Feature

Progressive Overload Tracking

Progressive overload is the foundation of strength training: gradually increasing the demand on your muscles over time. Plates tracks this automatically and tells you exactly when to add weight.

How it works

The suggestion engine analyzes your last 20 sessions per exercise, tracking:

• Weight and rep history across sessions
• RPE (Rate of Perceived Exertion) trends
• Estimated 1RM trajectory
• Your personal progression rate (learned over time)

When you've consistently hit your rep target at a given weight, Plates suggests adding load. The suggested weight is always rounded to what you can actually load on the bar (5 lb / 2.5 kg increments for barbells).

Nine suggestion types

Progressive overload is just one of nine personalized suggestions Plates can generate:

• Weight increase - ready to add load
• Rep increase - add reps before bumping weight
• Deload - time to recover (personalized threshold)
• Fatigue warning - sub-deload signal, back off slightly
• Volume hold - stay steady before pushing again
• Plateau detection - stuck at same weight/reps, try a variation
• Too light - RPE consistently low, jump to intended effort
• Hidden progress - 1RM improving even though weight/reps look the same
• E1RM gain - estimated max improved significantly

Context-aware intelligence

Every suggestion adjusts based on your current context:

• Diet phase - more conservative during a cut, more aggressive during a bulk
• Program phase - suppresses progression during deload/test weeks
• Session readiness - suppresses all progression on a rough day
• Equipment type - different increment logic for barbells, dumbbells, cables

On-device, always private

All analysis runs locally on your phone. Your training data never leaves your device for suggestion computation. No cloud ML, no data harvesting.