A workout tracker with no subscription

Badger is free: no subscription, no account, no ads, and no caps on routines or history. This page covers what that includes, where Badger falls short, and how other trackers charge.

What Badger costs

Nothing, on Google Play or the App Store, and there is no paid tier. Free here means all five of these:

  • No account. No sign-up, no login, no email address. Install it and start logging.
  • No subscription and no in-app purchase. No Pro version, no trial running down, and nothing in the app asking you to upgrade.
  • No ads.
  • No caps. Unlimited routines, history and custom exercises.
  • Free export. Every set exports to CSV, the whole database backs up to a single file you keep wherever you like, and routines and gym setups share as plain files.

The Badger promise puts these commitments in writing.

Why there is nothing to charge for

It is arithmetic: Badger has no servers. No account means no user database, no sync engine and no storage bill, so there is no monthly cost to recover from you. Your training sits in a database on your phone, which is why the app is free and also why it does not sync between devices. The same decision produces both.

Asking where the money comes from is the right instinct with any free app. Badger is one person's project, with no investors, no advertising business and nothing to pay back. The app has no analytics, and your training is not held anywhere it could be sold. (This website counts page views without cookies; the privacy policy lists what it records.)

The catch

Here is what you give up, so you can decide before you import years of history.

  • No sync between devices. One phone at a time. An optional backup to your own Google Drive, or a database file you move yourself, carries your log to a new phone, but two devices do not stay in step. See moving to a new phone.
  • No web app and no desktop version. The phone is the whole product.
  • No Apple Watch or Wear OS app. You cannot log a set from your wrist.
  • iOS is younger than Android. Both get every feature, but Android has been in people's hands far longer, so it is the more tested of the two. On iOS, Badger is iPhone only; there is no iPad version.
  • No social feed, no followers, no leaderboards and no streak badges. Some people want those.
  • No AI coach inside the app. Instead, Badger hands you your own data in formats you can give to whichever assistant you already use, with prompts to start from: use your own AI.
  • Support is one person and an email address, with no guaranteed reply time.

How the other trackers charge

These apps made different choices about money, and for many people one of them is the right pick.

Tracker What the free version gets you
FitNotes Genuinely free, no subscription, no ads, Android only. Development runs at roughly a release a year, so it is a stable simple log rather than a growing app. If you are on Android and it does what you need, there is little reason to switch.
Hevy A well-made app with a generous free tier that is nonetheless capped: a limited number of saved routines, limits on custom exercises, and older measurement history held behind Hevy Pro, which is a subscription. Plenty of people happily pay for it.
Strong The long-established one. The free tier is limited to a small number of routine templates, and the rest sits behind Strong Pro. It also requires an account to use.
StrongLifts 5x5 The program's own app. Now subscription-first: its store listing states the app requires a subscription to use.

Checked July 2026. Free tiers and prices change often, so read each app's store listing before you decide.

What matters more than the monthly price is what happens to your history the day you stop paying. Where it lives on a company's servers, that is the company's call. In Badger it lives on your phone, and in any backup you choose to make.

If you are coming from one of them

Badger imports your history from FitNotes, Strong, Hevy and StrongLifts, straight from each app's export file, and works out your PRs and graphs from what arrives.