Workout Log Apps vs. Paper Logs: Pros and Cons

[01dragonslayer]

January 5, 2024 by Daniel Richter
Tracking your workouts is one of the simplest ways to improve your strength training results.
Whether in a paper journal or in a workout log app like StrengthLog, the important thing is that you write down what you did and try to do more next time.
But should you use a paper log or a workout log app?
I am obviously biased in this question, seeing that we develop our own app. But, having made the journey myself, from a paper journal to trying out different workout tracker apps to now building our own, I still believe I might have some insights to share with you about the pros and cons of both.

Why You Should Use a Workout Log​

Let’s just start off by making it completely clear why you should use a workout log.
Strength training is about stimulating your body to grow bigger and stronger by exposing it to training stress.
Once you’re adapted to a certain stress (for example, a given weight lifted for a given number of repetitions), that same stress is no longer enough to stimulate further adaptations in your body.
In order to keep growing bigger and stronger, you must increase the training stress.
Here is where a workout journal comes in.
You write down the date, which exercises you performed, the weights used, and the number of sets and reps you did.
Then, in the next workout, you look at what you did last time and try to do a little more today. Add a little bit of weight, a few more reps, or some more sets. This is how you consistently get good results from your strength training.
With that out of the way, let’s begin by looking at paper workout logs.

Advantages of Paper Logs​

Take it from me, the CEO of a workout app company: there are certain things I love about paper journals.

• Simple and minimalistic. No batteries, no internet connection, and no notifications means nothing distracts you from your workout.
• The look and feel. A paper log feels old school and rustic. You can touch the pages, and they even smell nice. In addition, writing with a pen can enhance the experience further.
• Low barrier of entry. You don’t need to spend time getting to know a new app, and you don’t need any technical know-how.

Good stuff, but no strength without a weakness, right? Let’s look at the disadvantages.

Disadvantages of Paper Logs​

• No backups. There are no cloud backups here. Lost your journal? You’ve lost your data.
• No analysis. One thing I always found over the years I used paper logs was that I very rarely looked back longer than the last workout. It was difficult to get a good overview and draw conclusions of what worked well and not on a bigger time scale.
• No features. Simplicity has its costs. A paper journal offers no quick stats about your training on the fly, no search functions, and no workout plans for different goals.

Alright, let’s turn to our baby here at StrengthLog: the workout log app.

Advantages of Workout Log Apps​

What advantages can a workout log app offer over a paper journal? Let’s see.

• Accessible and convenient. Got your phone? You’ve got your workout log. You might already be bringing your phone to the gym to listen to music, anyway.
• Statistics and data analysis. Our workout log app keeps track of all your PRs (personal records), yearly records, and really every set you’ve ever performed. You can see your average weight lifted, your best 1RM, 3RM, 5RM, 10RM (and so on), how many sets you’ve performed per muscle, and more.
• Exercise instructions. Our workout log has exercise instructions for over 300 exercises, with a video demonstration and a muscle map showing the muscles worked in each exercise.
• Copy, edit, modify. Got a few workouts you usually cycle through? With our workout app, you can copy any workout you want and either train an identical workout again, or train it with a small modification, such as increasing all reps by one or all weights by a given percentage.
• Workout routines. Don’t know what to train? We’ve got over a hundred strength training programs in our app, with workout routines specifically for bodybuilding, powerlifting, bench pressing, and more.

There’s more to it than I could mention here, and you can read about more of the features of our workout app on this page.

Disadvantages of Workout Log Apps​

Of course, a workout log app is not without disadvantages. Let’s a look.

• Got battery? If your phone battery runs out, your workout log goes black.
• Potential distractions. There is nothing to steal your workout focus like plings and dings from notifications. Or the knowledge that you’re just a few taps away from the buzzfeeds of social media or engaging sites. Personally, I often set my phone in Do Not Disturb or Flight mode to counter this.
• Handle with care. A gym can be rough, with plenty of hard metal edges and messy chalk around. Bringing a delicate high-tech device for hundreds (or even a thousand) dollars in there and handling it between each set might feel risky.

Why I’m Choosing a Workout Log App over a Paper Log​

When the pros and cons are weighed and measured, a workout log app still comes out as the winner for me. The benefits are simply too great to miss out on.
When I used a paper log, I found that I rarely used it. I filled in my workouts, but it rarely guided my training going forward. With StrengthLog, I can make more informed decisions about my training and get summaries of my training data and records with a few taps.
If I’m bench pressing, I can easily see what my average rep count or my PR is on a given weight, making it clear to me what I need to beat to get better.
In addition, I can choose among the many strength training programs available in the app, and I am a frequent user of the powerlifting programs.
We all have our different preferences, but with StrengthLog, our goal is to make it the best free workout log app for lifters, utilizing modern technology to make it better and smarter than the time-tested paper log.

 

[R2D2]

i just use notes on my iphone

 

[kragon]

i just use notes on my iphone

Im same, but with the android notes app lol, thats pretty much all i use it for