We all know by now that maintaining an active lifestyle should be one of our top priorities in life. Only by taking care of ourselves do we stand a chance of being the kind of person we strive to be on the job, at home with our loved ones, and in our communities. But that doesn’t mean it’s easy.
Work, in particular, can get in the way of working out—in fact, there is a big paradox going on, and it becomes more obvious the more challenging (and exciting!) a job gets: On one hand, we struggle to find time to work out; on the other, we can’t afford to not exercise because it is integral to sustained success.
How to Stay Fit Despite a Demanding Job
1. Work Out Efficiently
Pick a workout form that you can do almost anywhere, whether you’re traveling or getting home from the office late. Ideally, this will be a form of exercise that doesn’t require much preparation (maybe save the wind surfing for the weekend) and that accomplishes significant physical gains in a short period of time (sorry, golfers). High-intensity interval training, Tabata training, bodyweight exercises, and running are all great choices.
2. Cater to Your Own Likes and Dislikes
By now you might be thinking, “I hate running!” (or Tabata, or what have you)—and that’s okay. We each need to be realistic and to know ourselves. One person’s running is another person’s yoga, weight training, or dance. Flexing your self-discipline muscles is often necessary when it comes to exercise, but make it easier on yourself by choosing a form of exercise that fits your lifestyle, personality, and taste. Not sure what you love to do? Don’t be afraid to experiment with different forms of exercise until you find what works best for you.
3. Use Competitions as Motivation
When it comes to being successful at work, collaboration is key. But when we’re trying to motivate ourselves to exercise on a regular basis (and with enough intensity for it to really matter), competition has its merits. Today, it’s possible to find a competition suitable to your skill level in almost any sport. Whether you’re elite, beginner, or somewhere in between, there’s something for all of us. Sign up, set a goal, and notice what it does to you—odds are good it might be the push you need to keep yourself in the game.
4. Make a Schedule and Commit to It
One of the most cited reasons to skip a workout goes something like this: “I am just too busy at work today; I can’t make my yoga class.” I call BS! If you unexpectedly had to pick up your child from school and had no back-up plan, how would you deal with the situation? Cancel an internal meeting? Take some work home with you? Do some hard prioritizing? The truth is that when we really need to, we get out of the office at the time that is necessary. Make a schedule (write it down if it helps!), stick to it, and remind yourself that working out is a priority worth keeping.
5. Track Your Activity Levels
“If you don’t measure it, it doesn’t exist”. It’s a slight exaggeration, yes, but this old saying really has some truth to it, especially when it comes to exercise. Make a note in your calendar every time you work out, and add up your workout sessions at the end of each week, month, and year so you can monitor your progress and identify areas for improvement. Measuring your activity levels (and ideally keeping notes on your progress) can help you to stay on track and realize when you’re slipping before you’ve completely lost the habit.
6. Choose Something Over Nothing
You don’t need an hour—or even 30 minutes—to get a complete, effective workout. And some exercises is virtually always better than none. Heck, even seven minutes can make a difference! We can always find a few free minutes in our day (yes, we can!). With an effective program, and done frequently enough, short and speedy workouts can do wonders to both the body and mind. Squeeze in fitness wherever you are and no matter how much time you have with bodyweight exercises or with the help of apps with pre-programmed short workouts—you can even do some exercises at your desk!
But maybe you want to know how to exercise more without making time for the gym? Wish you knew the best home exercises that will actually get you results?
These are the 50 best resources for free online workouts that make is easy for you to exercise at home. Whether you have just a few minutes for a quick core workout, or if you’d like to join a month-long daily yoga challenge, there is something here that will help you exercise at home.
There are a LOT of exercise videos online, especially on Youtube, but the ones that made this list are the very best when it comes to teaching you how to exercise at home. These workouts require little to no equipment and are taught by excellent fitness instructors who know their stuff.
So take a look through this amazing list of at-home exercise routines and find the perfect fitness instructor who can help you get a great workout done in just a few minutes each day.
Use These 50 Free Workout Resources To Discover How to Exercise At Home and Love It!
#1. Fitness Blender
Daniel and Kelli are the husband and wife team behind Fitness Blender, a site that offers a huge selection of full-length videos that allow you to exercise at home without equipment. Here you will find fat-burning workouts, kickboxing routines, total body strength training, workouts for boosting metabolism, stretching sequences, and more.
#2. Sweaty Betty
This resource offers wonderful online classes that are full of easy exercises to do at home. Sweaty Betty provides yoga workouts, HIIT routines, and many other types for you to try. No matter whether you have experience doing fitness classes or are a complete beginner, Sweaty Betty has something that will get you working at an appropriate level.
