Workplace wellness challenges can increase workplace productivity and wellbeing, while also reducing medical spending (1).
Often, wellness challenges are included as part of a broader wellness program for companies that includes health education, access to mindfulness apps and virtual fitness classes, screenings and assessments, and mental wellness and emotional support.
But why are workplace challenges so popular, and what are some wellness challenge platforms?
This article explains why organizations choose to run workplace wellness challenges and what benefits you can expect. We also provide a round-up of our selection of 7 wellness challenge platforms in 2026.
Prefer to skip the round-up and want to speak to a member of the BetterMe Business Team? Talk to us today and get started with workplace wellness challenges.
Why should you run workplace challenges?
Research from the University of St Andrews found that workplace step challenges led to measurable improvements in employees’ physical fitness and mental wellbeing, even during short challenges of 4-8 weeks (2).
Additionally, challenges focused on physical activity have many immediate and long-term benefits, like improved sleep, thinking and cognition, and even decreased short-term anxiety. Other long-term benefits include weight management, reduced wellbeing risks, including cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes, and stronger bones and muscles (3).
These are only a few of the benefits of regular physical exercise.
Workplace challenges should include a mix of physical and emotional challenges and activities to help improve overall wellbeing, mood, and wellbeing.
To improve 2026 corporate wellness results, add workplace challenges to an existing workplace wellness program.
How we chose a wellness challenge platform
We picked 7 wellness challenge platforms based on public data, considering the features each platform offers.
However, please note: The 7 wellness challenge platforms are presented in the alphabetical order for readability. This is not an official ranking; just an editorial round-up.
Wellness challenge platforms 2026
Here is our list of 7 wellness challenge platforms in 2026.
- BetterMe Business
BetterMe Business is a corporate wellness program and app designed for organizations to support employee physical and mental wellbeing.
When choosing a wellness program, our workplace challenges are an additional extra — they are not included unless specifically requested or included in your package when signing up.
In addition to the step challenge (which seems to be the most popular), BetterMe Business offers several other workplace challenges to get your workplace active, including:
- Meditation
- Cardio
- Daily-run
- Breathwork
- Sustainable nutrition
- Pilates
- 28-day marathon daily mindfulness meditation
This is just a sample of the many workplace challenges we offer.
Challenge participants compete against one another and can track their progress on interactive leaderboards. Challenge duration is typically anywhere from 7 to 31 days. However, the BetterMe team can also cater to your needs if you require longer challenges.
The image below provides a brief overview of some of the wellness challenges we offer.
For even better employee wellness, we recommend combining workplace challenges with a broader, holistic employee wellness program. Find out how the BetterMe Business team can support your wellness needs by reaching out today.
BetterMe has excellent tools for your business all in one place: a personalized approach to health and wellness, 1,500 workouts for every fitness level, a variety of meal plans and trackers to satisfy any dietary needs, mental health guides, and employer support. Discover all the options now!
- Big Team Challenge
Big Team Challenge is a virtual walking and movement activity challenge platform designed for large organizations (4, 5).
HR teams and challenge administrators choose between teams vs. teams or a single large-team challenge (5, 6).
In teams vs. teams, you compete against other departments, regions, or other segments to complete a set virtual route. You can track progress via the real-time leaderboard, which also includes the team’s total distance, individual total distance, and average team distance, which is especially useful for smaller teams (7, 8).
The Big Team Challenge requires your organization to work together to complete a much bigger step and activity goal, such as walking the distance around the globe. Progress is tracked on leaderboards, and you can also see visible progress with the built-in map, which also shows the route (5, 6).
When setting up an activity, administrators can choose from either walk, run, cycle, or swim (or all of the above). There are currently more than 300 + virtual routes to choose from. You can also create a custom route if you’re looking for something more varied (7, 8).
The Big Team Challenge app syncs with popular wearables, including Fitbit and Apple Health, for easy, accurate activity tracking (9, 10).
Read more: 4 Mental Wellness Platforms for Every Company Size (2026)
- ChallengeRunner
ChallengeRunner is an employee fitness challenge platform that provides HR teams with the tools they need to set up workplace fitness and wellbeing challenges without complicated software (11).
