167. How Vitality 2026 Expands Access, Adds Sleep Rewards, And Boosts Fitness Points

What if your weekly routine could fund your favourite devices and turn better sleep into real-world rewards? We sat down with Vaughan to unpack Vitality’s 2026 refresh and how it changes the game for anyone chasing health, status, and sustainable habits. The conversation zeroes in on three pillars: easier access to activities and devices, sleep as a foundational behaviour, and smarter ways to stack points without adding complexity.

We start with access. Demand for yoga and Pilates has surged, so Vitality added around 50 more studios and enabled class bookings at Virgin Active through the platform. Check-ins are seamless: book a class, scan a QR code, and collect 100 points. That simplicity nudges consistency and opens doors to a variety of workouts, from boxing and HIIT to mindful movement. On the device side, Garmin joins Apple in the fully funded model, letting you meet weekly goals to cover the cost over time or opt for up to 25% upfront discount. Footwear discounts at Sportsmans and Totalsports remain a practical boost for runners, walkers, and even golfers.

Then we place sleep where it belongs: at the base of health. Vitality Sleep Rewards sets a weekly sleep goal built from nightly scores, with Discovery Miles or instant treats like coffee when you hit the mark. There’s no penalty if you miss, only missed upside, which keeps motivation clean. To power accurate insights, Vitality partners exclusively with Oura. Members can fully fund an Oura ring through consistent sleep goals or take a 25% upfront discount, turning recovery into a measurable, rewarding habit.

Points get a thoughtful upgrade too. You can earn up to 500 points per month for quality sleep. Cardio fitness steps out as its own category, allowing 10,000 cardio fitness points plus 25,000 from fitness events, lifting the total available fitness points to 35,000. It’s a design that rewards both daily effort and long-term aerobic capacity, while aligning with how behaviours reinforce each other: train well, sleep better, eat smarter, repeat.

Ready to turn your routine into rewards? Follow the show, share it with a friend who needs a nudge, and leave a quick review so others can find us and level up their health.

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:12

Hello everybody. Welcome to Know Your Money. I'm Bronwin Wayner.

What Vitality Aims To Solve

SPEAKER_01 0:16

And I'm Craig Finch, and we are from Growth Financial Planning. We hope you enjoy our podcast. Welcome once again, Vogan. Thank you for joining us in the studio. Bron, nice to see you. Thanks, Craig. And good to chat about every year Vitality does some upgrades, some changes, some tweaks in the fantastic program that you've got. And making you healthy, knowing your health to make you healthier, to live longer, to claim less. I would think that's the main goal from the vitality perspective. But there have been some exciting changes for the year 2026. Why don't you share that with us?

SPEAKER_00 0:51

Yeah, 100%. I think if we can time travel a bit, I'll take you guys back to sort of Jan last year, Jan this time. You know, as Vitality, we asked ourselves what are the key problems that we need to solve? What are the three questions we need to sort of answer? And I think the three questions we arrived at was number one, how can we expand access to, I guess, facilities and devices for our members? The second one was how can we introduce sleep as a fundamental part of the vitality program? And the third one was how can we expand the ways in which uh members can earn points? As you probably know, the diamond status is very coveted among certain people. So really thinking how can we expand the points that are available for members to earn. And I think our launch addressed sort of all three of those questions.

SPEAKER_03 1:40

So, do you want to start with the first question and just tell us how are you?

More Studios And Class Bookings

SPEAKER_00 1:44

Yeah, 100%. Um so look, the first one was um how can we expand access to different um, I guess, devices and facilities. Um, as you know, our members like to earn points in a number of different ways. Some people prefer uh getting their points through being in the gym, others prefer heart rate workouts, some prefer just steps, just walking. Um but we saw that since the launch of our fitness platform, an increasing number of members are actually earning points by uh booking classes. So, I mean the classes you can book go from boxing to high-intensity interval training. But the one category that we saw the demand just keeps increasing and increasing is yoga and Pilates. So one of the stuff we launched last year was we've actually sort of increased the number of uh studios where people can book your, I guess, yoga and Pilates classes. We've increased it by an additional 50 studios. So really addressing that that demand increase. Um, and I think also on our fitness platform, people can actually book classes now at a Virgin Active through our platform, which is a very exciting enhancement.

