🏋 Modern open-source fitness coaching platform. Create workout plans, track progress, and access a comprehensive exercise database. - Snouzy/workout-cool
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Oh funny to see it here. I'm the original author of workout.lol.
I sold the app to a guy who seemed to just abandoned it. I also texted him multiple times if he needs support, but he didn't answer anymore. It makes me really happy to see it being maintained again!
Great work on the UI improvements.
Ohoh ! Vincenius !!
You have no idea how happy I was when I saw your name pop up ahahha
Yeah, no luck either. It really broke my heart to see the project stall like that.
That's what pushed me to rebuild everything, keeping the same open spirit you had from day one.
Thanks a lot for the kind words about the UI it means a lot coming from you.
And if you ever feel like jumping back in (I totally get that it might be tricky, especially since you sold the original project and this one is so close) but you’d always be welcome.
Your input, ideas, or even just your presence would mean a lot !
Cheers !
yo @dang, a section on HN for missed-tech-connections would be RAAAAAAAAAD
Could be a new tab "collab" or something to do with joint work maybe, one could post a site, repo or detail a past work experience and anyone who was around or passed thru could reconnect, discuss stuff and share anecdotes. Thinking long dead internal faang tools, stuff like op's post, abandoned repos, old shareware etc. Could also be a place to find cofounders or people interested in starting or working on stuff together.
By withinboredom 2025-06-199:551 reply That would be interesting to see. Kinda like a tell-hn, but for old/abandoned projects? I've worked on a few of those internal projects (such as time-traveling vector db for ML tools back in '19), and stuff like that.
Dunno how useful it would actually be, but an interesting thought.
By benchly 2025-06-1910:41 I would be into this. I'm basically trying to teach myself development by doing things with abandoned projects I find interesting. While nothing I do is even remotely production-ready, it would be cool to pair with someone more experienced to gain better understanding and perspective since it seems remarkably hard to find a mentor.
This is SO COOL!!!
I’ve been working on an automated calendar scheduling api that integrates with Apple CalDAV (iCal) that lets you schedule your life around goals (it uses Google OrTools to solve a great big CP-SAT constraint model blazing fast, a year in under 5 seconds), along with meal planning around macro goals. I knew I wanted to integrate a workout/training plan system but had no idea what component I’d end up using.
Now I know! Thanks for building this project.
By surgomat 2025-06-1816:43 Thanks mate.
I'd love to hear more about your setup and if Workout.cool can fit as a "component" let's say? in your system, that's exactly the kind of use case I built it for. Open, hackable, and easy to plug into more powerful workflows. GG !
So… someone in the industry bought it hoping to stop a free alternative from getting popular? Wonder what will happen to this one
I don't think that the guy who bought it was from the industry. In our talks, he really seemed interested in growing the project - but maybe I'm just naive.
If he really wanted to stop the project, he should've put the repository on private and put down the website, but he just left everything the same as it was.
By nashashmi 2025-06-1917:22 The growing anxiety of faltering commitments! I know the feeling.
By koakuma-chan 2025-06-1816:572 reply From what I can see this is AI generated, and it doesn't work when you press continue.
I think the servers can’t handle the high traffic from HN, you can clone the repo and run your own
By surgomat 2025-06-1818:12 Yeah, HN hit hard earlier lol, we are now on the 2nd place so things should start calming down now (or no, lol), btw the app is already back up and running normally again!
Sorry for that
By koakuma-chan 2025-06-1818:241 reply > I think the servers can’t handle the high traffic from HN
It appears to be hosted on Vercel...
By surgomat 2025-06-1820:05 database*
By xeromal 2025-06-1817:36 lmao
By minimalist 2025-06-1814:074 reply It does not appear to be working for me right now, I get "error loading exercises".
What are your thoughts about the wger project [0]? It is a FLOSS AGPL-licensed self-hosted fitness/workout/nutrition manager that has existed for almost a decade (I think?) It's a django app and has a companion flutter app that runs on android/ios/windows/linux/macos. It supports multiple users and could even be used to run a gym. Body.build [1] is a newer FLOSS project (also browser-based) that is focused around building a weight lifting program. The author of body.build also contributes to wger.
I'm using wger in my homelab and while there are a lot of moving pieces to the self-host process, it works well. I'd say the biggest limitation is the comprehensiveness of their exercise database, but that is something that many people have recognized and are steadily expanding. If anyone is willing to contribute exercises (and exercise media) to this AGPL licensed project, they would definitely appreciate it!
