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Oura is set to become the first mass-market fitness company

(sorry, Peloton)

There is a strange irony in fitness today.

Peloton built the most loved connected fitness experience of the last decade, yet Oura looks more likely to become the first true mass market fitness company.

I want to start by saying I love Peloton. When I get the perfect instructor, with the right soundtrack and the right class for me on that day, the experience is genuinely magical. But if even one of those elements is off, the whole thing collapses. Ultimately it’s not truly designed for me, it just happens to sometimes match my desires.

Admittedly, I do not own a bike. I have definitely considered it. But it takes up too much space and is too expensive, especially considering it would only be part of my fitness routine. Instead, I ride at the gym, or when I am staying with my in-laws. Plus, I wanted to minimise the risk of getting impaled (sorry too easy).

When you combine these things, you start to see the shape of the ceiling. Peloton scaled a product that is brilliant when everything aligns, but the brilliance sits on top of a format that cannot travel, cannot simplify and cannot adapt to each user at scale. It broadcasts fitness rather than shaping fitness around the individual. And it asks the household to organise itself around the machine rather than the other way around.

The numbers reflect this ceiling. Peloton has sold roughly 5 million Bikes and Treads in its entire history, far from the 100 million households John Foley once imagined. Recent performance makes the leveling off clear. Q1 FY26 revenue fell 6 percent year on year. Connected fitness subscriptions fell 6 percent to 2.732 million. Full year revenue is expected to shrink. The core product and price point they chose to scale cannot carry them any further.

Peloton digitised the boutique studio. They did it better than anyone. But boutique studio fitness, even when brought into the home, at that price point, was never going to become a mass market solution. The Covid surge did not signal mass adoption. It signalled a temporary shift in behaviour that disappeared once the world reopened.

Peloton’s strengths created their limits

Peloton’s vision was right, but the company became locked inside the three things that made it successful.

Their hardware.

Their instructors.

Their community.

These pillars created an outstanding product, but they also created constraints they couldn’t escape.

You can see this most clearly in the story of Lanebreak, their gamified workout experience. Lanebreak was one of the few signs that Peloton could build something that would disrupt themselves. Engagement rates were reportedly extremely high. It hinted at a format that could reach people who were never going to fall in love with instructors or choreography. It was the beginning of something new and it had a load of potential. Despite that, Peloton recently laid off most of the team behind it. Even with a strong signal, they could not commit to it, because Lanebreak did not fit the identity that had worked for them up to that point.

So where does the mass market solution actually come from?

If the goal is to reach hundreds of millions of people, then perhaps the starting point has to be completely different.

Rather than hardware which serves as the foundation for an integrated experience, what if the solution comes from hardware that serves as the foundation for deep understanding of the user.

What if the entry point is something that fits around your life, not the other way around?

What if personalisation comes first? Maybe it comes from wearables.

In comes Oura

If the mass market solution comes from the wearables end of the spectrum, the first question is obvious. Why Oura? Why not Apple Watch, Whoop, Garmin, Fitbit, or anyone else who has been trying to solve this for years.

The answer is in positioning.

Most wearables speak to athletes (real or wannabe).

Oura is different.

They built their product around everyday life, recovery and long term wellbeing. The ring is small, simple and easy to wear. It collects high fidelity behavioural data without friction. And it has resonated with a far broader audience than performance-led devices typically reach. Oura has already sold more than 5.5 million rings, and that traction is what sits behind their valuation of $11bn, nearly four times Peloton’s.

What takes Oura to the next level

What completes this, and what takes Oura to the next level, is the creation of hyper personalised movement content that goes with the user wherever they are. Content that adapts to sleep, stress, travel, available equipment, and long term goals. Content that is not tied to a single location or a single machine. Content that feels alive.

Once this layer exists, the connected fitness model becomes obsolete.

The bike or treadmill becomes interchangeable.

And this becomes even more obvious when you consider where the primary screen is heading. Today it is the phone. Tomorrow it will be AR glasses. In that world, a coaching layer that knows the user deeply and can surface guidance anywhere will be more valuable than an integrated experience tied to a fixed piece of equipment in the home.

Personalised fitness comes next

Peloton is still the best connected fitness product in the market. But connected fitness as Peloton framed it, premium hardware combined with instructor led studio classes, has reached its natural ceiling. The combination of limited personalisation, heavy, expensive hardware, and a single rigid format cannot carry the model to 100 million people.

Oura begins from the opposite side of the problem. And when it is combined with dynamic and adaptive content, it begins to look like the foundation for something that truly can reach everyone.

Peloton digitised group fitness and built the perfect integrated experience for a single device.

The next wave will build a personalised experience that works across every device.

It will reinvent movement itself.

Sam Cole

Chief Executive Officer, FitXR

Sam Cole is the Co-Founder and CEO of FitXR, a leading innovator in immersive fitness. With a background that spans technology, product design, and human performance, Sam is driven by a belief that exercise should be deeply personal, accessible, and joyful for everyone. Under his leadership, FitXR has evolved from one of the first VR fitness experiences into a global movement platform that combines cutting-edge technology with behavioral science to help people stay active in ways that feel natural and motivating.

Sam is passionate about reimagining how people move—breaking away from rigid formats and instead creating adaptive, inclusive experiences that meet people where they are. His vision centers on building the most engaging, personalized, and effective way for millions of people to build healthy habits through immersive content and intelligent coaching.