SwolTime
Designing the Full Workout Experience
Research
Inventory Analysis
Comparative Analysis
Heuristics Analysis
User Interviews
Synthesis
Affinity Mapping
User Persona
Problem Statement
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Design
Sketches
Lo-Fi Wireframes
Hi-Fi Wireframes
Prototyping
What is Swoltime?
In this collaborative project, our UX team partnered directly with the founder of Swol LLC to enhance and expand their fitness app, SwolTime, into a full-fledged workout experience. Originally developed over the past five years, the app primarily functioned as a versatile workout timer—supporting weightlifting, HIIT, mobility, stretching, running, and boxing. Our goal was to build on this foundation and design a more holistic and user-centric fitness experience.
The Brief
Existing Pain Points
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Confusing Timer Options
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Friction in workout planning and custom exercise creation
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Lack of Exercise Suggestions
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Not All Exercises Need Timing
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No On-the-Go Plan Building
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No Rep/Weight Tracking
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Lack of Useful Analytics
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Workout Plan Doesn't Save Edits
Product Goals
Design Principles
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Keep it Simple: Minimal distractions, minimal buttons, maximum efficiency.
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Compact: navigation is a major tax. Our focus is to keep the user within 3 clicks of any major action.
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Flexible: adaptable enough to fit all on-the-go workout scenarios
RESEARCH
Inventory Analysis
To take SwolTime to the next level, our first step was to conduct an in-depth inventory analysis of the existing app. We evaluated its current features and functionality, then benchmarked them against top-performing fitness apps that seamlessly integrate workout timers into a complete fitness experience—whether as a core feature or an optional enhancement. Those competitors were Shred, Hevy, and Seconds.
Comparative Analysis
Once we identified our inspirations, we conducted a competitive analysis to dive deeper into the end-to-end user flows of each app. This helped us uncover key enhancements we could aspire to—while still staying within the project’s scope.
Shred
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Wide range of workouts from gym based to bodyweight exercises, HIIT, free weight etc, cardio etc.
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Different fitness levels and preferences.
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Progress and insight tracker
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Different styles of AI driven coaching
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18 different training styles.
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Inter working timer used for HIIT exercises
Seconds
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Straight forward interface to create and customize workout routines
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Easy to read display
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Custom Exercise Creation
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Progress Tracking
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Audible Alerts
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Can run in the background if while you use other apps.
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Hevy
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Unlimited Routines and Exercises
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Simple interface to construct workouts quickly
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Advanced Routine Planner and workout logging.
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Automatic Rest Timers
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Intuitive workout log that recalls weights and reps from previous workout.
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Progress tracking dashboard
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Muscle distribution charts
Heuristic Analysis
​1. Recognition rather than recall-Make objects, actions, and options visible to help users rely less on memory.
2. Flexibility and efficiency of use- Allow users to adjust frequent actions to fit their needs
User Interviews
Through 8 interviews common themes started to really pop up. Some of the key takeaways were:
I want to see how I improve over time.
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“I keep my goals in front of me by using charts.”
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“I get more motivated as I see results, either physically or in a graph.”​
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I have time constraints.​
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“Time is limited. I have to decide what I’m focusing on.”
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“I never want to be in the gym for more than an hour.”​​​​​
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I like to be able to adjust my workouts as I go.
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“I have to adjust my workout based on what machines are available.”
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“I love that I can move my workouts around in the app that I use.”
SYNTHESIS
Affinity Map
Affinity Map
As we took this feedback and started to synthesize, we started to see some other user needs align with the business needs especially when it came to workout routine creation and not just randomly selecting exercises, having workout analytics just a click away and providing workout milestones as a result of those analytics.
"I want to see how I improve over time."
"I want to keep my goals in front of me."
"I prefer to create my own workouts."
"I prefer to use a pre-made workout."
Persona and Problem Statement
At this stage, our core concepts were established and our persona could be solidified.
Avery B.
