What Happens to Your Workout Data When You Switch Apps?

What Happens to Your Workout Data When You Switch Apps?

When you switch workout apps, your core training history — every session date, exercise, set, weight, and rep count — transfers in full via CSV export and import. What doesn't transfer are app-specific scores, body measurement logs, template groupings, and supersets-as-groups, because there's no universal format for those. The practical reality: you lose the wrapper, not the data that actually matters for tracking progression.

That's the short answer. The longer answer involves understanding exactly which fields survive the move, where the export/import process breaks down, and how to handle the edge cases — like exercises with mismatched names — that quietly swallow sets you thought you'd saved.

Why Three Years of Workout Data Is Worth Protecting

Your training history isn't just a log. It's the empirical record of how your body responds to load over time — your actual progression curve, your volume landmarks, your PR timeline. Losing it doesn't just mean starting over emotionally; it means your new app's AI coach, progression suggestions, and analytics start from zero rather than from your real numbers.

A multi-year record of your sets, reps, and loads is genuinely hard to reconstruct from memory — it's the difference between a progression plan built on your real numbers and one built on guesses. Protecting it when you switch apps is a practical decision, not a sentimental one.

What Actually Transfers When You Export and Import

The fitness app ecosystem has quietly converged on CSV as the migration format. It's not elegant, but it works — and the most valuable part, your training history, transfers in full for most major loggers.

Here's what typically survives a CSV migration:

• Date and time of each session
• Workout name (if the source recorded one)
• Exercise name for each movement
• Set order within the session
• Weight and reps for every set
• RPE where the source app recorded it
• Duration of the session

Here's what typically doesn't:

• App-specific scores (readiness scores, streak metrics, proprietary ratings)
• Routine and template structures — the sets import in order, but the grouping logic stays behind
• Superset groupings — sets come through sequentially, not paired
• Photos and notes attached to sessions (varies by app)
• Body measurement logs — these are usually a separate export entirely

The pattern holds across most loggers: what stays behind is the shell, not the substance.

How to Export From the Two Most Common Loggers

Exporting from Strong

Strong exports workout history as a CSV from Settings → Export Data. The file columns are: Date, Workout Name, Duration, Exercise Name, Set Order, Weight, Reps, Distance, Seconds, and RPE. The export function is available regardless of your plan tier.

Exporting from Hevy

Hevy's export is free on every plan. Navigate to Profile → settings gear → Export & Import Data → Export Data → Export Workouts. The app emails you workout_data.csv. Body metrics export separately from the same menu.

For a detailed walkthrough of export formats and how to back up your data before any migration, see our complete workout data export and backup guide.

The Exercise Name Problem — and How It Gets Solved

This is where most migrations quietly lose data. If your old app called a movement "Barbell Back Squat" and your new app's library lists it as "Back Squat (Barbell)," a naive import skips those sets entirely. You don't get an error — you just get fewer sessions than you expected.

The better import tools handle this by matching source exercise names to the destination app's exercise library, catching common naming-convention variations rather than requiring exact matches. It's not perfect — genuinely custom exercises or unusual movement names still fall through — but it catches the majority of standard compound and accessory lift mismatches automatically.

The practical step: before you commit to a migration, check whether your new app shows you a preview of unmatched exercises before writing anything to your history. If it doesn't, you're flying blind.

Importing Three Years of History into Kenso

Kenso's import is free and lives at Settings → Import Workouts on iOS. It accepts a Strong CSV export, a Hevy workout_data.csv, or a previous Kenso CSV/JSON export — format is auto-detected, and files up to 10 MB are supported.

Before anything is written to your account, Kenso shows a preview: the number of workouts and exercises found, the first three sessions, and a list of exercises it couldn't match to its library. Those unmatched sets are listed and skipped; everything else imports. Strong and Hevy exercise names are matched to Kenso's exercise library, so common naming-convention differences (not just exact matches) are handled automatically.

What transfers into Kenso:

• Date/time, workout name, each set's weight, reps, and RPE where the source recorded it

What doesn't transfer: routines/templates, photos, and superset groupings (sets still import in order).

One useful detail for lifters who aren't ready to fully commit: if you keep logging in Strong or Hevy and export again later, re-importing that newer file only adds the sessions that aren't already in Kenso. The dedupe works per source, so you can run a transition period and sync the gap without creating duplicates.

How This Fits Into Your Training Log

Once your history is in Kenso, use Settings → Import Workouts to trigger the post-import diagnosis — Kenso reads your last three months of imported sessions and surfaces muscle balance blind spots and estimated 1RM standings automatically, so your history starts working for you immediately.

What Kenso Reads Out of Imported History

Imported sessions count toward PRs, exercise progress charts, and muscle coverage immediately — nothing needs to be re-logged by hand. With six or more imported sessions from the last three months, Kenso runs a free post-import diagnosis covering two areas:

Muscle balance — where your completed sets actually landed across major muscle groups (Chest, Back, Shoulders, Quads, Hamstrings, Glutes, Biceps, Triceps, Calves, Core), with blind spots flagged where a muscle received under half the median volume.

Strength standing — your best estimated 1RM on anchor lifts, tiered against population strength standards when sex, bodyweight, and age are on file.

Kenso also detects the routine embedded in your last three months of imported history and builds a Kenso program from it — so progression suggestions start from your real numbers, not a generic template. One program extraction is free; the auto-progression layer and corrective-program features are part of Kenso Pro ($5.99/month or $49.99/year; use code EARLY for one month of Pro free).

The Claude-powered AI Coach has access to your full imported training history, which means coaching conversations start from context rather than assumptions.

The Case for Treating Your Data as Portable

One thing worth naming directly: a lifetime logger is a perfectly good logger. If Strong or Hevy is working for you, there's no urgency to move. The point of understanding CSV migration isn't to create anxiety about your current app — it's to recognize that your training history belongs to you and can move with you if your needs change.

Kenso exports your data as CSV/JSON, so importing into Kenso isn't a lock-in. The same portability principles apply on the way out.

The practical recommendation: export a backup of your current app's data today, regardless of whether you're switching. It takes two minutes and costs nothing. Three years from now, you'll either be glad you did or indifferent — there's no scenario where you regret having the file.

Frequently Asked Questions

Does switching workout apps mean I lose my personal records?

No. If your new app supports CSV import and your source app exports set-level data (weight, reps, date), your PRs are recalculated from the imported history automatically. You don't lose the underlying performance data — you lose the old app's PR badges and any app-specific formatting around them.

What is the most reliable format for transferring workout history between apps?

CSV is the de facto standard in 2026. Most major strength loggers — including Strong, Hevy, and Kenso — export and import CSV with set-level detail. JSON is also used for same-ecosystem transfers. There is no universal workout data standard across all apps.

Why do some exercises go missing after a CSV import?

Exercise name mismatches are the most common cause. If the source app's exercise name doesn't match (or alias to) the destination app's library, those sets are skipped rather than imported. Check your new app's import preview for a list of unmatched exercises before confirming the import.

Can I import from both Strong and Hevy if I've used both over the years?

Yes — Kenso accepts Strong CSV and Hevy CSV, each auto-detected and matched to the Kenso library. Dedupe works within a source (a newer Strong export against your earlier Strong import, for example), so if your Strong and Hevy histories cover the same dates, import only one of them for the overlapping period to avoid logging the same session twice.

Is there a way to keep logging in my old app while I evaluate a new one?

Yes. Keep logging in your old app for a transition period, then export again and re-import. Re-importing a newer Strong, Hevy or Kenso export only adds the sessions that aren't already present, so you won't end up with duplicate entries from that source.