It's the time of year when everyone you know is signing up for a new gym membership. So, of course, big companies like Microsoft want to jump on the fitness bandwagon before the 'fit for Feb.' crowd disappears. Microsoft has just developed a new fitness app that promises to be nothing like the rest.
Is the new 'Bing Health & Fitness Windows Phone App' all it's cracked up to be? Let's take a closer look.
Inside the Bing Fitness App
At first look, the Bing Fitness App seems very comparable to MyFitnessPal. The app lets you snag nutritional information from thousands of different foods, record what you are eating, select workouts from hundreds of exercises, and use a GPS tracker to record distances. But, that's where this app becomes less like MyFitnessPal and more like a unique app.
The Bing Fitness App also includes short exercise videos that you can use to figure out how to do a certain movement. If you're into training, you can compare these videos to what you might see on BodyBuilding.com or other fitness websites. Plus, the Bing app also lets users play doctor with a 'symptom checker.' Just plug in some symptoms, and see what might be wrong with you.
The Push for Bing
Microsoft has been trying to gain some Bing traction with a slew of new apps. In addition to the fitness app mentioned here, other Bing apps that have recently been released include the 'Food and Drink' app and the 'Travel' app. These apps do what you might expect, and it's just one more way that Microsoft is trying to make Bing relevant.
Will the fitness app work well? Right now, Microsoft has done a bit of brilliant marketing by posting the beta version of the app to the app's main site with the words 'For Beta Use Only. Do Not Download Yet' (or close to these words). Of course, this has only caused numerous Windows Phone users to download and test the app. So, yeah, you could say that there is some interest in Bing fitness.
App Requirements
The Bing fitness app does require that you use a Microsoft Phone to actually use the app, so that's something that you'll need to have to test out this app. If you do have a Windows Phone, though, I can see where parts of this app might be really appealing to people that like to train. Notably: the part of the app that shows you various exercise videos.
If you're new to the gym and you don't want to look like a fool, you might just open up your Bing Fitness app and take a look at how to actually do a proper squat. For this reason alone, the Bing Fitness app may have some mass appeal (especially since other fitness apps of this kind might not be available for Windows Phone yet). Is it similar to MyFitnessPal? Yes. Is it also different enough to matter? It sure looks like it.
Looking for a new fitness app for Windows Phone? The Bing Fitness app is still in beta mode, but it's definitely worth a try.