42 years old, has two children
Occupation is ER Nurse
Located in Denver, Colorado
Interests
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Hiking, rock climbing, trail running, weekly gym visits.
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Wants to prevent bone deterioration and continue doing physical activities with family.
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Wants to play with/pick up her kids.Interests
Frustrations
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Doesn’t have an efficient way to plan workouts.
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Recently changed careers to become an ER nurse, now has a demanding schedule
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Has noticed that it is more difficult than before to lift heavy weights (i.e. patient transfers)
Needs
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Needs to be able to construct a new workout routine quickly, in 2 minutes or less
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An easy way to retrieve info from previous workouts
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To see progress over time
Problem Statement: Avery prioritizes her functional fitness, but she is also a busy mom and ER nurse and has many demands on her time. Avery needs a better way to plan and execute her workouts, while also keeping track of her progress over time.
Design
Avery's Workout Flow
There was a great deal of anticipation surrounding the initial design phase, particularly around how to effectively integrate the original timer with the new workout interface. The question we kept asking was what purpose does the timer serve when timing isn’t always necessary?
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To explore this, we crafted a user story centered around Avery. She begins a workout that doesn’t require timing—allowing her to move at her own pace, completing each set and only using the timer for rest periods. However, the story pivots when Avery receives a call asking her to pick up her kids earlier than expected. Suddenly, her available workout time is cut short.
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Instead of abandoning the workout, Avery adapts by switching her session from untimed sets to timed, high-intensity intervals. She now performs as many reps as possible within a minute—similar to a HIIT workout—enabling her to complete her workout efficiently and still make it in time to pick up her kids.
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Landing
Page
Create Workout
Exercise Library
Set Timer/workout parameters
Start Workout
Workout Completed/ Analytics page
Updated Timer & Exercise Sets
Toggle to timed sets
**Assumption: User has previously used SwolTime App, and is experienced in working out.
Wireframes
This is when Avery changes her exercises from untimed to timed. It was when we incorporated the toggle feature in the workout edit window that we started to see this story come together. These early wireframes of the workout page incorporated the use of an edit menu that could be accessed by swiping up from the bottom of the screen. This option would later be changed to an edit button in order to decongest the workout page and give it that feature-rich experience all in one workout.
​​​​Other ideas like "open set" or "closed set" on the toggle were considered before "timed set" and "untimed set," but many of these terms had already been applied in different context or were very uncommon in the fitness industry.
We were able to simplify navigation and streamline the workout customization by keeping the entire exercise library to one page. The use of a drop down menu at the top helps Avery filter by muscle type. The filtered list below allows her to populate the exercise at the top of the menu so that she can keep track of what she's adding as she searches.
One thing we needed to change about the library was the display of workouts and changing from a gallery view to a list view. This gave us more real estate to add longer names like "weighted lunges" or "inverted rows".
Upon completion of the workout Avery comes to her workout analytics page. This not only tracks progress long term but also gives more insight (i.e. personal records).
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In our earlier wireframes we had the analytics page as a possible landing page with a "start quick timer" button as the first actionable item. This made it so that Avery could jump right into a workout on the fly if she wanted to. However, this overshadowed any prompts for Avery to create a workout, which minimized productivity in the app. To correct this, ​we created a new landing page that kept all actionable items at the top, and then repurposed the analytics page as a more insightful post-workout page.
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In Conclusion...
We were able to attain the following product goals:
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Simplify navigation
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Streamline workout plan creation and customization
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Establish a flexible, feature-rich single page in-workout experience
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Provide visual analytics and progress insights
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with the following design principles:
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Keep it Simple: Minimal distractions, minimal buttons, maximum efficiency.
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Compact: navigation is a major tax. Our focus is to keep the user within 3 clicks of any major action.
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Flexible: adaptable enough to fit all on-the-go workout scenarios
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In Conclusion...
Let’s Work Together
Get in touch so we can start working together.