Getting started

Install Badger, pick your weight unit, and you can log your first set a minute later. If you're coming from another app, you can bring your whole history with you.

Install and set up

Get Badger from the App Store on iPhone or from Google Play on Android. On iOS it's an iPhone app only; there is no iPad build. The first launch asks two things:

1. Weight unit - Kilograms or pounds. This is the default for every exercise, and you can change it for a single exercise later.
2. Import data - Pick I'm new or the app you're coming from: FitNotes, Strong, Hevy or StrongLifts. The main button then reads Start fresh or Import from that app. Until you pick, it reads Choose one above. Not now, I'll import later skips the step; see Import from another app. After an import, setup moves on by itself and its last page lists what came in.

After that you're on the Today screen. With no active routine, Today shows Pick a program or build a routine. If you have used named workouts in the last 8 weeks, such as Strong's, it offers Turn your workouts into routines instead.

From Pick a program or build a routine, open the program you want and tap Set as active program. Back on Today, its days are ready to start.

Pick the names you want. On the last step, Make this my active routine is on by default. Past workouts with the same name are linked to the new days, so the routine shows when you last trained each one.

Log your first workout

A workout is one day's session, and it holds the exercises you do in it.

1. On the Today screen, tap New workout to open the exercise picker.
2. Find your exercise: search by name, tap a category chip under the search box, or filter by muscle or equipment. The ones you have logged come first. If it is not there, tap Create at the bottom to add it.
3. Tap the exercise to open the training screen.
4. Enter the weight and reps (or whatever fields the exercise uses) and tap the checkmark to log the set.
5. The rest timer starts on its own. When it ends, log your next set.
6. When you finish an exercise, tap + Add on the right of the bar at the bottom of the screen to add the next one. To go back to an earlier exercise, tap Exercises on the left of the same bar, then tap the exercise in the list.
7. When the session is over, tap back to return to the Today screen and tap End workout. Badger records the end time and shows your workout summary.

The full tour of the training screen is on Logging workouts.

Start from a routine

If you follow a program, a routine fills in the exercises and weights for each day.

1. Go to You → Routines.
2. Tap + to build your own, or pick one of the built-in programs (StrongLifts, 5/3/1, PPL and others).
3. Open the routine and tap Set as active program at the top. Its days appear on the Today screen.
4. Tap a day to preview the workout, adjust any weights, then tap Start.

More on Routines.

Import from another app

Badger imports your full workout history from FitNotes, Strong, Hevy and StrongLifts. Export a file from your old app, save it on the phone you train with, then import it. On an iPhone, tap Save to Files in the share sheet. On Android, save it to Downloads or Google Drive.

Find your old app below for what to export, then follow Import the file into Badger.

FitNotes

In FitNotes, go to Settings → Backup to write a .fitnotes file. The backup brings:

• Your categories, exercises, every set, body weight and custom measurements.
• Your routines, with their days, exercises and planned sets. A routine with the same name as one already in Badger is skipped.
• Supersets on workouts and routine days, your daily workout comments, and workout start and end times.
• Each exercise's bar weight. Weight increment, rest time and favorite fill in only where the Badger exercise has no value of its own, and favorite can only be turned on.

The bar list and plate inventory stay out, since the plate calculator keeps its own. FitNotes doesn't mark warmups, so every set arrives as a working set.

Moving to an iPhone? FitNotes has no iPhone version, so make the backup before you give up the Android phone. See FitNotes on iPhone.

Strong

In Strong, go to Profile → Settings → Export Data to produce a strong.csv file. Your RPE, per-set notes and session times come with it, in kg or lbs, from any region's export. The Workout Notes column becomes the workout's note, after the workout name. When the export marks a set W (warmup), F (failure) or D (drop set) in Set Order, warmups and failure sets arrive as such and drop sets arrive as working sets. Older exports that only number the sets import as working sets.

Hevy

In Hevy, go to Profile → Settings → Export & Import Data → Export Workouts. Skip Export Measurements, which has no workouts in it. Warmups come across as warmups, sets Hevy marked as failure come across as To failure, and your RPE and session times come along too. The workout description becomes the workout's note, after the title, and supersets come across as Badger supersets.

StrongLifts

In StrongLifts, go to Settings → Export workout data to produce a CSV. Badger reads the weight unit and each session's start time and length from the file. The body weight column comes in as body weight readings, one per day, and a day that already has one is skipped. StrongLifts doesn't mark warmups, so every set arrives as a working set.

