Where do I start at the gym, and what should I eat?

Start with two or three strength sessions a week that work the whole body, keep them a little easier than you think they need to be, and add a bit each week. Walk, play a sport or ride a bike on some of the other days. Eat at the times that already suit your day, with a protein food at most of them, from dishes you already like.

This is how Nume starts someone new. The rest of this page sets out the approach and the guidance behind it, so you can follow it with Nume or on your own.

Who this is for

Anyone starting for the first time, or starting again after a long break. People ask it in words like these: “I want to be 130 by June but I don’t really know where to start.” We see the question often.

If someone has already given you a plan, from a coach, a friend or ChatGPT, check it first.

The first four weeks

How many days

The WHO recommends that adults build up to 150 to 300 minutes of moderate activity a week (or 75 to 150 minutes of vigorous activity), plus muscle-strengthening work for all the major muscle groups on 2 or more days a week. It also says to start with small amounts and increase how often, how hard and how long over time. The American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM), in its 2009 guidance, suggested two to three strength days a week for beginners.

So a full beginner’s week is two or three short strength sessions plus some walking or sport. You don’t need to reach 150 minutes in week one.

In Nume: you choose the days you can train, home or gym, and a session length from 15 to 60 minutes, or leave those to Nume. If you already play a sport or walk, Nume plans your food around it.

What a session looks like

Warm up with a few minutes of easy movement, then do one exercise for each part of the body:

Part	At a gym	At home
Legs	Leg press or goblet squat	Squat to a chair
Hips and back	Romanian deadlift or hip thrust	Glute bridge
Push	Chest press	Press-ups against a wall, a bench or the floor
Pull	Seated row or lat pulldown	Row with a resistance band
Trunk	Plank	Plank or dead bug

ACSM’s 2009 guidance for beginners is a weight you can lift 8 to 12 times in a row. Its 2026 review of the research found strength improved with 2 to 3 sets, a full range of motion, at least two sessions a week and heavier loads. Start light and work up to them. If you already play a sport, walk most days or do yoga, keep doing it. The NHS counts yoga and pilates as strengthening, and brisk walking, riding a bike and sports like football as aerobic activity.

In Nume: each workout is written out with sets, reps and rest, and you follow it step by step on your phone.

How hard

For walking, cycling or sport, the NHS has an easy test: at moderate effort you can still talk, but not sing. For strength work, finish each set feeling you could have done a couple more reps. ACSM’s 2026 review found that training every set to failure did not consistently change results.

How to add over time

ACSM’s 2009 rule is a good one to follow: once you can do one or two more reps than the target, add a little weight next time. It suggested 2 to 10%. Here is one way the first four weeks could go:

Week	Strength	Other days	What changes
1	2 sessions, 2 sets of each exercise, light	A walk or your sport on 1 or 2 days	Learning the movements
2	2 sessions, 2 to 3 sets	2 days	A few more reps
3	2 or 3 sessions, 3 sets	2 or 3 days	More weight where you reach 12 reps
4	3 sessions, 3 sets	2 or 3 days	The same, a little heavier

In Nume: the workouts it writes start easy. After a full session, the next one steps up.

Food without counting everything

Eat at your own times. One to six times a day, whatever your day already looks like. That might be breakfast and a late dinner, or four times with an evening meal before training.

Have some protein at most of them. The International Society of Sports Nutrition (ISSN) gives 1.4 to 2.0 g of protein per kg of body weight a day as enough for most people who exercise, against a general adult intake of 0.8 g per kg, and suggests spreading it in servings of about 20 to 40 g. You don’t need to count to get close. Put a protein food at most of your eating times. Eggs on toast, chicken with rice, dal with a bowl of curd, paneer or tofu in a curry, a bean burrito, a tuna or chickpea sandwich and Greek yogurt with fruit all do it.

Start from food you already like. Keep the dishes you cook and order, and build on them: chicken in the pasta, an egg on the noodles, beans in the tacos, an extra bowl of dal. Whey or another protein powder is a handy way to add protein if you like it.

If your goal is to lose fat, the NHS suggests aiming for 0.5 to 1 kg a week.

In Nume: you set your eating times and the cuisines you eat, and Nume plans dishes you already cook and order, with energy and protein on each meal. You log a meal with a tap, a sentence or a photo, so nothing has to be weighed or counted by hand.

Two common ways a start ends

Doing too much in week one

This one is our advice, drawn from the WHO’s guidance to start with small amounts. Very sore legs on day three make the next session easy to skip. Make week one easier than you think it should be, and leave each session feeling you could have done more. If you’re still very sore when the next session comes, do a lighter version or go for a walk, then pick the plan up again next time.

In Nume: workouts start easy by design. For fat loss, the first two weeks use a smaller cut, and protein builds up week by week.

A week that gets disrupted and never restarts

A change in life or schedule is one of the most common reasons people stop. One person wrote: “I was highly motivated in January, went 15 times, then work travel picked up.”

What helps:

Decide your minimum week now, for example one strength session and a couple of walks, and do that in a bad week.
After a missed session, do the next one as written. There’s no need to double up.
After a longer break, restart lighter than where you stopped and build back.
Restart at the next meal or the next session, whatever day it is. Monday isn’t special.

In Nume: a skipped session is dropped, so nothing piles onto the next one. After two missed sessions in a row, the next two are made easier, and the first session back after time away is lighter. On a trip, you choose to keep training, keep it light or take a break, and meals follow where you are.

Soreness and tiredness: what’s normal

Achy muscles one to three days after a new kind of exercise, and feeling more tired than usual in the first weeks, are normal and ease as your body gets used to the work. Pain far beyond that, dark urine or sudden weakness after a hard session is not normal soreness: get it checked the same day.

Starting with Nume

You answer seven questions: about you, your goal, your food, what a normal day looks like, the exercise you already do, whether Nume should plan workouts for you, and your eating times. Your first plan arrives in about a minute, and from then on it changes from what you actually eat and do.

Nume is free while the beta runs.

Checked on 12 November 2026 · The Nume team