Whistle App Helps You Find Compatible Workout Partners

September 22, 2015

A new app, launched this month, promises to find people available, compatible workout partners.

Toronto-based startup Whistle is unique location-based app that allows users to make a profile stating their available workout times, and workout preferences. The app then shows you a series of people with compatible schedules in your area and uses a swipe right/swipe left model so the user can choose the workout partner that’s right for them. It also allows the user to find people interested in doing the same activities.

“I started Whistle through my own personal struggle of staying motivated to work out,” says Laura Davidson, founder of Whistle. “I felt very uncomfortable going to the gym alone and did not want to pay for a personal trainer.”

For many, the momentum of wanting to get some exercise is lost, because of difficulty syncing their schedules with a friend. Davidson hopes Whistle will change that, and encourage people to stick with their fitness regiment. There’s also a sense of obligation in committing to someone over an app, whereas with friends, it’s easy to skip out on the workout.

Davidson’s initial struggle was finding a developer to help her make her vision of Whistle a reality. She ended up collaborating with Toronto-based FutureFuture.

Davidson says Whistle isn’t about tracking calories and doesn’t make you enter in your weight loss goals like other fitness apps. In some ways, it’s more of a social app.

“Whistle is designed to expand your social fitness network, make new friends, and try new activities with these local connections,” says Davidson. “Friendships in life are based on commonalities. Thus, finding someone in your own neighbourhood who shares the same interests as you will make the personal connection that much easier to forge.”

Davidson hopes that Whistle will contribute to a broader movement of social fitness, and plans to find ways to connect users not just to each other, but to nutritionists, local trainers, gyms, and places to get healthy food.