> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://chrislatham.ca/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # I Built My Own Fitness App with AI and Zero Developer Skills - Here's Exactly How - URL: https://chrislatham.ca/how-i-built-a-fitness-app-with-ai/ - Published: 2026-04-19T15:44:29.000Z - Updated: 2026-04-20T04:39:51.000Z - Description: A "showing my work" breakdown of going from idea to live app without writing a single line of code. - Author: Chris Latham - Tags: Learning & Curiosity I've been paying for fitness tracking apps for years. Monthly fees. Features I don't use. Features I wish existed but don't. At some point I thought: what if I just built exactly what I needed? The old answer to that question was: *"You can't. You'd need a developer. That costs serious money."* The new answer? AI changed everything. Here's the full breakdown of how I built **Accumulate**, my personal fitness tracking app, from idea to live, secure, mobile-friendly web app. No developer. No code experience. Just AI tools, some good questions, and a few developer friends who pointed me in the right direction. ## **The Problem: I Don't Have 60-Minute Workout Windows Anymore** My days of blocking out an hour for the gym are done. Life happened. But I can squeeze in exercises throughout the day, 12 reps here, a plank there, a few sets of kettlebell rows between meetings. The apps I was paying for (like Heavy) weren't built for this. They're built for structured programs. I just needed one thing: log what I did, see it add up over time. And I wasn't going to keep paying a monthly SaaS fee for that one feature. So I built my own. ## **What Accumulate Actually Does** Before I get into the build, here's the finished product. The app is simple by design. I hit the **+** button, log an exercise, say, 12 reps of bent-over kettlebell rows with an 18kg kettlebell, and it logs to my daily totals: total reps, total weight moved, and active time for things like planks and holds. Then I can look back at history by day, week, or month. March: 297 reps, 7,283 pounds moved, 1:30 of active time. April so far: 46 reps, 1,737 pounds. It's not glamorous. It's exactly what I need. ![screenshot of accumulate dashboard](https://chrislatham.ca/content/images/2026/04/accumulate-dashboard-screenshot.png) screenshot of accumulate dashboard ## **Step 1: The Brain Dump - Claude Chat** Everything started in **Claude chat**. Not with a perfectly written prompt. With a brain dump. I literally talked into a microphone, explained what I wanted, had it transcribed, and pasted that into Claude. Something like: *"Hey, I've got this idea. I want to build an app to track my health and fitness, mainly exercise routines, here's everything I'm thinking..."* and then rambled for a few hundred words. Claude didn't just say "okay, here's your app." It asked me clarifying questions I hadn't even thought about: - What platform am I targeting first? (Mobile? Desktop? Both?) - What do I want to see on the home screen? - Should the app support multiple users? That last one, multiple users, I hadn't even considered. The answer was easy: no. Just me. But without Claude asking, I might have gotten something way more complicated than I needed. ![Screenshot of the Claude chat conversation showing the back-and-forth Q&A that led to the PRD](https://chrislatham.ca/content/images/2026/04/claude-ai-chat-for-accumulate.png) Screenshot of the Claude chat conversation showing the back-and-forth Q&A that led to the PRD ## **Step 2: The PRD - The Blueprint Everything Depends On** After the Q&A, Claude produced a **PRD file**: a Product Requirements Document. I had no idea what that stood for until a developer friend told me: *"Whatever you do, get a PRD made first. It's the blueprint. Any AI or developer you hand it to will know exactly what to build."* That advice was gold. The PRD captured everything: the purpose of the app, the features, the platform targets, the user flow, all of it. It became the single source of truth for the entire build. ![screenshot of accumulate prd](https://chrislatham.ca/content/images/2026/04/screenshot-of-accumulate-prd.png) screenshot of accumulate prd ## **Step 3: The Design , Google Stitch** I'm not a designer. At all. But I knew I needed something to show Claude Code what the app should *look* like, not just what it should *do*. I used **Google Stitch**, a free, AI-powered design tool. Think of it like Figma, but it does most of the work for you. I put in the goal of what I wanted to achieve and it generated a clean dashboard: total reps for the day, weight moved, active time, the log button, all of it laid out nicely. That screenshot became the design reference for the entire build. ![Screenshot of the Google Stitch-generated design mockup](https://chrislatham.ca/content/images/2026/04/screenshot-of-accumulate-design-build-in-google-stitch.png) Screenshot of the Google Stitch-generated design mockup ## **Step 4: Claude Code - Actually Building the Thing** With the PRD ready and the design screenshot in hand, I moved into **Claude Code**. My first message was direct: *"I want you to view this file and make sure you have everything you need to get this built, because I do not want to go back and forth a million times."* Then I fed it the design screenshot too. Claude Code can see images, which is a big deal, it meant it could understand the visual layout, not just the written specs. From there it was a back-and-forth process. Questions, adjustments, refinements. More back-and-forth than I would have liked (Claude credits add up fast), but it got there. ![screenshot of claude code with accumulate prd](https://chrislatham.ca/content/images/2026/04/screenshot-of-claude-code-with-accumulate-prd.png) screenshot of claude code with accumulate prd ## **Step 5: GitHub - Where the Code Lives** Once the app was built, it needed a home. That home is **GitHub**. I'll be honest, I'm still figuring GitHub out. But the short version is: it's where developers store and manage code. Claude Code helped me push the project there, and from GitHub it could be deployed. ![screenshot of accumulate github repository](https://chrislatham.ca/content/images/2026/04/screenshot-of-accumulate-github.png) screenshot of accumulate github repository ## **Step 6: Cloudflare - Making It Live** **Cloudflare** took the code from GitHub and made it accessible as an actual live URL I could visit on my phone or desktop. This is the part that still kind of blows my mind. I have a real, live web app. Not a prototype. Not a local thing that only runs on my laptop. A real URL I can bookmark, open on mobile, and use every single day. 0:00 /0:19 1× Video usage of accumulate ## **Step 7: Security - The Part Most People Skip** This is where most non-developer builders stop. The app works, it's live, done, right? Not quite. A developer friend warned me: *"People are building stuff, launching it online, and it's not secure. Your data is going out there."* That hit hard. So I took the code to **OpenAI Codex** specifically for a security audit. Not to build anything new, just to poke holes in what I already had. Codex found some weak points and I went back and forth to fix them. The most important fix: **the app can only be accessed with my email address**. You could open the URL in an incognito window right now and you're not getting in unless you have my email. That's a feature Codex helped me lock down. ![codex security check of accumulate app](https://chrislatham.ca/content/images/2026/04/codex-security-check-of-accumulate-app.png) codex security check of accumulate app ## **The Full Tool Stack** Here's every tool that touched this build: - **Claude Chat**: initial ideation, Q&A, and PRD generation - **Google Stitch**: free AI design tool for creating the visual mockup - **Claude Code**: the actual build, turning the PRD and design into a working app - **GitHub**: code storage and version control - **Cloudflare**: deployment, making the app live and accessible - **OpenAI Codex**: security audit and vulnerability fixes ## **What This Cost Me** A few bucks a month, maybe less. Way less than the SaaS app I was using before for one feature. The bigger investment was time and the willingness to go through the back-and-forth. AI didn't build this in one shot. It took rounds of questions, refinements, and adjustments. But at no point did it require me to know how to code. ## **What This Proves** I'm a marketer. I'm not a developer. I had never built an app before this. And now I have one. It's live. It's mine. It works exactly the way I want it to. And the only people who can access it are the people I allow in. The tools are there. The barrier isn't skill anymore, it's knowing what questions to ask. Get a PRD. Have a clear picture of what you want. Then let the AI do the heavy lifting. Personal apps aren't just for developers anymore.