Peloton Is Dropping Apple Watch GymKit Support

[spcopsmac21]

I’m being intentionally hyperbolic, but it’s kinda sad that at launch in 2014, fitness/health was just one of the many tentpoles of the Apple Watch experience.

Now it’s a wind sock.

I know they’ve drilled down on what the users want out of the device, but a lot of potential has dwindled as devs just give up on watchOS and left Apple to just make their own software for it. I guess we should be happy Peloton actually makes an app at all!

This is what will happen to the Vision Pro.

Apple has sold 200,000 units. And say by the end of the year they will sell 750,000 units.

Why would developers take away resources from apps that cater to hundreds of millions of people to cater to less than a million?

 

[spazzcat]

Peleton, like every other company wants your data. Apple GymKit, HomeKit etc allow you to collect data on your devices and store it with end to end encryption in the Appleverse and not shared with anyone. This is why there are fewer devices that support HomeKit and GymKit. The manufacturers are not content with the profit they make selling the devices. They want to monetize your data too.

Not only that, but they want you to keep paying to keep access to your data.

 

[Le Big Mac]

That is NOT the only difference. GymKit syncs cadence, speed, and power to Apple Health and allows you to see trends over time with that data. With the basic syncing they’re going to it will not sync it to Health.

This is a huge step backwards and I hope a class action comes out of it. Many of us got the Bike+ for this feature and them taking it away is unacceptable.

So this is a bigger problem with the data that Apple Health imports and exports.

If I sync a Peloton ride to Strava, it shows power, cadence, HR, etc. But syncing to Health/Fitness shows just heart rate. Why doesn't Apple import more of the data?

And in the other direction, if I record a workout with Apple Watch, it won't sync cadence/power to Strava, just speed/HR.

So seems like the syncing of data to/from other platforms is a broader problem with Apple Health/Fitness than just GymKit.

 

[Le Big Mac]

Not only that, but they want you to keep paying to keep access to your data.

Export to a third-party app.

 

[Eradik]

If I sync a Peloton ride to Strava, it shows power, cadence, HR, etc. But syncing to Health/Fitness shows just heart rate. Why doesn't Apple import more of the data?

It's not Apple that's not allowing the sync, it's Peloton. They need to update their iOS app to sync that data to Health.

Will they when GymKit goes away? Maybe. But they haven't said one way or the other.

 

[spazzcat]

So this is a bigger problem with the data that Apple Health imports and exports.

If I sync a Peloton ride to Strava, it shows power, cadence, HR, etc. But syncing to Health/Fitness shows just heart rate. Why doesn't Apple import more of the data?

And in the other direction, if I record a workout with Apple Watch, it won't sync cadence/power to Strava, just speed/HR.

So seems like the syncing of data to/from other platforms is a broader problem with Apple Health/Fitness than just GymKit.

This has always been an issue, if you want everything to sync you need to use a 3rd party like https://www.fitnesssyncer.com/support/fitnesssyncer-app

 

[dominiongamma]

Too bad, gym kit had potential but never took off.

Problem was replacing gym equipment is expensive and most gym will no replace them unless they completely break

 

[Darren.h]

I GUESS THATS A SIGN. APPLE WILL NEVER BUY THE COMPANY.

 

[Skyscraperfan]

Is Peloton still not bankrupt?

 

[bodhisattva]

Peleton, like every other company wants your data. Apple GymKit, HomeKit etc allow you to collect data on your devices and store it with end to end encryption in the Appleverse and not shared with anyone. This is why there are fewer devices that support HomeKit and GymKit. The manufacturers are not content with the profit they make selling the devices. They want to monetize your data too.

Can't push new products to you if they can't target you with data. Agree 100%. There are SO many gyms dropping Peloton at the moment. Several in my surrounding area have removed all from the gym. Not to mention the feud between Dana White/UFC and Peloton. Kinda agreeing with other comments here that Peloton will most likely not be a thing in a few years.

 

[PatrickNSF]

GymKit I believe provided more accurate active calories burned then Peloton's total calories - just from a pure accuracy standpoint this is a big loss - especially since the NFC hardware is obviously in the Bike+ to work with GymKit why not just keep it? I wonder if Peloton is going to try to work better with NFC enabled machines generally with their watch app? Either way - the email they sent was simply a broken link for me so not a good sign.

Peloton's AW integration without GymKit is not great. I often lose the connection, and your observation regarding active vs total calories is correct. That's especially problematic if you use those Peloton workouts to close your Move ring. Peloton tosses total calories at you like confetti.