There are numerous pre-made challenges available, including weight-loss, step and movement challenges, and active minutes, as well as custom challenges. Data is entered via their web page, smartphone apps, and fitness trackers, or via text message (12, 13).
With multiple data entry options, it’s user-friendly and removes many barriers to setting up workplace challenges. Data is automatically synced from wearables and fitness trackers, including Wahoo, Polar, Strava, Oura Ring, FitBit, Garmin, and Wahoo. Challenge progress is tracked via a real-time leaderboard, making it easy to see the competition and who is making the most progress (13, 14).
ChallengeRunner is available within Slack, Microsoft Teams, and Webex platforms, making it easy for HR teams and administrators to set up and manage challenges without requiring additional software or apps (15, 16).
- GoJoe
GoJoe is a global employee wellbeing and engagement platform that helps organizations reduce spiraling costs and improve culture and connections through workplace challenges (17).
The app also allows users to track individual exercises and challenge participation, whether that’s a run or a pickleball session. Users upload their activity, and employees can like and comment on them (18).
However, the main offering is their wellness challenges, which are fully inclusive, use weighted points, sync with wearable devices, and even use anti-cheating technology to ensure fair competition (18).
Teams can run unlimited wellness challenges, whether across multiple departments or spanning several challenge types to suit employee needs (18).
Challenge participants earn points for participating in challenges and maintaining streaks, which can be redeemed for vouchers redeemable at favorite brands, including over 2,000 well-known retailers (17, 19).
- MoveSpring as a part of Reward Gateway
MoveSpring is a step-and-activity challenge platform designed for businesses and organizations (20).
Users connect wearable devices and compete in individual and team-based challenges. Currently, participants can connect multiple devices, including FitBit and Apple Watch among others (20).
Within the challenges tab, participants can communicate with each other, whether that’s competitive, discussing strategy, or kudos for other participants (20).
For some challenges, such as Stepping into Space, there is a visual leaderboard that shows planetary progress. There are also team leaderboards, group journeys, streaks, and more (20).
HR teams can also organize group targets and group target fundraisers (20).
- My Virtual Mission
My Virtual Mission is a community custom virtual challenge platform designed to encourage wellness and fitness while promoting fun and engagement (21).
Instead of traditional challenges like steps or water intake goals, My Virtual Mission uses “Missions” (22).
HR teams and group leaders choose a mission type (these can be solo or team-based). They then set up a map, add mission details, and add participants before launching the mission. Instead of chasing a leaderboard or specific step goal, participants work together to traverse across multiple States or countries (22).
When setting up a mission, you can choose what activities are eligible to make mission progress, whether that’s all activities like walking, running, and cycling, or a running-exclusive mission, for example (21).
There is also a conversion chart that converts time spent doing activities like yoga or weight training into activity distance and mission progress (21, 23).Data syncs from popular fitness apps and trackers, including Garmin and Apple Health among others. Participants can also manually enter activities (24, 25).
Read more: 6 Holistic Corporate Wellness Programs Companies Should Consider in 2026
- YuMuuv
YuMuuv is a workplace wellness challenge app designed to improve workplace wellbeing and engagement initiatives (26).
While many B2B wellness platforms offer wellness challenges, YuMuuv is exclusively a workplace challenge platform — it’s what they do, and it’s reflected in the wide variety and availability of challenges.
YuMuuv offers numerous preset challenges, including step challenges, water intake, sleep, plank challenges, and yoga. HR can fully customize goals, challenge content, communication methods, and challenge formats (27).
HR teams and challenge administrators can also create custom challenges to better suit their employees’ needs and goals, whether that’s activities more specific to a sport like running or cycling, or something as simple as getting up and moving around every 1 hour (27).
You can run unlimited challenges, all of which are fully customizable (27).
Uniquely, employees can also invite spouses and close friends to private challenges to increase motivation (27, 28).