#3. Turbulence Training
Do you want to do bodyweight exercises you can do at home? Craig Ballentyne of Turbulence Training provides a wonderful collection of no-equipment bodyweight workouts designed to help you burn fat and get lean. These instructional videos are mostly short ones (i.e. under 10 minutes) and can be used to create your own home workouts.
#4. Jessica Smith TV
Jessica Smith TV shares a unique collection of videos with 7-minute, 10-minute and 30-minute in-home exercise programs. She offers a really great variety of workout styles – Some focus on fat burning, others on cardio conditioning, workouts for beginners, kickboxing workouts and more. Jessica is an energetic instructor that will motivate you to join her.
#5. Do Yoga with Me
Do Yoga with Me is one of my personal favourite sources for good home workouts, obviously of the yoga variety! Many of their classes are filmed outdoors in beautiful British Columbia, Canada. The level of instruction is top-notch and there are videos that focus on pretty much every part of the body (e.g. hips, hamstrings, back, etc.), so you can target the area that you need to work on most.
#6. Make Your Body Work
I’d be doing you a disservice if I didn’t mention my own workouts that are available here at Make Your Body Work. Every single workout will challenge your entire body and will include elements of cardio, strength, and core conditioning. The uniqueness of these workouts are the “difficulty levels” that provide up to 4 distinct options for every single move. This makes each workout very accessible for newbies, yet challenging for super-fit users.
#7. Tone it Up
Karena and Katrina lead the workouts at Tone it Up. Their at home exercises for women are aimed at helping you shed excess weight and transform your body through simple strengthening exercises. Their website provides specific workouts for arms, legs, abs, cardio, etc. and have attracted followers from around the world.
#8. Yoga With Adriene
Adriene Mishler is a yogi with purpose. She wants to use her instructional classes to help people live life better. As she puts it, “Yoga offers up a way for us to see a world that is working for you instead of against you.” Try the following class when you’re feeling in a bad mood. (I tried it…and felt better afterwards!)
#9. Spark People
Spark People shares short videos for all different types of home workouts, no equipment required. There are several categories – Abs, Cardio, Yoga and Pilates, as well as others that diver into healthy cooking and eating ideas. These workouts are great when you are pinched for time. Choose a 10-12 minute routine and squeeze in some activity where you normally would have skipped it altogether.
#10. BeFit
Enjoy doing yoga workouts from home with your favourite trainers such as Jillian Michaels, Jane Fonda, Billy Blanks Jr., Tara Stiles and many others. This channel might offer the best variety of any out there – It even includes meditations with Deepak Chopra (maybe a good way to relax AFTER your workout!)
#11. Livestrong Woman
Livestrong Woman is a video channel featuring professional fitness instructor, Natalie Jill. In addition to Natalie’s resistance training instructional videos, you will also find great yoga beginners videos taught by Tara Stiles. As an extra bonus, this channel also includes some great videos that discus healthy eating tips and recipes.
#12. Diet Health
Diet Health is YouTube channel that shares easy home exercise videos and simple health tips that can help you change your lifestyle and improve your overall health. Their workouts are mostly quick ones (under 10 minutes) and are led by experienced personal trainers.
#13. Natalie Jill Fitness
Natalie Jill is a very popular fitness trainer who you will see guest starring on some of the other sites and channels found in this list. Her best home exercise videos can be found on her personal fitness blog which shares workouts for weight loss, exercise ball routines, jump rope workouts, booty belt workouts, body weight exercises and more. Natalie also shares great healthy recipes and useful nutrition tips on her site.
#14. Yoga Journal
Yoga Journal is a wonderful YouTube channel worth following if you want to learn how to do yoga at home. Highly experienced yoga teachers will show you how to do poses for the most relaxation, flexibility, and strength benefits. These short videos can be done whenever you have a few minutes to spare during your day.
#15. CafeMom Studios
CafeMom Studios is a very popular YouTube channel that helps moms exercise at home with the goal of building their body back after pregnancy and childbirth. CafeMom Studios offers postnatal workout videos for cardio, pain-reduction, circuit training, and yoga exercises for strength and flexibility.
#16. eFit30
Anyone looking for yoga, Pilates, and gentle muscle strengthening workouts will love eFit30. These full-length (i.e. 20-40 minute) classes are perfect for days when you want to exercise but don’t feel like making the trip to your gym.
