Fitness Trends 2022: How the ‘New Normal’ is shaping fitness

Every year since 2007, the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) publishes the results of the ‘Worldwide Survey of Fitness Trends’ – an extensive review that involves thousands of fitness and wellness professionals and experts such as personal trainers, exercise physiologists, medical professionals and gym club owners from all around the world.

The final report aims to monitor, assess, predict and introduce new fitness trends that have an impact on the evolution of the sector itself.

According to Mike Hewan, Marketing Manager for Technogym South and Southern Africa, “During 2021, we witnessed an unprecedented acceleration in the awareness of how much physical exercise impacts one’s well-being with the reaffirmation that it’s one of the most powerful forces for good health and as we’ve entered 2022, the fitness world continues to feel its effects.

The most important trends have emerged from this study in the fitness and wellness sector at a global scale for the year ahead. The results of this annual survey will help the health and fitness industry to make crucial business decisions for future growth and development.”

The top 10 Fitness Trends of 2022:

1. Wearable Technologies – They have been on the podium every year since 2016 and are premiere standout trends for 2022.

2. Home Exercise Gym – Fitness will be accessed in a completely new and hybrid way: people will work out at home and in the gym, in the same way as they go to a restaurant and at the same time use a home delivery service.

3. Outdoor Activities – One of the most current growing trends, can be combined with indoor training.

4. Strength Training With Free Weights – Before 2021, surveys conducted included a category described as “strength training”. That description was seen as too broad and as a result was dropped in 2020 in favour of the more specific “strength training with free weights”.

5. Exercise For Weight Loss – Maintaining a healthy and balanced diet and staying active are key for weight loss, maintenance and boosting metabolism.

6. Personal Training – Over the years, the figure of the personal trainer has evolved and become more accessible thanks to the internet in fitness clubs, as well as at home and in workplaces with gyms. People have finally come to the realisation that the role of a trainer is essential in assessing one’s condition, prescribing the correct training program, and offering achievable goals based on specific needs.

7. High Intensity Interval Training (HIIT) – It is a novelty that involves interval training sessions that consist of high intensity exercises followed by medium to low intensity breaks. 

8. Body Weight Training – The global Covid-19 pandemic and the resulting restrictions have encouraged the development of bodyweight training, virtual training and free weights, among others, which can all be done at home with the right guidance. Body weight training uses the weight of the body as resistance, performing simple to complex movements.

9. Live And On-demand Online Exercise Classes – The success of this upward trend – with online and virtual training – is certainly due to the alternating long lockdown periods and closures of fitness centres, however it has opened up new perspectives for the foreseeable future when the pandemic emergency has finally passed.

10. Health/Wellness Coaching – Today and more than ever, health and wellness has become an absolute priority for people that are showing more and more appetite for physical exercise and enjoy fitness and sports through using innovatively designed, high-performance and easy-to-use products to achieve their training goals.