I started the project already having knowledge of a couple of running applications. But I knew I needed to understand and research the use cases of these niche applications and what was their purpose. I focused more on the kind of audience these applications were going for.

Domain Knowledge

In order to understand more about these running applications, I needed to research these apps one by one, put them side-by-side for special insights, and visit the product to understand the product. I was also curious about the usage of these apps during the pandemic. This helped me understand what fitness applications prioritize as a business while looking at a few insights on how these applications were used.

Here are some key insights from the secondary research:

• Branding and overall design increase company image.
• Each running application has a personal business that they are focusing on. For example, Nike Run Club hopes users buy their shoes with their added “Add Nike Shoes” feature. This helps log the mileage on your shoes and notifies you when it is time to buy new ones. Strava’s focus is that you buy their monthly subscription for extra features (past effort comparisons, compete for segments, advanced metrics, training dashboard, suggested routes, and more).
• Fitness applications grew by 46% worldwide in COVID-19, gyms were forced to close or go digital.
• Daily active usage for fitness applications grew by 24% worldwide in COVID-19.
• According to Apptopia in the heat of the pandemic, below is an example of the uptick in daily global downloads in the height of the pandemic for fitness applications.
• Nike Run Club users want connections with other runners. For example, a user rated the application three stars because they want the option to sync to competitor apps like Strava (which has a community of athletes) to share their progress with friends and local running groups. The user also mentioned the lack of community in Nike Run Club, which does not allow them to connect with other runners in their area.

Competitive Analyses

Since there are a number of running tools that exist online, I went ahead and compared a few of the most popular ones.

Running Applications

Feature Analyses

My competitive analyses findings include:

• Strava is the only tool that can let you connect with people from your contacts and local community (and rich in running features).
• Running applications like Couch to 5k seems to be the only application with little features.