friends and followers.
The app is free for everyone to use; however, Strava generates revenue with its subscription model where users can sign up for personalised coaching and live feedback. The California based startup has raised USD 41.9 million from investors like Sequoia Capital and Jackson Square Ventures.
4.10 Calm
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There are fewer apps in the mental health and meditation category when compared to workout and self-tracking, but mental health is one of the top paying categories. Calm was named by Apple as The App of the Year in 2017. Users can subscribe to Calm meditations and stories with an annual subscription of $39.99per year. The app does provide a one week free trial period for new users to try out though. So far the app has raised USD 143 million over eight funding rights.
Calm offers relaxing videos, audios and music for beginners as well as advanced meditators. The guided meditation lengths vary from 3 minutes to 25 minutes to meet every user's need and time constraint.
5. Developing a Healthcare & Fitness App
As you have seen healthcare and fitness apps come in many varieties and every app needs a different app structure and functionalities. A studio and fitness app will essentially be a repository of recorded online workout sessions only. On the other hand, a healthcare app for a hospital will need multiple apps for doctors, admins and patients in addition to real time data sharing among all parties.
Hence you need to look at your niche within the larger market and customer expectations to determine the structure of your health and fitness app. However here are some universal steps that every healthcare and fitness app developer must consider in their app development.
5.1 Customer Segmentation
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Deciding your customer segment will allow you to develop focussed, effective and crisp video content. An app targeting women will be quite different from an app targeting both genders. This will also give a clear direction to design the app and market it. Segmentation can be based on the usual parameters like age, gender, ethnicity and location.
However in healthcare some other variables like fitness level, current illness, fitness goal can also be considered. For example, an app targeting beginners will have different content from one targeting professional athletes. Besides this there might be some trends which show up seasonally. For example, workout for kids sees a rise in demand during summer vacations and more women tend to sign up for weight loss app post new year.
Understanding your customer is perhaps most important for a successful business. You can start with researching your target segment and building customer profiles which list out their typical demographics, needs and wants and even their dreams, desires, fears and frustrations.
5.2 Need Analysis
Once you thoroughly understand your customers the next step is to figure out what solution will solve their problems or bring them closer to their dreams. Since fitness is a very aspirational goal, a health app needs to chart out a clear way for users to reach their goals. This is where transformational stories and social media influencer tie-ups can attract a lot of users to your platform.
In need analysis you can ask your customers what solutions will solve their problem. Alternatively, you can build a prototype of your app as most customers do not know what they want until they see it. Do keep in mind that sometimes what customers need www.redbytes.in 20
and what they ask for may be very different from each other. A final solution usually comes after a lot of innovation and iterations of beta app.
5.3 Competitor Analysis
Before you jump into the market it is vital to know your competition. Any solution that your customers currently turn to meet their goals is a competition for you.
For a workout and weight loss app, gym could be a competition. You need to know all the possible solutions in the market with their features, benefits, USPs and pricing.
Even knowing app developers and their strategies is important if you want to play in this market. This will give you a better chance to carve your niche, stand out in the market and package your app to attract more users.
5.4 Some Common Functionalities of mHealth Apps
(a) Login and Registration for Account This is the first interaction that you customers are going to have with your app and so it must be seamless and quick. Social media logins and Gmail accounts can be used for a one tap registration experience.
After the account is created the user must be able to access and edit his or her profile. This accounts management page is where the user can access data related to activity, scoreboards and any service opted for.
(b) Wearables Integration Compatibility with wearable devices is essential for any tracking and self-monitoring device. Considering that a majority of apps are in this category it is a must have in your app. Even studio and fitness apps are integrating intelligent wearables into their apps. www.redbytes.in 21
An example is workout app FIIT, which provides its paid subscribers with a heart monitoring strap that shows your heart rate and calories burnt in real time as you follow along their live workouts.
Users prefer collaborative apps which are able to sync and import data from third party applications. Restrictive data makes tracking difficult for users and typically see lower download rates.
(c) Social Interaction Social interactivity and gamification keeps fitness and health fun for users. A social feature will allow your users to share their scores like calories burnt, workouts completed, fit points, etc,. This also allows applications to host competitions and set leader boards for reward. Strava has done this successfully with a global community of runners that shares, inspires and learns from each other.
Apps must also be compatible with popular social media apps like Instagram, Facebook or twitter. A one tap share button on your app will attract more social media influencers and inspire more people to post updates from your app.
(d) Food Logs and Calculators According to research by Statistica, 30% of users download fitness apps to track their goals and 28% want to monitor health issues. Having functionality to track calories and physical activities becomes necessary in this care.
Self-monitoring health apps must have food logs and food items with their respective calories and macros. This functionality allows users to track their nutrition. Another popular features these days is the bar code scanning for food items to show their nutrition value. Calculators for BMR and calories burst are some common features tracking apps.