SPEAKER_01 2:50

So if there's a yoga studio that's that's linked to Vitality, you'll get points for doing that class. Yes. Same as Padal. Exactly. Same as golf.

SPEAKER_00 3:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 3:00

Yeah, okay, that's brilliant.

SPEAKER_00 3:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 3:02

And how many points is that?

SPEAKER_00 3:04

Um it's a hundred points.

SPEAKER_03 3:05

Okay, so it's just for logging in on the class. And they just put their details in that screen or how does it work at the yoga studios?

SPEAKER_00 3:13

So most of the classes have sort of a place where you would scan the QR code that you get when you book a class. So it's very seamless just when you walk into the class, scan your QR code sorted. You don't need to do anything.

SPEAKER_01 3:25

Oh no, Padel, you put your ID number and it uh gives you your points.

SPEAKER_00 3:29

Correct.

How Class Points And Check-Ins Work

SPEAKER_01 3:29

Correct.

SPEAKER_00 3:30

Um so I mean that's the one part, sort of expanding um access to facilities, but it was a two-part one, so also the devices part. So I mean we've seen how popular, I guess, Apple has been amongst our members, where you know people will literally go out on a run on a Friday afternoon just to meet their goals so that they can fully fund their Apple Watch.

SPEAKER_01 3:51

This is the watch you wear. Exactly. So it doesn't have to be an Apple Watch, it can be another watch, Garmin or whatever.

SPEAKER_00 3:56

Yeah, so that's actually our new enhancement. So we've introduced a similar mechanism on Garmin. Um so yeah, members will be able to fully fund a Garmin in the same way um as they do. Yeah, with Asset.

SPEAKER_01 4:07

So fully fund, are you they may purchase a Garmin?

Garmin Added To Fully Funded Devices

SPEAKER_00 4:10

Yeah, so you actually have two um options. So you can either fully fund it by achieving your um weekly sort of goals, um, or if you for some reason prefer to not go the fully funded route, you can actually get up to 25% off uh your like once-off purchase. So if you're someone who doesn't necessarily want to have to meet goals to to fund it, you can also get a up to 25% off upfront.

unknown 4:34

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 4:35

So just to break that down a little bit, um uh what Vitality does is if you want to go and get a watch, previously it was just Apple that you could do this with.

SPEAKER_00 4:45

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 4:45

And you could go and purchase that watch, and then every single month you had to meet your fitness goals. And if you met it that month, you wouldn't be charged a certain amount for your watch. I think it was a two-year period to pay it. So if you don't meet your goals that month, then you have to pay what X amounts? And now you're saying you've expanded that to also include a garment watch also.

SPEAKER_01 5:09

Correct. And what about running shoes? Because there was a benefit. Is that still in the middle of the year?

SPEAKER_00 5:14

Um Yeah, so I mean that's still there. So if you yeah, at Sportsman's and Total Sports, um that's still as if.

SPEAKER_01 5:21

Any shoes or more specifically German running?

SPEAKER_00 5:23

The shoes in Sportsman's Wear and Total Sports, so it doesn't necessarily have to be running shoes. Um, it can also just be normal German shoes. Can it be golf shoes? Um I think golf shoes are included. Um yeah. That's I assume you play golf.

SPEAKER_01 5:40

Yes. Okay.

SPEAKER_03 5:42

Awesome.

SPEAKER_01 5:42

So those are the devices? Um anything else on the travel change or did uh gym change?

SPEAKER_00 5:49

Is that still no that's that's still the same. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 5:51

That's still the same partners that you've got, the fly partners. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 5:55

Correct.

Sleep As A Core Health Pillar

SPEAKER_03 5:56

Um the next pillar?

Footwear Discounts And Partner Benefits

SPEAKER_00 5:57

Yeah, I mean the second one was again sort of how we can introduce sleep as a foundational part of the program. So I mean, oftentimes when people think about health, they almost view a good diet and a good exercise routine as the key pillars of health. But the truth is that good sleep is actually the foundation of these pillars. I mean, we've done tons of research into sleep and we found that sleep, or rather poor sleep, has such a big impact just on mortality and also just illnesses. Um, you know, we really asked ourselves how can we incentivize and reward members for sleeping well? And I mean, we thought what we could do, and the answer was actually pretty obvious, and that's uh vitality sleep rewards. So I guess similar to active rewards that people know and love. In this case, people will get a weekly sleep goal. Um, their nightly sleep score will essentially accumulate to this weekly sleep uh goal that they have, and if they achieve that goal, they get either miles or an instant reward, like a coffee, for example.

