Every month we read what coaches on QuickCoach actually assign, group every spelling of the same movement together, and publish the result on what coaches program. That page always shows the latest month. It doesn't show what moved. So we lined the September 2026 read up against October's, movement by movement, the same way we did for August against September.
The headline: the row pulled further ahead, the lat pulldown took second place from the Romanian deadlift, and October leaned towards machines and away from core work.
The short answer
The row rose to 59.7% of clients. The lat pulldown (38.2%) overtook the Romanian deadlift (34.9%, down 2.6 points) for second place. Machine movements climbed: the chest press and hip abduction each gained 2.2 points, the leg press 1.3. Core fell from 11.9% to 11.0% of assigned exercises, while pull rose to 18.3%.
What this is, in one paragraph
We compare two monthly reads of programming on QuickCoach, a platform used by more than 40,000 coaches and fitness businesses. September 2026 covered 229,713 verified assigned exercises grouped into 4,144 movements. October 2026 covered 232,596 grouped into 4,721. Movement figures are the share of clients assigned each movement at least once that month. Changes are in percentage points. The full method, and what one month can and can't tell you, is at the foot of the page.
Quickfire answers on October 2026 programming
- Which exercise gained the most clients from September to October 2026?
- The chest press and the hip abduction machine, level on a 2.2-point rise. On QuickCoach the chest press went from 18.3% to 20.5% of clients and hip abduction from 13.1% to 15.3%. The row gained 2.0 points to 59.7%.
- Is the Romanian deadlift losing ground?
- It slipped. The Romanian deadlift fell from 37.5% to 34.9% of clients on QuickCoach in October 2026 and dropped from second to third. The hinge pattern as a whole barely moved (9.8% to 9.7%), because the conventional deadlift and trap bar deadlift both gained.
- Did coaches program more machine work in October 2026?
- Yes. A machine was named on 13.9% of exercises assigned on QuickCoach in October, up from 13.2%, and the chest press, hip abduction, leg press, leg extension, leg curl and lat pulldown all gained at least 0.8 points of client reach.
- Did core work keep rising?
- No. After climbing from 10.8% to 11.9% of assigned exercises between August and September, core fell back to 11.0% in October. The dead bug, Pallof press and side plank each held or gained a little, so the fall came from the rest of the core list.
- Are coaches programming more carries now?
- Slightly more of one carry. The farmer's carry rose from 7.3% to 8.3% of clients on QuickCoach, but the carry pattern stayed at 0.8% of assigned exercises in both months. Carries remain the least-programmed pattern by a wide margin.
- How much data is this comparison based on?
- 229,713 verified assigned exercises in September 2026 and 232,596 in October 2026, grouped into 4,144 and 4,721 movements, from QuickCoach, a platform used by more than 40,000 coaches and fitness businesses.
Which exercises did coaches program more in October?
The climbers are a machine list with a few free-weight lifts mixed in. The chest press gained 2.2 points to reach 20.5% of clients and jumped from 18th to 13th. Hip abduction gained the same 2.2 points. The leg press, leg extension, leg curl and lat pulldown all rose too. Then come the row itself, up 2.0 points, the reverse lunge, up 1.7, and the shoulder press, also up 1.7.
Biggest climbers, September to October 2026
Change in share of clients assigned the movement at least once, percentage points
Movements from the top 50. Every spelling of each movement is grouped together. The leg extension and lateral raise also gained a full point.
Six of the fourteen climbers are machine or cable movements. That's a different shape from September, when the climbers were the deadlift, dead bug and pull-up. It fits a month where more clients were training in a gym than at home: the share of exercise names that don't state an implement fell from 30.4% to 28.6%, and the share naming a machine rose. We ranked that machine list on its own in the gym machines coaches program most.
Which exercises did coaches program less?
