Health

It Looks Like People Are Heading Back to Indoor Workout Classes

Fitness app ClassPass is experiencing its highest number of DC reservations and new users since pre-Covid.

Photograph by monkeybusinessimages/iStock.

A recent surge of people have returned to in-person workout classes and wellness appointments in DC, according to data from the fitness app ClassPass.

This comes as city Covid requirements have eased: Mayor Muriel Bowser lifted all restrictions on gym capacity May 21, and, while businesses are allowed to set their own mask requirements, the city does not require masks to be worn while working out indoors. It also likely helps that more than 50 percent of DC’s population is now estimated to be fully vaccinated.

DC ClassPass reservations have increased 265 percent since January, according to the app’s Comeback Report, and in June, they were up 708 percent compared to June 2020. ClassPass is also seeing its highest numbers of DC reservations and new users since March 2020. These numbers make sense given that many studios and gyms were operating at limited capacity or not at all during those times, and that many folks opted to work out at home while Covid numbers were high. But it does seem like people are finally starting to feel comfortable with indoor workouts: While ClassPass is continuing to offer the live streamed classes it introduced during the pandemic, none of the current top ten classes booked by DC users were virtual.

Another insight from the report: The top five most-booked workouts in DC right now are strength training, pilates, yoga, indoor cycling, and boxing, all of which require equipment that can be difficult to obtain and use at home, such as megaformers or weightlifting machines. (And it seems like Washingtonians particularly want to get back to pilates—nationally, the workout is the fourth most-booked activity right now; in DC, it’s the second most.)

And it also appears that DC is taking the hot vaxx summer theme seriously: While massages are the only wellness activity to make ClassPass’s list of top ten most-booked services in the country, massages, pedicures, and manicures all make DC’s top ten.

Mimi Montgomery Washingtonian
Home & Features Editor

Mimi Montgomery joined Washingtonian in 2018. She’s written for The Washington Post, Garden & Gun, Outside Magazine, Washington City Paper, DCist, and PoPVille. Originally from North Carolina, she now lives in Del Ray.