I just tried Wget the other month and sadly can't recommend it. The UX of the website is horrible, and their mobile app is a buggy mess (at least on iOS). No matter if I wanted to start a workout, edit weights for an exercise, or browse previous session, the app kept crashing, hanging and logging me out. I am now using LiftLog which does everything that I need. FOSS too. https://github.com/LiamMorrow/LiftLog
It's interesting that fitness and weightlifting are pretty common these days, but there are so few non-commercial applications out there that are usable and well maintained. At least that's my perception after digging through dozens of Github projects.
No. I indeed paid a human to set up a training plan and show me how to correctly execute the exercises. Highly recommend that to anybody starting with weightlifting. There's so much you can do wrong.
By sanderjd 2025-06-1914:02 How did that work? Did you have to sign up to a subscription at a gym and use a personal trainer there?
By bromuro 2025-06-197:14 I disabled the adblocker and it worked…
Yes totally unexpected! It is fixed right now.
Traffic spiked and my backend rate limits kicked in too hard.
Thanks so much for trying it out
maybe some weird cache?? sorry about that é_è... cannot see the error anymore in the logs
By ElijahLynn 2025-06-1817:46 I'm seeing the error too as of now.
By surgomat 2025-06-1918:30 We recently (a few hours ago) switched providers to handle the traffic/databse better.
Everything should be back to normal now
Really appreciate your patience and thanks again for giving the app a try and sorry again guys.
By lucasverra 2025-06-1816:231 reply same for me >> Error loading exercises
By surgomat 2025-06-1816:58 Thanks for flagging it should be fixed now !
This is cool, as someone whose been lifting for ~5 years its nice to see a fleshed out opensource tool for weightlifting.
The main problem with any app I've tried is that after enough experience the bells and whistles of the app don't really matter and mostly what you care about is consistent tracking for progressive overload.
I think this is a good app for people who want to get started weightlifting I would say the two main things needed for wider adoption would be 1. A mobile app ( or pwa, I've made and used my own personal workout app for a while as a PWA and its been just as good as any native app I've tried) 2. A way to save specific workouts as routines and track those for long periods of time
By LostMyLogin 2025-06-1813:593 reply Hesitating to write this because I don't want to push back at all on OP but I'm not sure I agree that something like this is a good option for people wanting to get started in weightlifting. I'm not sure it's a good option for anyone really. I applaud OP for the effort but this is recommending some pretty awful workouts. For example if I select back and bi, it's giving me nine different exercises with complete disregard for the order they are in or what other exercises are in the workout.
Why are compound lifts in the middle of the workout and why am I doing three different types of chin ups? There are also no reps / sets calculated nor are there 1RM percentages for weight.
Bro splits are some of the lowest quality routines you can use and this somehow makes them worse. You could replace all of this, remove the bells and whistles, and create a bare bones PPL app that determines exercises based on equipment available and it would be light years better than this.
Were those intended to be "do it in this order" or were they just options?
I got the feeling they were more options and you could reorder them if you wanted or shuffle or just do one or another.
To me a more casual / getting started is just about doing the thing.
By LostMyLogin 2025-06-1815:151 reply I'm not sure a beginner would know what order to place them in nor would they recognize the potential injury risk associated with stacking some of these exercises.
Beginners should be focusing on form and simple compound lifts. Throwing them into things like heavy accessory lifts with no regard for exercise choice or format is a quick way to get hurt. Again, I want to applaud OP for doing this. The fitness industry is in a terrible place and tools like this have a great place. I just think it needs a ton of work to make it useful. Maybe if I find some time, I'll try and contribute but in it's current state I would never recommend something like this to anyone.
By terribleperson 2025-06-196:27 Even without weights, you can permanently injure yourself with bad form. Bringing weights into the picture makes it much easier.
By SoftTalker 2025-06-1817:15 Pretty high if you don't know what you're doing with a weight that you're not strong enough to handle.
By LostMyLogin 2025-06-1822:02 Pretty high.
By RankingMember 2025-06-1815:412 reply Agree. IMO a simple 5x5 is going to be the better option for someone just starting out. Stronglifts is one flavor with a great app that just works and tracks all the little stuff (progression, giving you a specific rest time) and, once you plateau, you can start digging in to other options.
By SoftTalker 2025-06-1816:492 reply I also wanted to say that for people starting out keep it super simple. I wouldn't even use an app. At most a notebook or spreadsheet. Do "Starting Strength" (squats, bench, deadlift. 3 sets of 5). Start with a weight you can handle with good form, even if it's just the empty bar. When you can do that add 5 pounds at the next workout. Increasing the load is important but don't let your form break down. An app is not going to help you with form, and proper form is critical to avoiding injury, especially if you are at all older.
