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I Built MoveWith for People Like Me. Here's Why It's Different.

Emma · April 7, 2026 · 3 min read


I built MoveWith for people like me - people who struggle to stay consistent with home workouts. I've done the expensive personal trainer route, I've subscribed to ClassPass and booked classes days in advance so that five hours before the session when I remember about it and I'm tired and don't want to go, I also don't want to cancel and lose money. But nothing has been as effective for keeping me consistent with my home workouts - and more importantly the home exercise program my physical therapists give me (body doubling for exercise is the biggest reason why) - than having a virtual workout partner.

The body doubling space wasn't built for this

Other body doubling solutions out there are built primarily for desk work, and that creates real problems when you try to use them for fitness. I wrote a longer piece on body doubling for fitness that walks through why the desk-work model doesn't transfer cleanly to workouts, but the short version is that the social norms of a Focusmate-style session don't translate when one person is in yoga clothes and the other is doing dishes. As a woman, I feel vulnerable working out in yoga leggings on camera in front of a strange man who signed up to do focus work. The mismatch isn't just awkward - it makes the whole experience feel unsafe in a way that desk-work body doubling never does. MoveWith matches you exclusively with other people who are exercising, so everyone on the call is in the same context and the same headspace.

Why being self-funded matters for you

Every major body doubling platform out there - Focusmate, Flow Club, Flown - has taken venture capital funding, which means they're under pressure to maximize revenue from their users. MoveWith is entirely self-funded. Even a few years ago, building something like this would have cost $100K+ to hire a development team - but AI tools have made it possible for someone like me to build and launch an app without outside money. Because I'm not answering to investors, I can prioritize what's actually best for the people using the app instead of what's most profitable.

Consistency rewards

This is where that freedom shows up in a real way. At launch, MoveWith will cost $1 per week with a one-week free trial. If you complete three sessions in a week, your next week is free. No other body doubling service currently offers anything like this, and I genuinely doubt they will - because rewarding consistency so aggressively that your most engaged users pay nothing goes against the core business model of a company that needs to maximize revenue for shareholders.

I built this because I needed it and I think you might need it too. Try the beta on TestFlight and let's move together.


Emma is the founder of MoveWith and has had ADHD her entire life. She built MoveWith because she needed it and couldn't find it.

MoveWith is body doubling for fitness.

Get matched with a real person and actually do your workout.

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