The Burn Bar is how Apple Fitness+ adds a community aspect to its workouts. It compares your calorie burn to other people who’ve also done the workout and tells you how you stack up. But sometimes you won’t see the Burn Bar. What gives?
What the Burn Bar Shows
First, let’s quickly recap what the Burn Bar actually shows. It compares how many calories you’ve burned in the past two minutes of your workout (and at the end, the average for the whole workout) to people who are roughly the same age, weight, and gender (so newbies aren’t compared to elite athletes). You’re given a ranking—“Behind the Pack,” “In the Pack,” “Middle of the Pack,” “Front of the Pack,” or “Ahead of the Pack”—based on how you’re doing.
The Burn Bar Takes Two Minutes to Appear
Since the Burn Bar is based on how hard you’ve gone over the previous two minutes of your workout, it doesn’t appear until after you’ve actually worked out for two minutes. If you’re not seeing the Burn Bar at the very start of a workout, this is probably why.
The Burn Bar Only Shows on Certain Workouts
The Burn Bar only shows up on workouts where the aim is to burn calories. Some workouts, like Strength, Yoga, and Mindful Cooldowns, have different goals. The Burn Bar won’t appear in workouts like these because it’s not a good measure of performance.
In a Strength workout, for example, your goal is to perform high-quality repetitions that build muscle, not to get your heart rate up by bouncing around. The Burn Bar can’t compare your reps to other people’s, so Fitness+ won’t show it.
The Burn Bar Might Be Turned off
After your first workout, you get the option to disable the Burn Bar. If you did that by mistake—or deliberately turned off the Burn Bar at some point—you might need to turn it on.
In a workout, tap the metrics icon in the bottom right of the screen.
Tap the toggle to the right of “Burn Bar” to turn it on.
If the Burn Bar option is already enabled on this screen, you’re probably not seeing it for one of the other reasons—you might need to wait two minutes, or it might not be relevant to your current workout.
RELATED: How to Turn Off the Burn Bar in Apple Fitness+
