The team at Reviews.com just finished looking at 65 treadmills on the market to find the best. Here is an excerpt from their work.
Treadmills are some of the most straightforward pieces of fitness equipment out there — just rubber belts that move. They’re also some of the most decked-out. They let you check your email, run along the French Riviera, stream music from your computer, plan a marathon, and turn a celebrity trainer into your personal running coach. All that makes it easy to forget the most important question of all: What are they like to run on? The best treadmill doesn’t bury you under a features avalanche. It nails the fundamentals, like our pick, The Sole F85, whose smooth, quiet ride outperformed much more expensive machines.
How We Found the Best Treadmill
With the at-home exerciser in mind, we gathered data on 65 treadmills designed for a living room and not a gym. We compared their specs and features; evaluated each machine for its versatility, portability, and technology; then hit the road (we mean rubber) to let our feet do the talking. We pushed each of our top picks to their limits, running at max speeds and max inclines, before naming the best.
We cut manual treadmills.
At first glance, lightweight manual treadmills seem to have the advantage — their designs are simple enough that you can slip them under the bed when you’re done logging miles. But for running comfort, a machine that requires human power to turn is a nightmare: As you go, you have to not only move your body, but also power the treadmill’s belt.
When one of our testers ran on a few, it was clear they’re not worth their portability. Imagine a fast, 130-pound runner powering the belt of a 200-pound machine — the force of her impact, which had to drag the belt forward, coupled with just plain running caused the treadmill to shake so much she felt like it was going to collapse. Now imagine the experience a 200-pound runner would have.
We expect running on a treadmill to be not just enjoyable, but also enticing enough to encourage daily workouts. Any piece of equipment that feels like it’s going to snap isn’t going to cut it. We want sturdy.
On the heavier side of the spectrum are manual treadmills designed for athletic performance, like the popular Woodway Curve. Instead of setting a speed on a touchscreen, the runner has to dig deep with an explosive step. That’s not the in-home experience most people are looking for, so we cut both types of manual treadmills and turned our focus to quality electric machines.
We wanted a treadmill suitable for both runners and walkers.
Avid runners have speed and long strides that require larger surfaces; walkers are the exact opposite. We were positive one machine could accommodate both styles — an important feature if a household has more than one person looking to exercise (or one exerciser looking to mix it up) — and evaluated each of our contenders on three key factors:
- Speed and incline. Most treadmills have top speeds of 10-12 mph (the equivalent of a running a five- or six-minute mile!), though specialty running machines will go even faster. They typically incline between 10 and 15 percent, and some also offer the option to decline to mimic going downhill. The machines that scored highest here hit the max in all three places: speeds up to 12 mph, inclines up to 15 percent, and the option to decline.
- Maximum weight. We found that we didn’t have to sacrifice portability altogether to accommodate a heavier runner’s weight. Our top scoring treadmills were all able to handle more than 400 pounds.
- Running surface area. Runners have longer strides than walkers — and they need a deck that’s long enough to both keep feet from hitting the motor housing and keep runners from shortening their stride. Runners of average height need a running surface at least 60 inches long (though some treadmills offer a deck up to 72 inches long). Additionally, a console that’s too narrow at the front of the machine restricts both runners and walkers from moving freely closer to the control panel. Our top scoring treadmills all had running decks of 60 inches or longer and overall widths of 35 inches or more.
We ranked the contenders on home-friendliness.
Treadmills aren’t great additions to your decor if you don’t have the luxury of an at-home gym. We took a look at how easy it would be to move the machine (Does it have wheels? Does it fold? How heavy is it?) and its footprint (Is it so giant that it demands its own room?).
It turns out, most treadmills have very similar dimensions — nearly every contender was inch for inch with the others — but the highest scorers weigh less than 300 pounds, fold, and have wheels for easier transportation.
And we gave their features a whirl.
This was where things started getting interesting. The variety of technology and entertainment options on treadmills is mind-boggling. Treadmills can do everything from announcing when an incoming email arrives to planning your marathon training. It can transport you halfway around the world to run trails and update your position on a course on an LCD touchscreen, all while you stream your favorite movie. The best treadmill isn’t necessarily the one that can do it all, but we did expect, bare minimum, a few features:
- Health metrics display. This is considered standard equipment on most treadmills. We looked for a display that showed four basic metrics: heart rate, pace, mileage, and calories burned. Every single machine hit this bar.
- Touchscreen panel. It might seem like a luxury, but a touch screen makes it easier to use the console while you’re in motion, and it means the machine will be more responsive.
- WiFi connection. This is just a nice-to-have option that allows you to stream music or movies mid-jog. Not a deal breaker, but definitely a perk.
- Compatible with an MP3 player. We’d like the option to listen to music without having to hold our phone.
It’s not difficult to find a treadmill that offers all of the above. Many of our top contenders boasted much more: full-blown, onboard entertainment systems. Technology seems to be shifting so that runners are ditching their own gadgets in order to connect to a treadmill that can act as a media center, training center, and personal computer all in one. We couldn’t wait to give them all a try — would they still feel like noisy, lumbering exercise machines, or something more?
We ran on our final contenders at top speed and the steepest incline.
And we weren’t messing around. We tested shock absorption, the ergonomics of the running bed and controls, and overall comfort. We changed speeds on a dime — incline too. We answered emails mid-stride, and visited the French Riviera and a virtual beach in Mexico. We even started a marathon-training program (that we promise we’ll finish).
The user experience on each machine is unique, and what qualifies as the best will always be in part dependent on the fitness goals, aesthetic preferences, available space, biomechanics, and budget of the user. In the end, we valued the treadmills that were built with ergonomics in mind, that were comfortable and quiet, and that had controls we could easily navigate while in motion. And while flashy features were compelling, we were surprisingly just as impressed by consoles that were simple, clean, and let us focus on the exercise.
To the winners and the full list of tested treadmills, please click here and read Reviews.com.