Pricing is based on the number of registered participants and the challenge duration. You choose a custom period, ranging from 1 month to 2+ years, and a fixed number of users. Unlike other B2B platforms, you pay only for users who register for challenges, not for your organization’s headcount (27).
Good workplace wellness challenge ideas include step and movement goals, water intake, daily cardio, and meditation. For the best results, choose workplace challenges that meet your employees’ needs. Participants typically track challenge progress using an employee challenge app, which includes leaderboards (individual and team-based). Some organizations also incentivize challenges by awarding points for challenge participation and completion, which can be redeemed for prizes. Yes! Many organizations host workplace challenges to engage remote and hybrid teams as part of their employee wellbeing platform/program. You can work together towards one big challenge or compete in teams, whether that’s department or region-based. Frequently Asked Questions
What are some good wellness activity challenges?
How do participants track challenge progress?
Are wellness platforms suitable for remote and hybrid teams?
The Bottom Line
Workplace challenges have the potential to improve everything from workplace productivity and employee wellbeing to fewer sick days and lower medical spending.
This article has looked at 7 wellness challenge platforms, with a feature overview to help you see the benefits of employee challenges and why you should consider them.
Contact the BetterMe Business team today and get started with workplace wellness challenges for your organization. We’d love to hear from you.
DISCLAIMER:
This article is intended for general informational purposes only and does not serve to address individual circumstances. It is not a substitute for professional advice or help and should not be relied on for making any kind of decision-making. Any action taken as a direct or indirect result of the information in this article is entirely at your own risk and is your sole responsibility.
BetterMe, its content staff, and its medical advisors accept no responsibility for inaccuracies, errors, misstatements, inconsistencies, or omissions and specifically disclaim any liability, loss or risk, personal, professional or otherwise, which may be incurred as a consequence, directly or indirectly, of the use and/or application of any content.
You should always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition or your specific situation. Never disregard professional medical advice or delay seeking it because of BetterMe content. If you suspect or think you may have a medical emergency, call your doctor.
SOURCES:
- What do Workplace Wellness Programs do? Evidence from the Illinois Workplace Wellness Study (2019, pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov)
- Significant health benefits from workplace step count challenges, study finds (2025, stir.ac.uk)
- Benefits of Physical Activity (n.d., cdc.gov)
- Big Team Challenge – App Store listing (n.d., Apple App Store)
- Step Challenge – Get your workplace moving! (n.d., Big Team Challenge)
- Features – Leaderboards (n.d., Big Team Challenge)
- One Big Challenge (n.d., Big Team Challenge)
- Choose from any of our 300+ virtual walking routes (n.d., Big Team Challenge)
- Features – Sync Your Steps (n.d., Big Team Challenge)
- FAQ: Tracking steps using fitbit and other smart devices (n.d., Big Team Challenge)
- ChallengeRunner – Homepage (n.d., ChallengeRunner)
- Creating a Workplace Fitness Challenge (n.d., ChallengeRunner)
- Employee Wellness Challenge Management Features (n.d., ChallengeRunner)
- ChallengeRunner – App Store listing (n.d., Apple App Store)
- Challenge Collaboration Apps (n.d., ChallengeRunner)
- Collecting and Validating Participant Data (n.d., ChallengeRunner)
- Why GoJoe (n.d., GoJoe)
- Employee Wellness Challenge Management Features (n.d., ChallengeRunner)
- Corporate Wellness Challenge Platform | GoJoe (n.d., GoJoe)
- Employee Rewards Platform (n.d., GoJoe)
- My Virtual Mission – Homepage (n.d., My Virtual Mission)
- How it works (n.d., My Virtual Mission)
- Activity Conversion Chart (n.d., My Virtual Mission Help Center)
- Connections (integrations) (n.d., My Virtual Mission Help Center)
- MoveSpring – App Store listing (n.d., Apple App Store)
- YuMuuv – Homepage (n.d., YuMuuv)
- Pricing | YuMuuv (n.d., YuMuuv)
- Creating a challenge (Help Center) (n.d., YuMuuv Help Center)