(e) Push Notifications
Push notifications will motivate users to login often and complete their daily goals. Notifications must be timed strategically when users are more likely to login. For example studies have shown that people are more likely to login to their self- tracking fitness app at 10pm in the night. Hence a push notification at that hour will bring in more user engagement.
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(f) Favorites Users must have a section to store their favorite workouts so that they can easily access them again. In case of monitoring apps this section can store favorite food items the user eats or their one tap access to their favorite coaches, service and content.
(g) Payment Lastly all apps that have in-app purchases must have a payment section clearly showing ongoing subscription, past orders, option to upgrade service and payment issues. Issues related payment can be raised here or in the customer support section.
Apart from above feature various apps may require additional functionalities based on the app use. A healthcare app for online doctor consultation will require one to one conferencing features. Others may need a live session feature or chat with coach functionality.
5.5 How much does it cost to build a Healthcare and Fitness App?
Developing an app has three main stages namely designing, development and testing. Project management goes on simultaneously and takes care of all these stages. Designing needs comprehensive and can take up as much as 30% to 50% of your project cost depending on the complexity of your application. Development is stage needs man hours and can take up to 30% to 40% of project cost. Remaining functions like testing, documentation and project management can take 20%, 10% and 10% of project cost respectively.
Needless the features of your app decide the cost of your project. Here are some rough estimates of man hours required for various features of healthcare and fitness app.
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Feature Project Feature Cost Hours
Registration, Login and 30 - 60hrs Gamification 40-100hrs Password Recovery
User Profile 10 -20hrs Workout Database 20-80hrs
Social Media Integration 10-40hrs Live Streaming 80-160hrs
Notifications 15- 40hrs Wearables Device 20-100hrs Integration
Goal Setting 5-20hrs Pedometer & Sleep 18- 48 hrs monitoring
Geolocation 20- 40hrs Product Database 30hr
It is difficult to estimate a project cost of app development without having a full list of features required. However a basic app can take 1000+hrs. Based on this, the cost can come to $5000 to $8000. The experience of your project development team and cost of developers hired call all make a huge difference to your project cost.
The standard cost for developing a health and fitness app with Redbytes can be found out here: https://www.redbytes.in/healthcare-app-cost/
6. Future Trends
Health and fitness apps have been around for more than twelve years now and the market has undergone many changes since then. Every socio-economic change and new technology has moulded the health fitness industry.
The recent COVID-19 pandemic has brought new trends and an increase in demand for online fitness content. Here are some patterns that we will continue to see in the future.
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(a) Mini Workouts
People are hard pressed for time today and prefer short workouts over an hour long session. Research into fitness has also shown that even 30 minutes sessions of light to moderate exercise thrice a week is good enough to see drastic changes in health markers.
Many apps have introduced 20 minutes to as low as 5 minute exercise sessions on their platform accordingly. Calm has started offering two and five minute meditations to its users. Bite size workouts are something every health and fitness app will have to offer its users.
(b) Customization through Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning
Ten years ago, sceptics pointed out that, health apps could not take the place of a face to face interaction with a human doctor or coach. Today we have come a long way and virtual healthcare is a reality. Today we can give personalised diet and workout plan based on body type and user goals. Still there is a lot of scope for improvement.
Diet tracking app, HealthifyMe has already launched an AI powered diet coach called Ria. The bot coach gives out smart diet plans and handles as much as 54% of customer queries.
As more data becomes available and Artificial Intelligence advances, customisation upto the minute level will become possible. Already AI powered healthcare companies have raised more than $864 million in investment last year.
(c) IoT Integration
Wearable integration has been around since 2016 and every app is in the race to develop a better and more accurate tracking device. One study reported the inaccuracy rates of the tracking wearables to be as high as 90%. In coming years the focus will be on improving accuracy in a variety of devices.
Apart from wearable belts and watches, entrepreneurs are investing in integrating smart clothes, smart home and smart vehicles to health applications. This can lead to a better tracking of stress, sleep patterns and movement tracking.
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(d) Data Security
A Federal Trade Commission study from 2014 revealed that 12 of the examined fitness apps shared user data with 75 third-party companies. Data leaks and privacy breach is not new to the app markets. Every year we see new cases of apps that have abused customer data and this has led to customers being jittery about sharing their data.
Going forward customers will respect and interact with apps that have transparent privacy policy and treat customer data with consent. Hence new entrepreneurs must take user data policy as seriously as app features.
7. Conclusion
Be it virtual workout sessions or digital doctor consultation mHealth apps have something to offer every person on the globe. Every person with a smartphone is sure to have a health and fitness app downloaded and in use. Add to that the fact that health and fitness apps have the highest user engagement and lowest user attrition.
Healthcare and Fitness apps market is booming and is expected to continue its growth for coming years. Growing interest of users in fitness and investor eagerness to invest in the market makes it a thriving ecosystem for new start-ups. With a variety of categories within the market and new technologies coming in everyday, there is a lot that can be done innovatively in this market.
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8. Contact Us
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