The fallers are the free-weight staples. The Romanian deadlift lost 2.6 points and its second place. The generic squat fell 1.4 points, the box jump 1.3, and the Bulgarian split squat, pull-up and bench press each slipped by half a point or more. None of these is a trend reversal. They gave a little ground to machines and to the row.
Biggest fallers, September to October 2026
Change in share of clients assigned the movement at least once, percentage points
Movements from the top 50, plus the Copenhagen plank, clamshell and kettlebell swing from the long tail. A fall of one point means about one client in a hundred fewer was assigned the movement.
Two of these fallers need a second look. The Romanian deadlift's drop was not a drop in hinging: the conventional deadlift rose 0.9 points to 16.8% and the trap bar deadlift 0.7 points to 9.1%, so the hinge pattern held at 9.7% of assigned exercises. Coaches swapped one hinge for another. The generic "squat" fell while the goblet squat and back squat both rose, which looks more like coaches naming the implement than dropping the pattern. We explain why names shift like this in exercise abbreviations and name variations.
Did the top of the list change?
For the first time since we started the monthly read, yes. The lat pulldown passed the Romanian deadlift to take second place, which puts two pulls at the top of the list. The row itself stretched its lead to 59.7%. Further down, the chest press jumped five places and the shoulder press moved into the top eight.
| Movement | Oct rank | September | October | Change (pts) | Rank move |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Row | 1 | 57.7% | 59.7% | +2.0 | same |
| Lat Pulldown | 2 | 36.8% | 38.2% | +1.4 | up 1 |
| Romanian Deadlift | 3 | 37.5% | 34.9% | −2.6 | down 1 |
| Bench Press | 4 | 32.2% | 31.7% | −0.5 | same |
| Lateral Raise | 5 | 26.2% | 27.2% | +1.0 | same |
| Hip Thrust | 6 | 24.5% | 25.8% | +1.3 | same |
| Leg Extension | 7 | 23.6% | 24.6% | +1.0 | same |
| Shoulder Press | 8 | 21.0% | 22.7% | +1.7 | up 1 |
| Goblet Squat | 9 | 20.6% | 21.3% | +0.7 | up 2 |
| Squat | 10 | 22.6% | 21.2% | −1.4 | down 2 |
| Push-Up | 11 | 20.9% | 21.1% | +0.2 | down 1 |
| Leg Press | 12 | 19.5% | 20.8% | +1.3 | same |
| Chest Press | 13 | 18.3% | 20.5% | +2.2 | up 5 |
| Overhead Press | 14 | 19.4% | 19.7% | +0.3 | down 1 |
| Leg Curl | 15 | 18.4% | 19.2% | +0.8 | up 2 |
Share of clients assigned the movement at least once in the month. October's full top 50 is on what coaches program.
A reshuffle at the top is worth noting without over-reading. The gap between second and third was 0.7 points in September and is 3.3 points now, so the lat pulldown's lead is real rather than a rounding artefact. But both movements still reach more than a third of clients, and the four most-programmed movements are the same four as in August. What's changed is the order, not the set.
How did the split across movement patterns change?
Group movements by pattern and two things moved by more than half a point. Pull rose from 17.7% to 18.3%, driven by the row and lat pulldown. Core fell from 11.9% to 11.0%, giving back most of what it gained in September. Everything else held within two-tenths of a point, including carries at 0.8%.
| Pattern | September | October | Change (pts) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pull | 17.7% | 18.3% | +0.6 |
| Push | 17.0% | 17.3% | +0.3 |
| Mobility / warm-up | 13.9% | 13.7% | −0.2 |
| Core | 11.9% | 11.0% | −0.9 |
| Hinge / hip | 9.8% | 9.7% | −0.1 |
| Squat / knee | 7.7% | 7.7% | 0.0 |
| Lunge | 5.0% | 4.9% | −0.1 |
| Conditioning | 4.7% | 4.6% | −0.1 |
| Carry | 0.8% | 0.8% | 0.0 |
Share of assigned exercises that could be classified to a pattern, on a 90th-percentile trimmed set so a few very high-volume accounts can't skew it.
