Outdoor Gyms

In a world where convenience is king they provide a place you can workout 24 hours a day whether you’re traveling or simply because a gym membership is out of your budget.

On this page I’ll explain the type of equipment available at a free open air gym and help you find one in your area.

Working Out in The Great Outdoors

outdoor gyms The first gyms available to the public in outdoor open spaces were developed in China to get the Chinese working out in advance of the 2008 Olympics.

This entailed over 20 million square meters of outdoor workout facilities and approximately 4000 open air gyms springing up all over China.

The success of these gyms in China has caught on across the world and the outdoor workout revolution is taking over and you probably have a open air gym near you!

Equipment Available

As with any gym the equipment available is key to how useful it’s going to be and like regular gyms open air gyms also have a variety of equipment depending on the council or states selection whilst ordering. Having the best trampolines is always a lot of fun.

My first experience of an outdoor gym was whilst visiting my uncle in The Netherlands. I’d been there for 4 days and hadn’t worked out and I started looking for a local gym where I could pay per session.

I struggled to find a gym that would let a non-member walk in off the street so in frustration I decided to cycle around the town and borrowed my Uncle’s bike.

No less than 5 minutes after cycling through the park opposite his house I stumbled upon the first open air gym I ever saw.

outdoor gyms

I hurriedly got out my camera and started snapping away and the results are what you see on this page. I proceeded to try the gym for myself and I have to say I had a great workout right there in the middle of the park and aside from it being slightly wet!

I knew right there that the prospect of people being able to workout for free at their convenience was an idea that would catch on!

Find Open Air Gyms Near You!

Once I got home from my Uncle’s I started to look for similar gym near me and near hotels I was staying at on business. There weren’t many but I kept my eye out for them and over the next few years they popped up everywhere!

I put together a list of outdoor workout facilities in the UK and I’ve tried to find out where they are in the rest of the world. You can now find a open air gym near you using the tools below:

UK

Here’s a handy map I put together with a list of open air gyms with their addresses and contact details:

View Free Outdoor Gyms in the UK in a larger map
You can also find UK gyms by postcode using the link posted under Australia below.

outdoor gyms
USA

In the US there are a number of companies providing outdoor fitness equipment but not all of them help you find their equipment once installed!

Tri Active America on the other hand kindly provide a directory by state so you can find a gym near you!

Australia

Australians can find outdoor gyms from The Great Outdoor Gym Company in their state using this directory:

Asia/Rest of World

OK Star Fitness are a Beijing based company who were instrumental in creating the first outdoor gym equipment and they now supply equipment around the world including USA, Australia, Canada, Turkey, Spain, Brazil, Israel, Singapore, Malaysia, Sudan, and Mongolia.

Summary

I hope this guide helped you find an outdoor fitness facility near your home or wherever you are. If you didn’t then you may need to consider a cheap home gym instead.

For those of you following my Free Personalized Workout Plan guide, if you’ve now decided where you’ll work out then you can go back and move onto the next step or consider alternatives.

I’ll leave you with the rest of the pictures I took that day and you can start planning your own outdoor workout!