SPEAKER_01 6:56

And if you don't reach it, do you get penalized?

SPEAKER_00 6:59

No. Then it's just no reward, but you don't lose anything. You don't lose points or whatever. It's more just sleep. There's only stuff that you can gain from sleep, but you don't lose anything for poor sleep.

unknown 7:10

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 7:10

That's really interesting. Maybe we can do another episode on that why sleep and what it does and the benefits of it.

SPEAKER_00 7:17

100%.

Weekly Sleep Goals And Rewards

SPEAKER_03 7:18

Awesome. And the third and final one?

Oura Ring Partnership And Funding

SPEAKER_00 7:20

I think just one more thing to touch on sleep. Um, so I mean, obviously, there's a bunch of different ways in which you can track your sleep, um, and we can chat about that in our sleep episode. But I think one thing that's really exciting is we've actually partnered exclusively with Aura. Um so essentially what Aura is, I'm wearing one now. It's a smart ring, which essentially helps you to track your health.

SPEAKER_01 7:41

So it tracks So should you be sleeping at the moment, or you're uh no, no, luckily I I I can be awake.

SPEAKER_00 7:47

It's okay, it's okay. Um Yeah, and I mean Aura, it helps you track your health holistically, but what they're known for is being best in class for sleep tracking. So we've partnered with them in a way that members are actually able to fully fund an Aura ring. Again, similar to Apple and now Garmin, you can fully fund your Aura ring by achieving your weekly sleep goals. Um and again, similar to Garmin, if people don't want to go the fully funded route, you can also get a uh 25% upfront discount.

SPEAKER_03 8:16

Amazing.

Expanding Points: Sleep And Fitness Caps

SPEAKER_00 8:17

So very exciting stuff. Um and then, yeah, the the last pillar is sort of expanding points, um, yeah, access to points. So the one part where we expanded it was sleep. I mean, as we said, we asked ourselves how can we introduce sleep as a foundational part of our program, and we know that points are a foundational part of our program. Um so once that's live, uh people will be able to earn up to 500 points per month for sleeping well.

SPEAKER_01 8:43

Um that one, this new sleep which you'll chat about, doesn't add, you don't have to do more points to achieve is a hundred still there?

SPEAKER_00 8:53

Yeah, the thresholds remain exactly the same.

SPEAKER_01 8:55

So this is uh another way of getting there.

SPEAKER_00 8:58

100%. Um a second way in which we've expanded the available points is through our fitness points. So you would recall currently you can earn a max of uh 30,000 fitness points. And part of that is your cardio fitness, where you can earn up to 10,000, but that contributed to your, I guess, overall cap. Um, however, since the introduction of cardio fitness, we see that it's been extremely popular amongst our members. I think we've had over 200,000 cardio fitness readings. So what we've decided to do is actually pull out cardio fitness as its own uh points category. So now people can still earn their 10,000 points there, they can earn 25,000 points from uh fitness events, which ultimately means we've increased the number of available fitness points from 30 to 35,000. So again, more ways for members to earn points.

SPEAKER_03 9:47

Awesome. I think that helps.

Behaviour Change And Next Episode Tease

SPEAKER_01 9:49

And the the I saw the uh Jacene over the years, I th the emphasis is going to exercise as well. There's a lot more points for exercising regularly and keep that up, and that's quite good as well for everybody too.

SPEAKER_00 10:03

Hundred percent. Um and I think that's that's the beautiful thing with health, right? It's a cycle where everything feeds into each other. So if you are exercising better, chances are you're eating better, chances are you sleeping better. So it's like almost all these behaviors enable each other.

Closing And Subscription Details

SPEAKER_01 10:19

Um we're gonna go to your favorite subject next episode on sleep. Looking forward to that. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you for listening. If you have enjoyed this podcast or would like to subscribe, please visit our website at www.growth.fp.co.za. The information we have provided in this podcast is our personal opinion. For more detailed information, please discuss your financial association with a financial planner.