ClassPass Is Redefining What the Modern Gym Membership Looks Like for a New Generation
From Pilates to boxing, ClassPass is helping people build more flexible workout routines without committing to one gym.
Sticking with a workout routine is the part most people quietly give up on. A $30 billion U.S. fitness industry has spent the past decade trying to crack that problem, and one subscription app has bet that variety, not willpower, is the answer.
ClassPass, founded in 2013, lets members hop between yoga studios, boxing gyms, Pilates classes and recovery services through a single monthly plan. As of January 2025, 94% of its users were brand-new to the venues they visited through the app, suggesting the model pulls people into studios they would not have tried on their own.
How ClassPass works
The pricing model has shifted since launch. The app originally offered a flat $45 a month for five classes regardless of type or location. Today, pricing varies by market and runs on credits rather than unlimited access. A general class might cost one or two credits, while popular studio classes can run up to nine.
Woman's World Answers
ClassPass currently partners with more than 8,500 studios across 50-plus cities. The app also books recovery services like massage and meditation, plus beauty appointments such as nails and haircuts. Members are not locked into a single studio or modality, which is the central design choice.
Why variety drives the fitness habit
The fitness industry has boomed in part because of how people now want to move. The U.S. health and fitness market has grown 3% to 4% annually for the past decade, according to IHRSA data cited by Forbes, with boutique studios now accounting for more than 35% of total revenue. Millennials drove much of that shift, favoring specialized, social and varied workouts over traditional gym memberships. The fastest-growing formats in 2017 included event-style classes, HIIT, Barre and small-group strength training.
Jeff Bladt, senior vice president of pricing and marketplace at ClassPass parent company Playlist, argues that variety itself is what keeps people coming back.
“All those fundamental problems that prevent people from forming a fitness habit, ClassPass solves,” Bladt told Forbes.
Bladt describes fitness as a habit-forming frequency thing and identifies price, discovery and availability as the biggest friction points. The credit system is built around that thinking. Members get a monthly allotment and a deadline to use it. Miss a week, and the math starts pressuring you to catch up before credits expire at the end of the month. Bladt argues that locking users into one studio may create short-term commitment but long-term fatigue.
What members actually say
For some users, the format flips the relationship with exercise entirely.
“It wasn’t until I started using ClassPass that I discovered the joy of exercise,” Alina Tang wrote for Medium. “Not simply for results, but for pure pleasure.”
Tang said she had tried more than 30 different studios across yoga, spin, boxing, Pilates, Zumba and cardio bootcamps in roughly two years as a subscriber. The pattern Bladt describes, starting with one modality and drifting into others, is what the app is built to encourage.
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