Streaks are one of the biggest features of Apple’s Fitness app on iPhone. Hit your daily activity goal multiple days in a row—for a week, a month, or even longer—and you’ll receive a digital reward that’ll give you a surprising incentive to keep moving. But sometimes, real life gets in the way of closing your fitness circle. iOS 18 adds a feature to the Fitness app that recognizes this while still allowing you to maintain your streak.
In iOS 18's Fitness, you can pause your workout streak for a set period of time (sometimes a day, sometimes longer) without letting your streak end. Much like the ability to set specific workout goals for specific days of the week, this iOS 18 addition mirrors a similar feature added in watchOS 11, which is also in beta testing at the time of writing.
There are perfectly legitimate reasons why you might pause a workout. Maybe a real emergency is intruding on your gym time, preventing you from closing your ring. Maybe you’ve contracted an illness or maybe you’ve injured yourself. About two years ago, I injured my knee, and rather than taking some time off to recover, I tried to push through the injury (in part because of the Fitness app’s reminders to keep moving). If I had had access to the Pause feature back then, my injury recovery might not have been as long.
So ignore the ability to pause your workouts in iOS 18's Fitness app at your own peril. Here's how to use the feature.
1. Launch the Fitness app
(Image: © Future)
Tap the Fitness app to launch it, and tap your activity ring.
2. Pause your Move ring
(Image: © Future)
Scroll down until you see Pause Ring. (It's located right next to the Change Goal button to set different movement goals.) Press Pause Ringtoneand then Choose a period to pause your Move ringtoneYour default options are For today, For the rest of the week, For the rest of the month, or a custom option.
3. Customize the pause duration of your Move ringtone
(Image: © Future)
If you Press Customyou see a scroll that allows you set a specific number of days to pause your Move ring. You can pause it for up to 90 days. When you're done, press Set in the upper right corner.
4. Resume your Move ringtone sequence
(Image: © Future)
After pausing your Move ring, it will now appear as an empty ring with the end date of your pause in the center of the ring. If you want to change this period, press Edit Pause. If you wish to resume your activity sequence, press Resume Ring — your motion ring will become active again and your sequences will resume.
And that's all there is to enjoying a great new addition to the Fitness app in iOS 18. If you've downloaded the iOS 18 public beta, you can check out other features like customizing the iOS 18 Home screen and using text effects in the Messages app.