It’s well documented that there was a craze during the pandemic for people increasing their exercise levels at home. From home workout videos, renovating rooms and garages into home gyms, streaming online fitness classes to indoor bike sessions. As you will see from the trend data below, the increase in search volume during lockdown periods was significant.
But what about post lockdown? Has the trend for home fitness stuck with us or was it merely a flash in the pan over the pandemic? Let’s take a look.
Exercise at Home Search Trends
The search volume for queries relating to ‘exercise at home’ has returned to pre-pandemic levels. However, searching for ‘home workouts’ on Youtube has increased compared to its pre pandemic levels.
Also, ‘exercise at home’ is trending upwards by 48% in the last month but that can be attributed to January being a popular month for fitness related search. If you compare January 2023 to January 2022 the volume of search is slightly down from 6500 in 2022 (average monthly search volume) to 54000 recently in 2023 (average monthly search volume).
| Keyword | Average Monthly Search Volume (UK) | Trending (%)* |
| Exercise at home | 3,600 | 48% |
Trends for Home Gyms
Again, during the lockdown periods you can see the volume of search significantly increasing for home gym and exercise equipment such as exercise bikes. Search related to home gyms has been higher in the last 12 months compared to pre pandemic levels. Also, home gym equipment has also received slightly higher search volume than compared to pre-pandemic. This highlights that home gym and exercise equipment search categories are still performing strongly and may continue to grow as people continue to make use of their newly designed home gyms during the pandemic.
| Keyword | Avg Monthly Search Volume (UK) | Trending (%) |
| Home Gym | 12,100 | 31% |
| Home Gym Equipment | 9,900 | 33% |
| Exercise Bikes | 60,500 | 31% |
| Weight Bench | 18,100 | 18% |
As expected, fitness equipment particularly for home use is trending early in the year as New Year resolutions kick in to inspire people to exercise more.
Indoor cycling at home was very popular during lockdown but search for exercise bikes are returning to pre lockdown levels. However, strength training equipment such as weight benches are showing consistently higher search volume trends than pre-pandemic levels. Although this may indicate that people are looking for strength training equipment for their home over cardio equipment such as bikes, this isn’t necessarily the case.
Over the pandemic there were brands that elevated their profile over lockdown and were clear winners in taking advantage of the exercise at home craze.
Peloton Gaining Traction in Memberships
Brands like Peloton became increasingly popular over lockdown. The volume of search for Peloton Bikes increased significantly. Their model of selling an exercise bike with an online membership subscription to stream instructor led classes from the comfort of your own home has proven to be successful.
Whilst the volume of search for Peloton bikes have decreased since lockdown, the volume of search for membership has been consistent with pandemic levels.
It also indicates that consumers have brands in mind when searching for indoor workouts. Instead of seeing a rise in generic search terms such as exercise bikes, treadmills or cardio equipment we are seeing a rise in search for brands such as Peloton. Also, people have a fitness expert that they follow and are searching for their specific name or brand e.g. Joe Wicks and his brand ‘The Body Coach’ or youtube sensations such as Madfit and Roberta’s Gym.
Gym Memberships Are on The Rise
Despite the home exercise and home fitness trend still performing post lockdown, gyms have witnessed a strong resurgence.
As indicated in the trend graphs above you can see that search queries for gym memberships and gym near me are performing better than pre-pandemic. In fact, there was a total estimated search volume for gym membership of 172,800 in 2019 and 198,700 in 2022. Also, gym near me increased from 7,998,800 in 2019 to 9,125,700 in 2022. The peaks in January 2023 also look promising that search for gyms and gym memberships will continue to remain high in 2023. This highlights that fitness enthusiasts increasingly want to get back into gym environments but maybe not at a compromise to being able to exercise at home.
People Want Flexibility To Exercise Where They Want
The interesting insight from looking at home fitness trends is that despite people increasingly going back into gyms, it’s not at the expense of exercising at home.
In line with remote and flexible working, we are seeing similar attitudes towards fitness and working out. Fitness enthusiasts want the choice to exercise on their own terms and fit around the new lifestyles and routines that have been carved out of the pandemic.
To accommodate flexibility, we are seeing gyms such as Les Mills offer on-demand workouts and classes that can be streamed in live to participate at home. There is clearly an opportunity for gyms to not only capture gym memberships but also offer online experiences so fitness enthusiasts can receive instructor led workouts either at home or in the gym environment. Les Mills has coined the phrase ‘omnifitness’ which relates to how consumers want to receive their exercise and workout experiences in multiple channels.
Online Personal Training Remains High In Search
Personal trainers who do not offer an online service may be missing out on valuable business. Whilst it might be a competitive space to rank in search, fitness enthusiasts increasingly expect similar flexibility from personal trainers as they do gyms.
The volume of search continues to be strong despite some decrease since the pandemic. The average monthly search volume for the keyword online personal trainer is 2900 with peaks during January and peaks and troughs in the summer from April to August.
Weight Loss is Still the Top Reason People Search for Exercise at Home
As you can see from the table below, the top related searches for ‘exercise at home’ shows intent towards weight loss.
| Search Terms | Index** |
| how to exercise at home | 100 |
| exercise to lose weight at home | 40 |
| exercise for belly fat at home | 40 |
| at home exercise equipment | 33 |
| exercise bike | 22 |
| best exercise to lose weight | 15 |
| best exercise to lose weight at home | 15 |
| exercise to reduce belly fat for female at home | 13 |
| exercises to lose belly fat | 12 |
| back exercises at home | 11 |
| walking exercise at home | 10 |
| exercise at home for women | 10 |
| chest exercises at home | 9 |
| crunches exercise | 9 |
| best at home exercise equipment | 9 |
| aerobic exercise at home | 8 |
| tummy exercise at home | 8 |
* Trend (%) – Relates to the increase or decrease in volume of search in recent months compared to the avg monthly search volume over the last 12 months
** Index – Google trends provide an index on search popularity on a scale of 1-100 with 100 being the most popular search term for the location an time the data is requested
Data Sources:
- Google trends
- Semrush
- Google ads keyword planner