The core fall is the odd one, because the named core drills mostly held. The dead bug rose to 18.7%, the side plank to 12.7% and the Pallof press to 13.3%, while the plank slipped 0.3 points. Our best reading is that generic core entries fell: the "core, changes weekly" and "abs" lines some coaches use as a placeholder for a circuit they explain in person. We can't see those directly in the grouped figures, so treat it as a reading rather than a measurement. What we can say is that the pattern lost nearly a point while no named drill lost more than 0.3. We rank the full core list, from dead bugs to hanging leg raises, in a separate report.
Did the equipment mix change?
Yes, and more than the patterns did. Entries that don't state an implement fell from 30.4% to 28.6%, the biggest single move in this table. The machine, dumbbell, cable, band and barbell shares all rose to fill the gap, while bodyweight fell a full point. Read together, October's programs were more specific about kit, and the kit was more often a gym's.
| Equipment named | September | October | Change (pts) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Unspecified / generic | 30.4% | 28.6% | −1.8 |
| Bodyweight | 20.6% | 19.6% | −1.0 |
| Machine | 13.2% | 13.9% | +0.7 |
| Dumbbell | 11.6% | 12.5% | +0.9 |
| Cable | 6.0% | 6.3% | +0.3 |
| Band | 4.5% | 4.8% | +0.3 |
| Barbell | 4.2% | 4.5% | +0.3 |
| Kettlebell | 1.5% | 1.4% | −0.1 |
Share of assigned exercises where the implement could be inferred from the name. Suspension (1.0%), trap bar (0.6%), landmine (0.6%), sled (0.4%) and plate (0.2%) make up most of the remainder. Fuller numbers are in what equipment online coaches program.
Does this match what the wider fitness market is doing?
Broadly, yes. The American College of Sports Medicine's worldwide fitness trends survey for 2026, a poll of about 2,000 exercise professionals, ranks traditional strength training seventh and functional fitness tenth, with balance, flow and core strength at number five. Our data is the programming behind those votes. Strength work is the bulk of what coaches assign, core and mobility together are a quarter of it, and conditioning is under 5%.
The machine lean in October also fits the participation data. The Sports & Fitness Industry Association's 2026 fitness participation report, drawn from 18,000 interviews on 2025 activity in the United States, describes free-weight participation as growing, resistance machines as stable, and bodyweight and calisthenics as softening. Our October numbers show the same direction inside coaching programs: bodyweight down a point, machines, dumbbells and barbells up. One month on one platform is not a market survey, but the two are pointing the same way.
What happened in the long tail?
The long tail grew faster than the data did. October's read grouped assigned exercises into 4,721 distinct movements, up 14% from 4,144, against a 1.3% rise in volume. The share of assigned work coming from outside the 100 most common movements held at about 42%, the same as September and August. So the tail got longer without getting heavier: more one-off and client-specific names, not more volume in them.
Within the tail, 3,127 movements were classed as uncommon or novel in October, up from 2,477 in the August read we published in the uncommon exercises report. Mobility work is 22% of that long tail, core 20% and pushes and pulls about 9% each, the same shape as August. The Copenhagen plank, September's long-tail standout, eased from 5.8% to 5.0% of clients. The Nordic curl went the other way, from 1.5% to 2.0%, and the air bike rose from 2.0% to 2.6%.
Are coaches naming exercises more consistently?
No. Coaches typed 27,187 distinct exercise names in October, against 26,661 in September and 25,900 in August. More than 1,400 of those names contain the word "row". As in previous months, most of that variety is useful detail written into the name: side, grip, tempo, a regression, the seat setting on a machine.
It is still the hidden cost of typing programs by hand. A name written fresh each time loses its demo video and its history. Saving each exercise once in a library, then building programs from templates, keeps the name, the video and the record attached.
What should coaches take from one month of change?
