I’m a big fan of Strava. I think it’s a positive social network focused on being active and living a healthy life. Not only that, but I’ve made some wonderful friendships through the app that have translated into real world meetups for running and cycling.
Despite the upsides of Strava, it was sometimes challenging to get activities from the Apple Watch into Strava. Thankfully, that’s changed in recent years and there are more ways than ever to get activities from an Apple Watch into Strava. Let’s look at three to figure out which one is right for you.
Option #1: Use the Strava Apple Watch app
Strava has their own Apple Watch app, but I’ve heard from multiple people that their calorie burn and active minutes aren’t accurate despite setting up their weight and gender settings correctly inside Strava. This is unfortunate because if your goal is to lose weight, Strava will misreport your calorie burn to any food diary apps.
I'd pass on the Strava Apple Watch app. I know they've improved it recently, but I don't think it'll ever beat the built-in Workouts app by Apple. If you do continue with the Strava watch app, definitely make sure your weight and gender settings are correct in Strava's settings. That will help with their calorie estimation.
Option #2: Import workouts into Strava from Apple Workouts
If you can put up with some limitations, this is a great method that’s relatively new. The big benefit is that you can continue using the Apple Workouts app. After initial setup in Strava, your workouts will be ready for import. Your calorie burn and active minutes come straight from the Apple Watch, so they’ll look familiar.
If your goal is to get your workouts into Strava only, I think it’s worth trying this method first. Strava has a help article to get you going. That being said, I've heard from some people that this method is somewhat finicky, which leads me to…
Option #3: Use the Apple Workouts app and send workouts to Strava via HealthFit
This method has been around longer than option #2, and even though it’s not a direct method like #2, I think there are some benefits worth considering.
With this option, HealthFit is a bridge to move your health data around. HealthFit reads your health metrics and workout data, then sends it to other sources. This is the method I use since I send a copy of each workout to Strava, Training Peaks, and iCloud Drive (for backup). For the privacy-conscious, all processing happens on the device and no data is uploaded to HealthFit.
Since this method still treats Apple Health as the source for your health data, it also means food diary apps that are linked with Apple Health will report calorie burn correctly. You’ll likely be able to remove any direct integrations between apps (e.g., linking Strava with Lose It) and still see accurate calories burned inside the food diary app.
Setting up HealthFit
The initial setup for HealthFit takes a bit of work, but the app runs mostly on autopilot after that. In my case, I only need to open it every once in a while when iOS decides to put the app in the background.
It’s also worth noting that HealthFit only exists on the iPhone—you don’t need to set anything up on the Watch. Using Apple Workouts will add the workout to Apple Health, which is then picked up by HealthFit and sent out to any other destinations you choose.
To get started, download HealthFit from the App Store.
Open HealthFit and give the app “read” access to your health data during initial setup. Your workouts should show up in HealthFit now! Next, we’ll make sure they are sending to Strava.
Go to the “More” tab and scroll down to Strava. Tapping on Strava will open up an authentication flow so HealthFit and Strava can start sharing data.
Once HealthFit has permission to send data to Strava, turn on automatic workout synchronization. With this turned on, HealthFit will send workouts to Strava as soon as they happen without you needing to do anything.
And that’s it! You’re set up. When you complete a workout using Apple Workouts on your Watch, HealthFit will pick it up and send it to Strava.
If you’re seeing double…
There’s an easy fix if you’re seeing duplicate workouts in the Apple Fitness app. If you previously gave Strava “write” access for the Apple Health app, You’ll want to turn that off in Apple Health.
This is likely the case if you’ve ever used the Strava iPhone or Watch app to record a workout. Go to Apple Health > top-right profile icon > Apps > Strava. Turn off all the “write” switches since Apple Workouts and HealthFit handle those now.
Bonus: Preferred settings for HealthFit
These are a few helpful settings you may want to consider. They’re all found in the More tab of HealthFit.
Other Platforms > iCloud Drive: On
Turning this on creates a HealthFit folder in iCloud containing .fit files for backup and safe keeping. It also makes it easier to move the files around to a source not supported by HealthFit (e.g., AllTrails or Gaia GPS).
Workout naming: None
Turn workout naming off to see activity names that look like “Morning Run”, “Afternoon Cycle” or “Afternoon Activity”. When workout naming is on, any activities uploaded to Strava automatically pull in the nearest location as the activity name, instead of the activity type.
Workout synchronization: Automatic (with overrides)
There’s in-depth customization for each platform you’re sending to, allowing you to send certain workout types automatically and leaving other workout types for manual upload. For example, I keep most workouts syncing automatically, but I turn off indoor cycling since I need to upload my Zwift virtual cycling activities manually.
Start exercising!
While it might require a bit of a setup, using HealthFit as a bridge between various services adds many options for sharing workout data. It’s also a set-it-and-forget-it thing—a small amount of work up front translates to a lot of time saved manually moving .fit files around.