Private beta · iPhone and Android

Training built on the evidence.
Kept on your phone.

Emberlift builds your programme from what the research actually shows — how much each muscle needs, how long it needs to recover, when to add weight — then coaches it set by set, without sending a byte of your training anywhere.

Join the beta See how it works Free during beta · no account · nothing leaves your phone
12literature reviews behind the rules
200+exercises, each graded, each with a demo
0 bytesof your training sent to anyone
What it does

Three things a good coach does — done with numbers you can check.

Most apps hand you a template. Emberlift builds yours, then keeps adjusting it from what you actually lift — and says why, in sentences.

Volume that’s yours

Weekly set targets per muscle, from your level, your goal and your age — not one number for everyone. The Muscles screen shows what’s done, what’s short, and when more stops helping.

How volume is set

Rest placed by recovery

A per-muscle recovery clock, from the kinetics literature, decides where rest days go — and tells you on the day: “chest still recovering, ready about 8 pm tomorrow.”

How rest is placed

Progression that reacts

It reads your first set, how many reps you had left, your stalls — and says exactly what to load next session. Double progression for size, a percentage wave for strength.

How it progresses
Front and back muscle map, with groups lighting up in turn
The Muscles screen

See what you’ve worked, what’s recovering, and what’s short.

  • Every muscle, every week. Sets counted against a target that’s yours — and a ceiling, so it can also tell you to ease off.
  • A clock, not a calendar. Each group recovers on its own timeline; the app knows which are ready today and which want until tomorrow evening.
  • Soreness counts. Tell it a muscle is sore and the clock moves — the session adapts before you’ve picked up a bar.
  • The body you said you have. A male or a female figure, and a close-up atlas you can swipe through and tap into.
See the recovery clock
This week · coaching2 of 4 sessions done
Quads — do more. Six sets short of this week’s target, and Friday’s Legs B only covers four. Counting on Friday, that’s still two short.
Where should the extra sets go?Leg press · WednesdayHack squat · Friday
Back — on track. Thursday’s Pull B covers the rest, if it happens.
Side delts — do less. Fewer reps at the same weights, and still sore. They need a bit less next week.
The week, reviewed

It judges the whole week — then looks back and tells you what it saw.

  • Counts the sessions still to come. It won’t say “add a set for back” on a Monday when Thursday already covers it. Every note says what to do — do more, do less, keep as is — and why.
  • Replies you can tap. Which exercise gets the extra set, or take the trim. It never asks what it already knows.
  • A Sunday review. What went well, where the growth came from — the sets you took close to failure — and what to watch. Earned from your numbers; a quiet week is called a quiet week.
How the week is coached
Made for the gym floor

Real gym. Real life. It keeps its place — and yours.

Machine taken? One tap swaps in a ranked substitute. Forgot to press finish? It reminds you. Back an hour later, out of order, on a different day than you planned — the session reopens where you are, not at the top.

What happens mid-workout
A library with judgement

Two hundred-plus exercises — each graded for what it’s actually good at.

Technique notes, a demo video for every one, and a quiet opinion about which to reach for. When the app says “ease off chest”, it can also say which chest exercise to drop.

Records and the Body screen

Records that say what they beat. A body plan that says why it isn’t faster.

  • A record is the set that earned it, counted once — with what it beat, “+2.5 kg on your best”, and the climb that led there.
  • Share a workout as a card for your stories: the muscles you hit, your sets, any records. Calories only if your Apple Watch measured them — no Watch, no figure.
  • Cut, maintain or bulk, each at a pace with a calorie and protein target. Where a faster pace would sit there’s a sentence saying why it’s not offered.
See the Body screen
Body · Cut, steady−0.5 kg a week
Calories1,640 / 2,100
Protein136 / 160 g
WeightTrend, four weeks
82.4 → 80.9 kg
Faster isn’t offered. Cutting quicker than about half a kilo a week starts taking muscle with the fat — and that’s the thing you’re training to keep.
What it refuses to do

The training app that tells you the truth.

Some things are left out on purpose. They’re the things that make apps sticky and lifters worse.

  • No streaks, no badges for showing up, no engagement machinery. The medal is for a record, not for opening the app.
  • No numbers from thin air. If your watch didn’t measure it, the app won’t print it. Where the evidence is thin it says “about”, gives a range, or asks you.
  • No pretending. Work for your joints isn’t counted as muscle growth, a muscle that only helped isn’t credited as if it led, and a quiet week is called a quiet week.
  • No account, no server, no sign-up. Your training lives on your phone and in your own backups.

“Every rule in Emberlift traces back to a written review of the literature, with its evidence graded. Where the research is thin, the app says so — rather than inventing a number.”

Read how we work
Privacy

Nothing about your training leaves your phone.

The app checks for updates, and that check carries nothing about you. If you write to us from Settings, your message goes — and nothing else does. Your workouts, body weight and food diary live on your phone; backups go to your iCloud on iPhone, or a file you export. The privacy policy is short, because there’s little to say.

Private beta

Train with it before anyone else.

Emberlift is on TestFlight for iPhone and as a direct install on Android, for a small group of lifters. Send us an email address and we’ll send an invite — a few minutes to set up, free while it’s in beta.

Ask for an inviteWhat testers do