Treat it as a prompt to check your own programs, not a trend to chase. October's shifts were small, and most of them trace back to where clients trained and how coaches named things rather than to any change in method. If you want to see what the ranking looks like when it is written out as a plan, we built and graded it in the average coaching program, built from the data. Three questions are worth asking:
- Did your clients' equipment change? October's shift towards machines looks like more clients training in gyms. If yours did too, check that the program they're on still matches the kit in front of them, and keep a home version ready for the weeks it doesn't.
- Is your core work named? The pattern fell while the dead bug, Pallof press and side plank all held or gained, which points at generic placeholder lines. If a client's core slot says "abs", name the drill so the demo video and the history travel with it.
- Is the hinge still there? The Romanian deadlift slipped but the hinge held, because coaches swapped in deadlifts and trap bar pulls. Any hinge works. Dropping the pattern doesn't.
Methodology and limitations
How we got these numbers
Source. Two monthly reads of programming on QuickCoach, a platform used by more than 40,000 coaches and fitness businesses worldwide: 229,713 verified assigned exercises in September 2026 and 232,596 in October 2026. Months run on Australian Eastern Standard Time. No individual coach, client or plan is identifiable in anything published here.
Definitions. Exercise names are free text. Every spelling, abbreviation and equipment variation of the same movement was grouped into one canonical movement before counting: 4,144 movements in September and 4,721 in October. Movement figures are the share of clients assigned each movement at least once in the month. Pattern and equipment shares are of the assigned exercises that could be classified, on a 90th-percentile trimmed set (201,022 entries in September, 215,274 in October), so a few unusually high-volume accounts can't skew them.
Like for like. Every September figure here is the one we published from the September read on what coaches program and in the September data reports, compared with the same measure for October. The uncommon-movement count is compared with August, the last month we published it. The count of distinct names containing "row" is a text match on raw exercise names and is not comparable with the grouped spelling counts in earlier reports.
Limits. One month to the next is a short window. The group of coaches and clients changes from month to month, and grouping improves as we see more spellings. A movement can rise because a few coaches with large rosters started a block. Read changes of under a point as noise. External surveys cited above measure different populations in different countries and are context, not a like-for-like comparison. Figures are rounded.
Privacy. Everything is aggregated. No personal data, client information or individual plan is exposed.
Frequently asked questions
What changed in what coaches programmed in October 2026?
Pulls and machines rose, core fell. The row reached 59.7% of clients (up 2.0 points), the lat pulldown overtook the Romanian deadlift for second place, and the chest press and hip abduction each gained 2.2 points. Core fell from 11.9% to 11.0% of assigned exercises.
Is the row still the most-programmed exercise?
Yes, and by more. A row of some kind reached 59.7% of clients in October 2026, up from 57.7% in September and 56.8% in August. It sits well ahead of the lat pulldown (38.2%), the Romanian deadlift (34.9%) and the bench press (31.7%).
Why did the Romanian deadlift fall in October?
Coaches swapped hinges rather than dropping them. The Romanian deadlift fell 2.6 points to 34.9% of clients, but the conventional deadlift rose to 16.8% and the trap bar deadlift to 9.1%, so the hinge pattern held at 9.7% of assigned exercises.
Did coaches program more machine exercises in October 2026?
Yes. A machine was named on 13.9% of assigned exercises, up from 13.2%, and the chest press, hip abduction, leg press, leg extension, leg curl and lat pulldown all gained client reach. Generic names that don't state an implement fell from 30.4% to 28.6%.
Is one month of change a trend?
Not on its own. A month-on-month shift can come from new coaches joining, new training blocks starting or more clients training in gyms. We treat these as signals to watch and compare each new month on the living what coaches program page.
Published November 2026, comparing the September and October 2026 reads. The latest month always lives on what coaches program, the previous comparison is August against September, and we'll compare each new month as it lands. Questions about the data? Reach us at support@quickcoach.fit.