#17. Sarah Fit
Sarah is a well-known health and fitness blogger has made “enabling your passion for healthy living” her mission. She will help you learn how to exercise at home with her quick and simple core workouts, cardio routines, flexibility workouts, and more on her blog. Sarah is fun, energetic, and really likeable, which makes following along with her workouts quite easy.
#18. Blogilates
Cassey Ho is is the energetic fitness instructor behind Blogilates. She shares a lot of videos with quick and fun bodyweight workouts that you can do at home in just a few minutes. Her workouts are themed for different objectives such as the “Swimsuit Slim-Down” series that you can see below.
#19. Bodyrock.tv
Bodyrock.tv is one of the forerunners in online exercise videos. This popular health and exercise blog is dedicated to weight loss, fitness, beauty, food, love and relationships. “Bodyrockers” find daily at-home workouts that are either laid out with descriptions and pictures, or that are instructed in video format. All of the online workouts can be done with minimal equipment.
#20. Gymra
GymRa offers a excellent range of exercise videos that are divided into different categories – 5 to 15 minutes online workouts for beginners, abs workouts, dumbbell workouts, no-equipment workouts, total body routines and yoga sessions. There is really something for everyone at Gymra.
#21. Good Health 24by7
Shilpa Shetty Kundra is happy to share her yoga expertise on the Good Health 24by7 YouTube channel. Enjoy doing full-length yoga asanas, or simply learn proper form and technique from her quick tutorial videos.
#22. Live Strong
Workouts provided on the Live Strong YouTube video channel will definitely help you improve your strength, flexibility and fitness. Celebrity trainer, Nicky Holender instructs most of the online workouts you’ll find here. He knows his stuff and tailors these at-home workouts for busy people who want a quick exercise fix.
#23. Caroline Jordan Fitness
Caroline Jordan Fitness is a great choice for quick core, flexibility, strength, and yoga videos. Caroline’s demonstrations are excellent and her instructions of each more are very clear. This is a good place to learn the foundational moves that make up any good home workout.
#24. Rebekah Borucki
Rebekah Borucki provides people with an amazing collection of online workout plans for weight loss and toning. Her focus really is on time-saving at-home exercise, so she employs lots of interval training and HIIT series to make your workouts as efficient as possible.
#25. Steady Health
Steady Health has a large collection of online workout programs that include specific exercise routines for pregnant women, office workers, those who are rehabilitating after injury, and for people who just need a little relaxation.
#26. Pop Sugar
Pop Sugar offers some of the top fitness videos and just about anything else you could want in a health blog. On the website you will find lots of workouts broken down with great written instructions and pictures. On the Pop Sugar Fitness Youtube channel you can enjoy a great range of quick online workouts led by some fitness industry superstars.
#27. Jenny Ford Fitness
Enjoy doing easy step aerobics and fitness cardio workouts led by super-stepper, Jenny Ford. Jenny does a great job of making step classes doable for beginners (like me) who might not be the most co-ordinated! You can certainly tell she loves what she does – Check out one of her free video classes.
#28. Fit Strong and Sexy
Amanda Russell is a former Olympic-hopeful runner who suffered a career-ending injury before she got to compete at the world’s biggest stage. Now she has devoted her career to helping others safely stay in shape with workouts that can be done at home.
#29. Tara Stiles
Tara Stiles is a yoga guru whose video classes will help you become strong, energized, and more flexible at the same time. Tara’s unique movement system is approachable for anyone. Be sure to try her 7-minute morning yoga routine (below) – it’s fantastic!
#30. Yoga For Dummies
This is another excellent Youtube channel that is worth checking out, especially if you are new to yoga. It offers a series of six videos, each just 10 minutes long, which teach introductory yoga poses that most people would find quite approachable.
#31. Lauren Hefez
Lauren Hefez is a personal trainer and Pilates and barre instructor. She has a great fitness blog that includes recipes, product reviews, and of course there are workouts in there too! She does a great job of specifying workouts for target areas like your abs, arms and back, butt and legs, and other combinations.
#32. Barre3
Sadie Lincoln is an experienced fitness trainer and founder of Barre3. Barre workouts are based on a traditional ballet style of training that uses a bar (of course!). Sadie has taken this foundation and developed a unique training program that perfectly combines yoga, pilates, dance and bodyweight workouts.
#33. Cosmo Body
Enjoy using Cosmo Body’s videos that include easy-to-follow full-length strength, dance, and cardio workouts. Astrid Swan, celebrity personal trainer, also provides many quickie workouts (10 minutes and less) that give you an express option when you’re crunched for time.
