For Gen Z, hitting the gym is the new 'going out' — 81 million members have jumped on the bandwagon as fitness clubs become social spaces

And people aren’t just signing up and forgetting about it. According to the Health and Fitness Association, the U.S. now has 81 million gym members, up 5.2% from a year ago, and the share of members who never use their membership has dropped to a record low of 4.6%.

Americans are paying for the gym and actually showing up, and the biggest reason may have less to do with six-packs and more to do with socializing.

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Adults aged 18 to 24 now have the highest gym membership rate in the country at 35.5%, according to HFA. Meanwhile, fitness app Strava says new clubs on its platform exploded to one million in 2025, with running clubs growing 3.5 times and hiking clubs growing 5.8 times year over year.

Here’s a whopping statistic: 64% of Gen Z respondents said they’d rather spend money on fitness gear than on a date.

It’s a shift in how young people are spending their time and money, and according to a recent article in The Wall Street Journal, many people in the younger generation are choosing health and fitness over socializing with alcohol.

Researchers have a name for what’s happening. Sociologist Ray Oldenburg called places outside home and work where people build community “third places.” For decades, that meant coffee shops, churches, pubs and neighborhood hangouts.

Nowadays, it seems that the most popular third place is increasingly becoming the gym.

With loneliness among young adults remaining stubbornly high, the weight room, spin class and Saturday morning run club are becoming places to meet friends, find dates and feel connected — all while getting a workout in.

Wall Street missed the memo

While gym attendance is hitting record highs, venture capital has largely backed away from the fitness industry.

Global funding for fitness and wellness startups fell to just over $5 billion in 2025, according to Crunchbase data cited by Forbes.

But investors didn’t stop spending on fitness. They just spent it somewhere else.

Companies that measure health have been showered with cash. ŌURA raised funding at an $11 billion valuation, WHOOP secured a major funding round valuing it above $10 billion, and Strava reached a reported valuation of about $2.2 billion.