The Burrow
Mar 13, 2025
Fitness and staying active is an important part of maintaining both your physical and mental wellbeing. From joining a run club, to social sports and hitting the gym, physical health has never been more accessible.
Following global lockdowns, the global fitness industry was valuated at AU$167,336 billion in 2022 and is projected to hit AU$325.158 billion by 2030.1 With ‘fitness’ placing as the third most used hashtag on TikTok in 2020, amassing over 56 billion pieces of tagged content, it’s easy to see why the industry is enjoying a renaissance of popularity.2
As health insurance comparison experts, we wanted to see which countries are the craziest about fitness and the gym. To do this, we placed 20 countries across a multitude of factors such as number of gyms per capita, search volume for gym related terms and the average cost of fitness clubs, among others.
Here’s what we found.
Lunging into first place on our list is France. It was the clear winner for the index, with the most gyms (60 per 100,000 people) and the highest search volume for each search query per 100,000 population.
France dominated search volume per capita across the board, with ‘gym’ (13,080/100,000) and ‘pilates’ (11,812/100,000) keywords both returning a volume of almost 10,000 higher than the second-highest placements. The rankings for the ‘workout’ keyword ended up much tighter, with France (706 per year/100,000) just edging out Ireland (410 per year/100,000).
In terms of costs for fitness clubs and a mid-range pair of running shoes, France had solid results, placing as fifth cheapest for average monthly fitness club cost and fourth most expensive for average mid-range running shoe cost.
Our second most gym crazed country is Ireland. Ireland scored highly across the board but tended to struggle in comparison to other countries in terms of costs.
Ireland placed with the second highest number of gyms per capita (31 per 100,000 residents). Similarly, the nation placed second in search volume per capita for ‘gym’, and third for ‘workout’. Ireland has not felt the pilates craze as much as other countries though, placing seventh for ‘pilates’ search volume per capita.
Ireland struggled the most with prices, placing as the second most expensive country for fitness club monthly fees (AU$89.37/month) as well as a middling placement for the cost of mid-range running shoes (AU$142.74).
Canada leaps into third spot of the index, boasting above average in four of the six metrics analysed. The country’s highest individual placement was in pilates search volume per capita, placing in fifth (1,687/100,000). Canada’s other metrics placed similarly, ranging between eighth and 11th place. While Canada did not shine with any individual metrics, the nation’s consistent placements allowed it to land as our third top country for gym junkies.
Australia tied for fifth with its neighbour New Zealand. Across the index, Australia tended to do mostly well, though struggled with any cost-related metrics.
The country had the fourth-highest number of gyms per capita, with 29 per 100,000 population.
In terms of search volume, Australia largely performed above average. For ‘gym’ keywords, the nation placed with the sixth-highest search volume. Pilates search volume was Australia’s best performing metric, placing second in the index.
Australia landed as one of the more expensive countries for gym goers, placing as the second most expensive for a pair of mid-range fitness shoes, and sixth-most expensive in terms of average monthly fitness club fees.
| 2024 Search Volume (Yearly) (Per 100,000) | |||||||
| Rank | Country | Number of Gyms per 100,000 | Average Fitness Club Cost, Monthly (AUD) | Average Cost of Nike Running Shoe (Mid-Range) (AUD) | Gym | Workout | Pilates |
| 1 | France | 60 | $54.15 | $148.85 | 13,080 | 706 | 11,812 |
| 2 | Ireland | 31 | $83.38 | $142.74 | 1,272 | 410 | 1,636 |
| 3 | Canada | 23 | $65.12 | $135.75 | 768 | 140 | 1,687 |
| 4 | Mexico | 10 | $52.33 | $135.85 | 809 | 402 | 476 |
| 5 | Australia | 29 | $74.37 | $160.58 | 899 | 114 | 2,111 |
| 5 | New Zealand | 22 | $55.82 | $145.25 | 645 | 392 | 1,062 |
| 7 | United States | 26 | $75.62 | $142.79 | 662 | 203 | 1,433 |
| 8 | Portugal | 30 | $62.77 | $130.08 | 281 | 80 | 1,318 |
| 9 | Poland | 7 | $54.50 | $128.76 | 417 | 72 | 1,808 |
| 10 | Brazil | 14 | $33.20 | $107.70 | 178 | 126 | 440 |
To view the full dataset, click here.
Compare the Market’s Executive General Manager of Health Insurance, Steven Spicer, notes how health insurance could help cover your workout routine.
“Not everyone is aware that gym memberships can be included on some health insurance policies when the membership forms part of a health management plan,” Mr Spicer said.
“Finding a health insurance policy that pays a benefit towards your active lifestyle could help to cut back your monthly expenses overall.
“This doesn’t only apply to gym memberships though; some insurers can help cover you for other activities such as group fitness classes.
“If you’re a regular to any of these and you’re in the market for health insurance anyway, it makes sense to compare policies to find an option that helps you cover your lifestyle. Just keep in mind that some health funds have specific requirements which must be met before a member can claim on their gym membership benefits.”
To rank the 20 countries, we gathered six data points for each one. For each of these data points, the cities received a score between 0 and 10 based on how they compared to each other, with 0 being the ‘worst’ performer and 10 being the ‘best’. These six scores between 0 and 10 were then averaged together to create an index score for each city.
The metric “Number of Gyms per 100,000” and each search volume total for ‘gym’, ‘workout’ and ‘pilates’ were placed against the country’s population in order to find a per capita number.
Each country’s total population figure used to generate per capita numbers was sourced from Worldometer.
Additional Sources