I'll second that, no app needed. A small notebook with a "table" per planned exercise and a ball pen are always in my sports bag, so its ready to go when its training time.
The phone appears to be a distraction for many people I watch at the gym, over-extending the rest between sets while watching social media. The minimalism provided by the paper notebook is what I prefer instead.
By padjo 2025-06-1914:42 Honestly for beginners just building a habit of regular lifting is by far the most important thing. Progressive overload, going to failure, periodization etc won’t do much if you don’t have consistency. My advice to beginners would be to go to the gym 3 times a week and do whatever interests you for about 45 minutes. Once you have that habit nailed down for 6 months then we can talk about more advanced stuff.
By RankingMember 2025-06-1817:25 Couldn't agree more about form and keeping it simple. I would note, though, that an app can help with that, e.g. the one I mentioned has videos demonstrating proper form, and what I would do when starting out is video myself from the side and compare. An app will also track progression more easily on something you naturally carry around (your phone), versus needing to remember a notebook.
Hardly anybody would recommend 5x5 these days for anyone, much less beginners.
By jonwinstanley 2025-06-1822:031 reply Why?
5x5 and 3x5 are out of vogue for lots of reasons but it largely boils down to:
* Not enough volume
* Non-periodized
That first bit means different things at different phases of a lifting "career". But generally speaking "time under tension" and research into effective rep ranges has changed modern thinking on set sizes and volume.
These days people, including World's Strongest Men, tend to recommend higher rep ranges for beginners and those coming back to the gym to build work capacity and reduce risk of injury.
By SoftTalker 2025-06-193:561 reply If you are just starting out all that matters is going in to the gym regularly and lifting some weight. 3x5, 5x5, or some complicated periodized program with a lot of accessories are all going to work.
That's why I recommend keeping it simple. Build the habit and build some strength. Once you've done that, you can get fancy if you find that you're really into it.
By bluGill 2025-06-1914:13 A better training plan gives you a chance of winning competition. Most of us wouldn't win no matter what plan we follow (at my age only drugs could make me a winner and those have side effects I don't want), we just want enough strength for general life and health. With those more modest goals 3x5, 5x5, or since something not as good still will get us there.
What are your goals?
By nsagent 2025-06-192:13 Weird. I've lifted on and off for 25 years. For most of that time I did the stereotypical 3x8-12 and saw much slower progression. During the past couple years I switched to a 5x5 plan and saw massive gains in strength, even while I was cutting weight via a caloric deficit (was eating 1500-1600 calories a day, but had lots of protein and adequate carbs).
For reference, I went from a dumbbell bench press of 45lb to 75lb in 4.5 months (5x5). Previously my progress was much slower.
I'll caveat that I've obviously not closely controlled for all factors and I'm an n of 1. Additionally my interest is in having a great strength to weight ratio, rather than being a body builder. I'm a climber and that's an important consideration.
By mmmrk 2025-06-1910:11 3x5 like done by Starting Strength continues to work well for beginners looking for strength. After you tapped out the easy gains, you can use a periodized program for body building described by "the science" if you wish, but can do more useful weights because you are stronger.
By mywittyname 2025-06-1816:591 reply Community-made working plans would be a killer feature.
But I do agree with your assessment. Each exercise needs a categorization (compound, isolation), compliments (if an exercise is a push, then what are some pulls), companions (if you're working arms at the cable stack, might as well do a bunch of arm/shoulder/back cable exercises), and a est. time to perform (including warmup, setup). This will allow plans to be generated in a way that makes sense.
Though, I think community made exercise plans are a better solution than trying to devise algorithms to generate good plans. Though, an LLM integration might work well for beginners, send a prompt with a list of exercises and goals (i.e., beginner looking for a 3 day a week strength plan, build one using these 20 exercises).
By LostMyLogin 2025-06-1822:03 My next question would be why are we trying to use algorithms to generate good plans? Good and simple plans have been around for decades that are easy to find.
By gavmor 2025-06-1822:51 Ideally, some way to export and share between different UIs.
https://json-schema.app/view/%23?url=https%3A%2F%2Fgist.gith...
By surgomat 2025-06-1817:45 Thanks a lot means a lot coming from a gym bro hehe
Btw I totally agree: once you’ve been training a while, the only thing that really matters is tracking your progress and showing up consistently (or "mental" side in my case, i do not train anymore for performances).
Good news : saving + tracking routines over time is in the roadmap.
That's why the architecture of the "workout session" is the part that is the most different from the old app.
I want users to create, reuse, share, analyse and evolve their own training blocks with minimal friction.
Would love to hear how you handled that in your own PWA sounds like we've walked similar paths :)
