Fitness in the metaverse
What is the metaverse and how could it transform home fitness?
What is the metaverse?
An upgrade to the internet, a fully three dimensional, immersive world that mirrors our world. It’s a much hyped area with Facebook’s CEO, Mark Zuckerberg saying he expects “Facebook to become a metaverse company”. There are already a few notable examples of companies trail blazing within the metaverse, and it starts with gaming.
Fortnite
Gaming shows off the potential of the metaverse and provides a glimpse into the future. Fortnite is a hugely popular game and is developing into a platform, allowing players to meet and interact online, not just to play the game. This is already happening, with Travis Scott’s live event attended by 27 million members. To put this into context the 2020 NBA finals saw an average of 7.5 million people watching.
Roblox
Roblox takes the concept of the metaverse even further by allowing players to create the games as well as play them. Players create an avatar and play against each other virtually. Roblox had 41.1 million daily average users (DAU) in Q1 2021. This is up 74% YoY from 23.6 million a year ago.
But what does all this mean for fitness?
There are a few applications that already seek to bridge the real world with a virtual environment for fitness. Zwift has hundreds of thousands of members all working out virtually. In January 2017 Zwift demonstrated a virtual reality version of its application (credit: DC Rainmaker) taking the experience one step closer to the metaverse.
But one major criticism of Zwift is it’s not that easy to interact with others. If your computer is out of reach you must use your smartphone to type to other members. This leads to a somewhat lonely experience, despite being surrounded by literally hundreds of others at all times. There’s no simple easy way of interacting with others which is a real shame.
Therefore, to address this lack of interaction, we need the fitness metaverse. Imagine attending a virtual class, seeing other members avatars and being able to interact. Perhaps cheering each other on. You create a virtual avatar that represents you online. This has a few benefits; it means you’re somewhat anonymous. Others can’t see you sweating and looking disheveled. It also means you get that much needs buzz and encouragement from training with others. It will also bring a new dimension to competing with other members.
But Peloton is trying to bridge the current gap, by providing a video chat when training on your friends list. You can request to chat with others during your workout and see each other in the process. But the image is grainy and you don’t look your best whilst working out.
Why is it so exciting?
Peloton and Zwift have proved hugely popular with both platforms building significant customer groups that remain loyal. Taking the experience further will allow members to truly interact in a virtual environment. One of the key elements to Peloton is forming a connection with the instructors. Imagine being able to interact with your instructors like never before, being in the room with them virtually. In Zwift that might mean seeing and experiencing the elevation of Alpe Du Zwift or Mont Ventoux with your favourite professional rider. The metaverse is an incredible prospect for those of us that want to take the experience one step further.
Hardware
To enter the metaverse we need some kind of virtual reality headset to provide a truly immersive experience. There’s a few out there, but none so far offer something that caters specifically for fitness. Sweating happens, but sweat and electronics don’t mix well.
My friend George Jijiashvili, Principal Analyst covering games and AR/VR at Omdia explains:
“None of the 'main' VR headsets on the market are geared towards fitness. The closest thing that we've had was this:
which everyone got really excited about... but turned out to be a CONCEPT that HTC created for some showcase.”
So the world must wait for a VR headset that will allow us home fitness enthusiasts to adopt the fitness metaverse.
What about Facebook?
Facebook owns virtual reality headset company Oculus who have always been at the forefront of the space. Mark Zuckerberg believes fitness lends itself to the metaverse saying:
“I really want us to get a good experience where you can basically do the pumping [iron] part in VR, but we don't quite have that yet. But I think in all these things, doing Beat Saber or FitXR or Supernatural, they're real workouts. If I'm in Beat Saber, especially if I'm competing with one of my friends for half an hour or an hour, you definitely work up a sweat. You get tired by the end of that. So it's pretty active. And I think it's pretty clear why people really like it.” Credit: CNET
When will we workout in the metaverse?
It feels like we’re still some years off. I’m ever the optimistic but there a few elements that are required to provide an experience that will exceed expectations and provide a better experience versus the two dimensional virtual workout.
As mentioned above, hardware is a big barrier to adoption. Not only do you require a fitness ready VR headset, we also need a powerful VR ready PC to get the best experience. That really limits the options available.
It’s not inconceivable that Peloton or Zwift push ahead with developments that bridge the gap between where we are today and the fully immersive experience of the metaverse. Zwift has been working on VR since its conception. But it will take a huge development effort to pivot into the metaverse.
What’s next?
Aside from Facebook’s commitment to the metaverse the idea and concept really is in its infancy. We’ll therefore have to wait for a platform to become established from huge technology companies like Facebook, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon or Google. It might be too much for a fitness company to pivot on its own. But it’s certainly an exciting place that will present countless opportunities for new entrants. It’s going to be exciting to see what the metaverse does for home fitness.
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