Being outside is wonderful. Breathing in the fresh air and feeling the warm rays of the sun is healthy and boosts your energy naturally. Unfortunately, we live in a day and age where we are increasingly busier and more occupied with a million other things. This makes going outside less than a priority.
The challenge is to make going outside an activity you actively want to pursue. And with the kind of technology we have these days, it is more than feasible. Let us discuss some apps you can download for your phone to encourage more outside activity and avoid boredom.
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Pokémon Go – A Reason to Explore
A good way to encourage walking around outside is to give it a sense of purpose. And what better way than to simulate a childhood dream of becoming the world’s greatest Pokémon trainer? With Pokémon Go, you can grab your phone and march outside looking for any Pokémon ever released for the franchise.
Plenty of the game’s mechanics are centered around making you move. Catching Pokémon requires you to go explore, getting pokéballs and other supplies requires you to find Pokéstops and hatching eggs requires you to move anywhere between 2 km to over 10! If you want fun while moving, this game is it.
Harry Potter – Wizards Unite!
If Pokémon really is not your thing, there are alternatives that employ the same mechanics. Wizards Unite is a Harry Potter themed version of Pokémon Go made by the same developer: Niantec. Instead of exploring to find Pokémon and catching them, you instead roam the world trying to find fragments of famous items and characters in the Harry Potter universe. They are suspended by powerful spells that you will need to dispel using your own spells!
Many of the same mechanics from Pokémon Go have been transferred over to this game, making it another fun and engaging app to keep you walking while having fun, you can safely bet on that.
Step Counters – A Competitive Edge
Some people like to see results when they spend their time doing something. They like to get paid when they work, they like to see a score after finishing a match in a video game and so on. The same general principle can be applied to walking.
A step counter is an app that tunes into your phone’s GPS and is able to track where you go and therefore also how far and fast you go. Sometimes they can even tell you a rough estimate of how many calories you have burned in the process. It is a perfect way to give walking a competitive edge and for you to set challenges for yourself.
There are hundreds of these apps on the app store and it can be difficult to gauge which ones are worth their salt. We would recommend reading some online reviews or taking them on a short test drive to see if they are accurate. In any case, they will be cheaper than a fitness center membership.
