Sweatcoin

There’s always something that’s more important than exercise. But what if you got paid to lace up and pound the pavements?

That’s what Sweatcoin offers to do by using your phone to convert steps into currency units called – unsurprisingly – sweatcoins. Through the app you can spend your sweatcoins on actual goods, services and experiences.

That’s the good part. The bad part is that running this app will have a small, but noticeable, impact on your battery life.

What’s more, you’re going to have to be prepared to walk a LOT to work up enough sweatcoins to buy anything decent. But that hasn’t stopped millions of people from downloading the app, which is available for free on both Android and iOS devices.

It might not let you buy up the neighbourhood with a few laps around the nearby common, but it’s an intriguing concept that hopefully will push some of us into being a bit more active.