 

[bodhisattva]

GymKit, Dynamic Island, Siri they all sound great at first then the support drops like a brick in the water.

No wonder their products dont sell that much like they did.

Dynamic Island is a temp solution while the screens must support this limitation. Our app and several others make very good use of it. And Siri works fine for all uses I've thrown her way. GymKit worked on my treadmill but seems kinda useless to me as my only interest was tracking basic health data... which my devices do fine.

 

[Born Again]

That is NOT the only difference. GymKit syncs cadence, speed, and power to Apple Health and allows you to see trends over time with that data. With the basic syncing they’re going to it will not sync it to Health.

This is a huge step backwards and I hope a class action comes out of it. Many of us got the Bike+ for this feature and them taking it away is unacceptable.

That sucks.

Wasn’t aware the bike + did that.

I don’t think Apple markets this GymKit thing very well. I haven’t seen any treadmills offer it during my brief research.

If you ask me Apple doesn’t do much with sport data.

I prefer Garmin.

 

[thenahon]

Just like App Clips. I am surprised this was not used more during the pandemic.

I don’t know about you but I see the codes for App Clips and use them. Just because they aren’t ubiquitous doesn’t mean it’s a failed feature.

 

[paulovsouza]

Removing features for no real good reason is always a great business decision. Why develop a better solution alongside GymKit and convince users they could have better data tracking, in a cleaner UI, with more functionality, when you can force people to use only one. Being consumer focused stifles profits, I mean creativity.

 

[contacos]

I don’t know about you but I see the codes for App Clips and use them. Just because they aren’t ubiquitous doesn’t mean it’s a failed feature.

Certainly does not exist on my side of the globe

 

[philstubbington]

...and CarPlay

Even our Withings bathroom scales want us to subscribe to them!

 

[gaximus]

I've actually been looking to into getting a stationary bike to keep inshore during the non-MTB season (yes, I'm only a fair weather rider), And this was a much have feature, I was on the fence about Peloton anyway, because of the price. A buddy of mine has been getting into it pretty hard with another brand, using Garmin and swears by having power and all those metrics, says they are a must. Glad I saw this announcement, before committing to Peloton.

 

[GLS]

After sleeping on this; I'm wondering if Apple is simply discontinuing GymKit and Peloton jumped the gun.

Even the Peloton bike+ page, as of a few minutes ago, still is extolling the advantages of GymKit.

As a Bike+ owner (almost 1000 rides in just over 2 years) I'm peeved this feature is going away.

 

[WarmWinterHat]

Certainly does not exist on my side of the globe

I've seen App Clips one time, at a restaurant that used Toast as their payment processor.

Same with GymKit. I'm a pretty devout runner, and while I only use treadmills in the worst of conditions, I've only ran across GymKit support once, at the local YMCA and only one treadmill of about a dozen supported it.

 

[FCX]

After sleeping on this; I'm wondering if Apple is simply discontinuing GymKit and Peloton jumped the gun.

Even the Peloton bike+ page, as of a few minutes ago, still is extolling the advantages of GymKit.

As a Bike+ owner (almost 1000 rides in just over 2 years) I'm peeved this feature is going away.

I suspect txscott is correct - GymKit isn't going anywhere, Peloton just wants to siphon that data for themselves and monetize it.

 

[MNWildFan]

Apple has completely given up on GymKit. It haven’t seen any mention of it since the initial Keynote announcement.

And device manufacturers never advertised it. It was one of those cool features that Apple introduced and then forgot to do anything with it.

Yup, hate to say it, but I think you're right

Even at locations for my gym I go to (Anytime) that has treadmills new enough to support it, sometimes it's so hit or miss as to whether it'll work or not

 

[Robert.Walter]

Not only that, but they want you to keep paying to keep access to your data.

They’re selling your data … back to you!

 

[turbineseaplane]

GymKit, HomeKit

Apple really seems to struggle with "kits"

I have a variety of wifi light switches at a rental house and everything about using Google Home to control them instead of HomeKit is simply better. The setup, the managing/organizing them, the reliability of the connections and accepting controls to turn on/off -- not being tied to iCloud which uncomfortably ties it too much to specific actual iOS devices (vs just "an account with Google").

It was work to even get it to "work' with HomeKit and so middle of last year I set them all back up in Google Home (when adding some more) and it's been painless, carefree, flexible and rock solid. A+ to Google on this one.

So many of these Apple things seemingly don't get used much by enough diversity of people at Apple to push on the edge cases and find operational issues customers may run into.

 

[MrGimper]

Until Apple by Peloton soon.