Can I listen to my own music when working out?

asensei gives you a variety of options for listening to music, or podcasts, or any other form of audio when working out!  

If you want to change your music source, you can do so from the MY ASENSEI (settings) page.  Choose MY ASENSEI from the main menu button (or on older app releases choose Hey asensei [+] then My asensei).  On the MY ASENSEI page tap on the option shown beneath the Music heading where you'll be given a choice of several options - detailed below:

Music Option: BY ASENSEI

Music 'BY ASENSEI' is your default option and consists of playlists curated especially for asensei with our music partner feed.fm.  This option gives us the greatest control over what we can do with music during a workout.  Uniquely in this mode you'll see on-screen track notifications appear at the top of the screen when the track changes and we also have greatest control over the ducking of this music so it will be played at the most optimal volume possible.

Music Option: YOUR OWN 

You have two options for playing back your own music, either Apple Music or Background. 

Apple Music

The Apple Music option allows you to choose a playlist from your Apple Music collection and asensei will play this automatically during your workout.

When you choose this option asensei is able to pause the music during specific parts of the workout to allow you to hear the coach's introductions or wrap-ups for example.

asensei is not able to control the volume of the Apple Music playback dynamically during a workout.  Instead the app provides a coarse adjust to the music level which should ensure the coach is audible.

• If the music is too quiet when working out then you can use the volume slider in the app (tap the screen during a workout) to reduce the coach volume if you find it too loud.  You may of course turn up/down the entire audio volume using the volume controls on your phone as usual - this will adjust the audio levels of video, music and asensei's voice together. 
• If your Apple music is too loud even after asensei has ducked it in your workout and the coach is set to max volume in the asensei app via the slider, then your options are currently limited to playing with the Music equalizer settings to try and reduce the loudness a little, however this is a relatively minor adjustment.  To do this go to Settings > Music > EQ and choose the EQ setting that helps the most.

Background Music

The Background music option allows you to play music from any 3rd party app such as Spotify, Pandora, Soundcloud, or your favourite podcast app.  You will need to start the music yourself before you start your workout but the music will continue during the workout.  

Note that similar to the Apple Music mode, asensei is unable to control the volume of the 3rd party application directly in Background music mode so it simply ducks the music volume (a coarse volume reduction) to help make the asensei audio (such as the coach instructions) more audible.  To adjust the relative volume of asensei and the music app you have these options:

• If the music is too quiet when working out you can turn down the asensei/coach audio by tapping the screen and sliding the volume slider towards the music icon.  This will adjust the mix of asensei:music.  You can then turn up the overall volume via the phone volume controls.
• In rare circumstances if your 3rd party app is playing extremely 'loud' music for some reason (heavily boosted audio, such as you hear during adverts on TV, or the music app is in 'loud' mode) then it may still be difficult to hear the asensei coach feedback.  Your options are limited here, turn off the loudness boost in the 3rd party app or use a less boosted version of the audio track. Playing with an equalizer in your music app to adjust your playback music volume may help a little if such a feature exists.  If you are having problems, let us know at [e-mail] and we'll do our best to help.

Get in the zone

The Get In the Zone option allows you to turn off music altogether.  Tap on the text saying None and you won't have any music playing while you workout, allowing you to get in the zone and stay in the zone.

As before if you want to skip a track, pause or play, you can use the iOS Control Center.

We hope you enjoy these expanded options, but tell us what you think via [e-mail].