Super eager to get started on your career in fitness but want to know exactly how long it will take to become a fitness trainer?
Don’t worry, I’ve got you covered!
In this article, I will break down the fastest options you have for getting yourself qualified so you can get out on that gym floor and get your fitness career started.
Sound good?
Let’s go…
I have researched the most popular UK course providers and discovered how long they consider it takes to reach level 2 qualification. By using this data I was able to find out the average length of time it takes to complete the courses they provide.
How long to become a fitness trainer in the UK?
The average length of time it takes to complete a course and become level 2 qualified as a gym instructor in the UK is 4-6 weeks. There are several UK providers that provide intense online training courses that can be completed within 2 weeks.
There were a ton of different companies all offering level 2 qualifications with the courses taking anywhere from 2 weeks to up to 14 months!
To make things a little clearer check out this table I made of some of the UK’s most popular training providers and the estimated times of completion for their level 2 gym instructor courses.
| Training provider | Minimum course duration | Intensive or standard course? |
|---|---|---|
| Diverse Trainers | 4-6 weeks | Standard |
| HFE | 6-8 weeks | Standard |
| Focus training | 4 weeks | Standard |
| YMCA fit | 2 weeks | Intensive |
| Amac | 6 months (MAX) | Standard |
| Lifetime | 14 months | Standard |
| Future fit | 3 months | Standard |
| The fitness group | 2 weeks | Intensive |
| Bisma | 4-6 weeks | Intensive |
| Nrpt | 2 weeks | Intensive |
| Entire training | 4-6 weeks | Intensive |
| Academy of fitness professionals | 130 hours | Intensive |
Why the big difference in time scales between training providers?
The answer to this boils down to whether or not the training provider insists that you have practical assessment and training days during their course.
For some providers, being able to speak to you on a 1-2-1 basis, assess you, and see you practicing what you have been taught with others on the course is something they will not budge on.
Other providers, however, are more than happy to conduct their training sessions via videos, online video calls, and online assessments that you submit to them via email.
It goes without saying that if you are required to psychically attend a class or assessment, it will drastically increase the length of time it will take for you to complete your course and gain your level 2 status.
It is more expensive for providers to hire gyms and conference rooms to teach and assess their students, which obviously drives the overall cost of the course up.
Providers who do this generally think of themselves as offering a higher quality service than that of providers who exclusively offer online training, however, the fact that they do this may be more to set themselves apart from providers offering a cheaper solution.
There is something to be said about offering a premium service in the big world of marketing, so I think this is something these companies are engaging in.
Intensive training or standard course: which is better?
Standard, of course, right?
I’d love to tell you that a course that requires a person to go to a fancy gym up in London (they usually book fancy gyms) and takes them 14 months to complete is the best way to get your qualification and become a level 2 gym instructor.
But I can’t, because I just don’t think it’s true.
At least not for everyone anyway.
If you are a complete beginner who has never even been to a gym before deciding to become a trainer (don’t laugh it happens, I know because it’s what I did), then I think physically being in a gym to learn is a great idea.
However, if you have been training yourself for years and just want to get the qualification under your belt, I really can’t see the need to be in a gym to learn about working in one.
You will be familiar with the vast majority of the kit provided and how to use it, so all you need to learn is the theory and some other safety features you may be unaware of to become pretty confident that you can pass your exam.
That’s why it’s my opinion that if you have been going to a gym for a good while, know how to use a lot of the kit, and understand basic training principles such as how to train for strength, hypertrophy, endurance, and weight loss, you can totally go for one of the cheapest courses available with the shortest completion time without any cause for concern.
What will you be learning in these courses?
To get the data for the table above, I went through a ton of training providers, and whilst I was looking at the course durations, I had a cheeky look at the course content and I can assure you that is almost exactly the same for each provider.
There are of course small variations from provider to provider, but not enough to warrant a dramatic increase in either price or course duration.
At its most simple, in order to become a fully qualified level 2 fitness trainer, you will need to have passed an exam that covers both the practical and theory sides of gym instruction, which is not actually a great deal.
You will need to learn:
- Member goal setting and exercise prescription
- Basic anatomy of bones, muscles, and joints
- Gym risk assessment and member safety
- Principles of Cardio and resistance training
- Exercise program design
- Delivering practical sessions ( gym inductions and program walkthroughs)
That’s pretty much the curriculum for every level 2 fitness trainer course out there, they are all very similar in what they are teaching, but the way they are teaching these subjects is often what differentiates them from one another.
None of these elements is particularly difficult as I outlined in my article “Is it hard to pass the level 2 gym instructor course?“, so don’t be fooled into thinking they will take months and months to learn.
I’m not wishing to take anything away from someone that has just qualified as a gym instructor, it still takes a great deal of effort and patience to learn what is required of you, it just definitely does not need to take any more than a few weeks to learn.
Online or practical learning, which is best?
For speed: Online intense training courses
For beginners: Practical courses and examinations
For seasoned “exercisers”
If you need your qualification quickly and you are confident that you already know most of what I have listed above, then go for an online course, it’ll cost you way less and you can have your qualification and be working in a gym within a few weeks.
A lot of the 1-2-1 training would be wasted on people that already know how to train themselves and have trained friends or family already, so you would be paying for something I don’t think you would get a lot of benefit from.
The examinations are exactly the same if you already know how to train yourself, going into a gym and having a person watch you do it so they can mark on a piece of paper that you know what you are doing is a waste of time and money.
For newbies
For people newer to exercise, you can pretty much reverse everything I’ve just said.
You will get a great deal of knowledge and confidence from actually seeing and using the equipment, and getting 1-2-1 training will vastly speed up how quickly you will learn.
It is hard to visualize some of the concepts that will be being taught to you, so if you have no prior knowledge of them, I think you will find it much harder to learn.
If you are in a hurry, there is nothing wrong with taking one of the intensive courses that I have listed above, but I would recommend that you make sure that are intense practical courses rather than entirely online.
Conclusion
Becoming a level 2 qualified fitness trainer can take anywhere from 2 weeks to 14 months.
The sweet spot seems to be around 4-6 weeks, which would be a course that offers both practical learning days and theory work that you can study at home.
Some of the intense courses that exclusively offer online training may be difficult for some people to get to grips with, and I know from my own personal experience just how helpful it can be to learn whilst in an actual gym environment.
For example, learning about an exercise principle and then immediately going out onto the gym floor to experience it first-hand makes it much easier to remember than having read about it on a page only.
What is best for you depends entirely on your own circumstance, but just remember that faster and cheaper aren’t always the best routes to take. Sometimes it’s worthwhile spending a little time in the trenches yourself, especially if you are planning to do it for a full-time job!
Hopefully, this article has given you a realistic idea of how long it takes to get your level 2 gym instructor qualification. If you are planning on going out and gaining yours, I wish you all the best and I hope you have a great time in the industry.
Go get ’em!
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