Apple Fitness+ is eliminating some positions, and the Time to Walk and Time to Run audio formats are being scaled back. The future of the service is still under internal discussion. What this means for subscribers in this country is less significant than the announcement initially suggests.
Apple Fitness+ has been under scrutiny for about a year: In November 2025, it was first reported that the service was under internal review, and since then, Health and Fitness have been part of the services division under Eddy Cue. In February, it was announced that the planned Health+ would only be a scaled-down version. Then, in August, a job posting appeared that hinted at live content for Fitness+.
Mark Gurman, in his September 20th Bloomberg newsletter, reports on job cuts at the service. According to the report, a handful of positions are affected. At the same time, the service's two audio formats are to be scaled back.
Key Facts at a Glance
- According to the report, Apple Fitness+ will be cutting a handful of jobs.
- The audio formats Time to Walk and Time to Run are to be scaled back.
- Apple is still considering the future of the service; a merger with the Health app is considered a possibility.
- For the time being, nothing will change regarding the offer for subscribers, including the price of 9.99 euros per month.
- German-language workouts have only been available since December 2025 – production in Santa Monica continues.
What the report calls
At its core, the discussion centers on three points: minor job cuts, a reduction in the two audio formats, and a still-open fundamental decision regarding the service. Time to Walk launched in January 2021 with celebrities sharing stories from their lives while walking; Time to Run followed a year later with guided running routes. Both run on the Apple Watch and are the service's only offering that functions without a screen.
The report suggests a possible direction for the integration of Fitness+ with the Health app. This idea is not new: it was already discussed in connection with the redesign of the Health app, which Apple unveiled in September.
How reliable is the report?
Gurman relies on sources within Apple and was the first to describe the changes in the Health and Fitness division over the past year. His information on this area has proven reliable so far, for example, regarding the transfer of responsibility to Eddy Cue.
The report does not specify a concrete number of job cuts, a list of affected roles, or a timeline for phasing out the audio formats. The integration with the Health app is an expectation, not an announcement.
The chronology of the renovation
| Time | Occurrence |
|---|---|
| December 2020 | Apple Fitness+ launches in six countries |
| January 2021 | Time to Walk is added |
| November 2021 | Launch in Germany, Austria and Switzerland |
| January 2022 | Time to Run is added |
| November 2025 | Health and fitness are moving into the service sector; service is under scrutiny |
| December 2025 | Workouts and meditations are available in German |
| February 2026 | Health+ is being scaled back to a smaller version. |
| August 2026 | Job posting suggests live content |
| September 2026 | Job cuts and reduction of audio formats |
As far as subscribers in this country are concerned
For German-speaking regions, the most interesting point is not the number of jobs, but the language. Apple has been producing workouts and meditations in German since December 2025, without subtitles – that is, only for nine months. Those who have subscribed to the service here are therefore using content from a production that has recently been expanded, not scaled back.
The price remains unchanged at €9.99 per month or €79.99 per year, with Fitness+ included in the Apple One Premier bundle. Time to Walk and Time to Run, however, are only available in English. Therefore, the discontinuation of these two formats will have a less significant impact on German-speaking subscribers than on audiences in the US.
Why a handful of positions reveal little about the service
This personnel change hardly serves as evidence for the service's demise. The expensive components of Fitness+ are secure and will continue. All content is produced in a converted building in Santa Monica with approximately 2,100 square meters of floor space, where, according to Apple, 13 robot-guided cameras move on tracks – the largest installation of its kind, according to the head of fitness. In addition, there are around 27 trainers and new sessions every week.
These basic costs are incurred regardless of whether a handful of production positions are filled or not. Anyone who truly runs a service will first adjust these costs, not individual roles. Recent steps in the opposite direction also contradict this: German-language productions since December, and a job posting for live production in August.
We therefore expect Fitness+ to remain as a service, with the packaging changing instead – perhaps as part of the Health app or a bundled subscription. The reduction of audio formats fits this pattern: it precisely affects the part of the catalog furthest removed from studio production, the part for which Apple needs to attract celebrities.
Do you use Time to Walk or Time to Run on your Apple Watch, or are the video workouts your sole reason for subscribing? Let us know in the comments which part of Fitness+ you actually use.
