Gravl and Hevy get compared constantly, and we understand why: both live on your phone, both track your lifting, both have a social feed. But they are built around different questions. Hevy asks "what did you do?". Gravl answers "what should you do next?".
This is our own comparison, so read it knowing where we stand. Every Hevy claim below comes from hevyapp.com and their published pricing as of July 2026, so you can check each one yourself.
The short version
Hevy is a workout logger, arguably the best one: you bring the program, and it gives you a beautiful place to record it, chart it and share it. Gravl is a training system: the program itself is generated for you, weights included, recalculated after every session, with recovery tracking, human coaches, and nutrition around it.
| Gravl | Hevy | |
|---|---|---|
| Built as | An AI system that plans and progresses your training | A workout logger with a social feed |
| Workout planning | Full week generated for you, recalculated after every session | You build your own routines with the routine planner |
| Weight recommendations | Every set pre-filled, learned per lift from your history | You pick the weights; charts and 1RM estimates help |
| Progressive overload | Automatic, per lift thresholds that learn how you respond | Manual, you decide every bump |
| Muscle recovery | Per muscle, synced with Apple Health, Health Connect, Garmin, Strava | Not modeled |
| Logging | Sets arrive pre-filled, rest timers, one tap exercise swaps | Excellent: warmup, drop and failure sets, rest timers, notes, PRs |
| Social | Friends feed, Strength Score leaderboard, share templates | Feed with follows, likes, comments, save other athletes' routines |
| Human coaching | Real coaches in chat, included | Not offered |
| Nutrition | Macros by camera, built in | Not offered |
| Watch apps | Apple Watch and Wear OS | Apple Watch and Wear OS, works offline, custom watch faces |
| Web app | App only | Full web version at hevy.com |
| Price | Subscription with free trial | Free with limits; Pro from $2.99/month, $23.99/year or $74.99 lifetime |
GravlWhere Hevy is genuinely good
Credit where due, and Hevy deserves a lot of it. The app is free, ad-free and polished, with 14+ million athletes and a 4.9 star rating on both stores. The logging experience is the best in the category: warmup, drop and failure sets, automatic rest timers, notes, personal records, deep exercise charts and a complete history.
The free tier is genuinely usable (4 routines, 7 custom exercises, 3 months of history), Pro is famously cheap, and there is even a lifetime option. Add the full web app for building routines on a desktop, offline watch apps, and a social layer where you can follow friends and save other athletes' routines, and you get why the community loves it.
If you enjoy writing your own program and want the nicest possible notebook for it, Hevy is a superb choice.
Where Gravl pulls ahead
You do not have to be your own coach
Hevy's routine planner assumes you know what to put in it: which exercises, how many sets, what to change when you stall. That is a real skill, and half the lifters we onboard tell us they were guessing. Gravl removes the job entirely: your week is generated against your goal, your equipment and your schedule, and it rebuilds itself after every session you log.
The right weight, without the mental math
In Hevy you decide every load; the charts tell you where you have been, not where to go. Gravl pre-fills every set, and the thresholds that decide when you get 2.5 kg more are learned per lift from how you responded to previous bumps. Progressive overload stops being a discipline you maintain and becomes a default you follow.
Recovery is part of the plan
Hevy does not model recovery. Gravl tracks readiness per muscle, fed by Apple Health, Health Connect, Garmin and Strava, and lets it change real numbers: tired patterns get tempered loads, and rest suggestions come with a reason attached. Sunday's trail run shows up in Monday's leg day.
A human when you need one
Hevy has a help center. Gravl has coaches in your chat: form checks on your videos, deload calls, a plan adjusted by a person when life does not match the algorithm. For a lot of our users this is the feature that made them switch from a logger.
Both halves of progress
Training and nutrition live in one place. Macros by camera puts calories and protein next to your workouts, so the week you undershot protein and the week your squat stalled stop being separate mysteries.
The bottom line
If you love programming your own training and want the best logger ever made for it, buy Hevy Pro and be happy. If you want the programming done for you, weights picked, recovery watched and a coach one tap away, that is exactly what Gravl is for.
The best test is the same for both: run your next two weeks in one of them and watch what happens to the bar.