Import the file into Badger

1. Go to Settings → Your data and tap the row for your old app: Import from FitNotes, Import from Strong, Import from Hevy or Import from Stronglifts. The screen opens with that app's export steps. When your file is ready, tap Choose file and pick it.
2. Check the preview: exercises, workout days, sets and the weight unit. For a FitNotes backup, set Weight unit in this file yourself. It starts on kg, which is what FitNotes normally stores; a backup from before about 2018 carries its unit per set and doesn't need it.
3. Check the date range under Workout days, then Exercise mapping. It shows how many of your exercises matched ones already in your library, which keeps their history, PRs and graphs together. Tap Review exercise mapping to change what any name is logged against, or to add it as a new exercise. Close guesses are listed first, under Close guesses. Turn on Keep my exercise names to add every name from your file as its own exercise instead of matching.
4. Tap Import. A big file takes a minute, and the screen stays awake while it writes.

A close match is skipped when the library exercise has no field for something your file logged. A Farmer Walk with a distance would lose it on a weight and reps exercise, for example. It's added as a new exercise instead, and the review sheet says why.

New exercises go into an "Imported" category (a FitNotes backup keeps your own categories instead). Where a name states its equipment, Badger fills in the equipment type: "Cable Fly" arrives as cable, "Smith Machine Squat" as machine. You can edit exercises and move them between categories in the exercise library afterwards.

Import each file once. Sets on a date that already has a workout are added to that workout, and nothing is overwritten, so importing the same file again adds those sets a second time. The preview warns you when a file overlaps days you've already logged.

Coming back after a break

After six weeks or more without a workout, Today opens with a card: "Welcome back. It's been 9 weeks. Want to start lighter this week?"

• Start lighter - Begins a lighter week that runs for 7 days from that day. Each weight starts at 60% of what you last lifted, rounded to a load you can make. You do the same sets as usual. It works even if deload detection is off, and it doesn't change your deload settings.
• Not now - Closes the card. Nothing changes.

The card shows once per break. If you train again and later take another six weeks off, it comes back.

During the lighter week, a banner on Today says when it ends. Tap End early to go back to full weights. Workouts that week are deload workouts: their summary shows no comparison with last time, and they don't move your program's progression. Your first normal workout after it compares with the last one before the break.

Last time, and weight suggestions

• The line above the weight field says how long ago you last did the exercise, for example "Last 8 @ 80 kg, 14 weeks ago".
• After eight weeks away from an exercise, Badger stops suggesting more weight for it until you've trained it again for a few sessions in a row.

Add a little weight each session as it feels right. If an injury or a physio sets limits, write them in the exercise's notes so they're on screen while you train.

Home-screen and lock-screen widgets

The Journal widget shows this week's attendance (a dot for each day you trained), your last entry and, if you follow a routine, the next day to train. With nothing logged yet, it invites you to start a workout. Tap it to open the app.

Android

Long-press an empty spot on your home screen, tap Widgets, find Badger, and drag the Journal widget into place. It starts at about 4×2 and resizes freely.

iPhone

Touch and hold an empty spot on your Home Screen, tap Edit, then Add Widget, and search for Badger. The small size shows your week and the next day to train. The medium size adds your last entry.

For the Lock Screen, touch and hold it, tap Customize, choose the Lock Screen, and tap the widget area below the time. Three shapes are offered:

• Round - this week's workouts as a count inside a ring of seven days.
• Rectangular - your week, your last entry and the next day.
• Above the time - the next day to train, or this week's count when you don't follow a routine.

The widget refreshes when you open Badger and after you finish a workout. It follows your light or dark theme and your accent color. It turns to the new day at midnight and starts a fresh week on the first day of the week you chose in Settings, even if you have not opened Badger for days.

Key terms

• Working set - A regular set at your training weight.
• Warmup set - A lighter set before your working sets. Tap the Warm-up chip before you log it.
• RPE - Rate of Perceived Exertion (1-10), an optional rating of how hard a set felt.
• RIR - Reps in Reserve (0-5), an optional count of how many more reps you could have done.
• 1RM - One-rep max. Badger estimates it from your sets with the Epley formula.

Full definitions are in the Glossary.

Early iPhone builds

Want iPhone updates before they reach the App Store? Join the TestFlight beta and send feedback on what's new.