#34. XHIT Daily
XHIT has put together an impressive library of video workouts that are free to use on their blog or Youtube Channel. Their followers, called “X-hitters”, enjoy the efficiency of their workouts (always under 20 minutes), as well as their exercise-specific instructional videos that teach just one or two moves in greater detail.
#35. Yogasync
Yoga Online is the Youtube channel for Yogasync.tv and it is a great place to find home workouts for new yogis. If you have just started doing yoga, you will find it interesting to watch videos with breathing techniques, and instructions for mastering key yoga poses.
#36. Movee
Movee is the place to go if you’re looking for quick, dance-based workouts that will get you sweating. It also provides videos with yoga workouts for beginners, pilates workouts for beginners, perfect leg workouts, easy back exercises, body stretches and amazing healthy raw food recipes.
#37. Body Project
The Body Project specializes in high-intensity fat-burning workouts that can be done from home. Their workouts have some creative moves that are fun and effective. The low-impact cardio workout found below is a great place to start.
#38. Emily Skye
Emily Skye has a Youtube channel complete with dozens of exercise tutorial videos that are mostly 1 minute or less. She has put together some interesting movement combinations that you can assemble into your own full-length home workout.
#39. eHowFitness
What better place to learn how to exercise at home than eHowFitness! This YouTube channel provides specific workout ideas and health tips from leading fitness experts and popular celebrity trainers. Videos provided here focus on weight loss, breathing exercises, water workouts, stretching exercises and even workouts for kids. They also have niche exercise videos like this one for expectant mothers.
#40. Fightmaster Yoga
Leslie of Fightmaster Yoga teaches hatha yoga for beginners, yoga for energy, yoga for reducing stress, meditation yoga, yoga workouts for strength, yoga for office workers…in other words, she offers a BIG selection of yoga classes! She is a knowledgeable instructor and is an excellent communicator, which makes her classes especially easy for beginners to follow.
#41. PsycheTruth
PsycheTruth is a holistic health channel on Youtube that discusses exercise, weight-loss, massage, pain relief, and many other health-related topics. Included are some amazing yoga sequences including this “10 days of flexibility” series that is worth checking out.
#42. Do You Yoga
Do You Yoga offers amazing yoga video “challenges” for everybody. Providing a little more structure via their courses (a number of which are completely free), Do You Yoga can help you create a habit of daily yoga!
#43. Sean Vigue Fitness
Sean Vigue is a really inspiring fitness trainer who Pilates, strength, cardio, weight-loss, core training, and yoga workouts on his Youtube channel. He also throws in some “fun” stuff like this 1-minute burpee challenge. (It only takes 1 minute…try it!)
#44. Method Yoga
Method Yoga explains their approach best: “Method Yoga offers the student a processes of development and transformation by uniting methodologies of old and new so one begins to experience true liberation, wholeness and actualization which is the definition and purpose of “yoga”. It’s hard to pass on that!
#45. Upside-Down Pilates
Upside-Down Pilates shares videos that will help you realize the many health benefits of Pilates. These aren’t “let’s get sweaty” types of workout – Instead, they are more suited for improving the way your body moves by training your pelvis, hips, knees, arms and shoulders for proper function.
#46. Fine Tune Pilates
Brittany, a certified Pilates instructor, created Fine Tune Pilates as a way to help people rediscover their bodies and to learn how they actually move throughout the day. Her gentle classes are a nice workout, without any of the pounding on the joints that come with some high-intensity exercise styles.
#47. Body Positive Yoga
Amber Karnes offers “judgment-free” yoga classes that are perfect for beginners and for those with “big bodies” who might not feel comfortable with traditional yoga poses. Amber has used yoga to help her embrace her own body and she is an excellent teacher to help you do the same.
#48. Strong Like Susan
Susan’s Youtube channel has lots of workout instructional videos and tips, but none are better than her 30-Day Ab Challenge. These are quick but challenging core workouts that offer you something different each day for an entire month!
#49. My Free Yoga
My Free Yoga is pretty much exactly as it sounds – if offers free yoga classes for you to enjoy! It is a little different than other yoga options on this list in that it is really a hub for yoga instructors to post their free yoga class videos. The video library is huge and you can search for classes that focus on your specific problem areas. For example, there is a category for those suffering from hip issues and another for those experiencing back pain.
#50. HASFit
Coach Joshua Kozak is the trainer behind HASFit, which gets its name because “every Heart and Soul deserves to be Fit!” These are some of the best at-home workouts that are based primarily in bodyweight training, making them nice for at-home or when travelling. Coach Kozak has prepared some unique workouts such as one specifically for seniors and a series for teenage weight-loss.
