Free alternatives to Zwift

Although Zwift remains the queen of virtual cycling applications, the significant increase in price, which puts the monthly fee at 20 €, has made many users of virtual rollers are looking for different alternatives that allow them virtual cycling reality in a more affordable way. These are the main options you can turn to.

Indoor cycling apps: there is life beyond Zwift

When we talk about virtual cycling, we all think of Zwift, the application that popularized this activity and is still today the one with the most users. A platform that has not ceased to evolve with constant events, new routes and other features that have allowed it to maintain its reign. However, applying the laws of the market, the high demand and constant innovation has caused the subscription price to increase to a figure that is no longer affordable for many cyclists.

Fortunately, there are several options for continuing to train indoors while riding in virtual worlds.

MyWhoosh

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The platform based in the United Arab Emirates is undoubtedly the one that is emerging as Zwift's main competitor, to the point of having snatched the organization of the UCI Indoor Cycling World Championships from Zwift.

In general terms, MyWhoosh has many similarities with Zwift, although its virtual scenarios are smaller, but in exchange, there are more options, all of them based on real scenarios, except for the one called MyWhoosh World. Among the 10 available scenarios we find places like California, Arabia, Colombia, Australia or Belgium.

In addition to the functionality offered by MyWhoosh, this platform is completely free of charge.

TrainingPeaks Virtual

Recently, the well-known training management platform TrainingPeaks has acquired the IndieVelo platform, giving rise to TrainingPeaks Virtual, a new indoor cycling application that promises to become a benchmark in the coming years.

TrainingPeaks Virtual is currently under development, so they have decided that, in order to attract users that will allow them to evolve it as quickly as possible for the time being, in principle until March 2025, it will be offered free of charge. From then on, it will become an element of the premium subscription of this training portal.

The main advantage is the integration with the TrainingPeaks platform, which allows us to perform virtually all the workouts we have scheduled, in addition to being able to access the very large list of trainers and workouts on this platform. For the rest, it offers similar features to the other applications, with virtual worlds and some concessions to realism such as wind, falls...

ErgVideo

Curious application, also free, which allows us to upload a .fit file with a route that we have made or designed on the map with which we simulate the route showing us a simple avatar on screen and interacting with our roller to harden or soften depending on the loaded route.

In addition, it has a large library of videos so we can play a lot of sites while our roller adapts to what we see on the screen, some as legendary as the Galibier, the Bonette or the Glandon.

TrainerDay

Very simple application that allows us to follow plans and training sessions. Actually it is not a virtual simulation application but we simply have the graph of the training to perform that connects with our roller to simulate, using the ERG mode of the roller the watts that we have to provide in each interval that touches.

Very useful for those who do not need to see small figures on the screen and use the roller exclusively to focus on the training to be done.