CNBC's technology product editor Todd Haselton joins 'Closing Bell' to compare and contrast Apple's new fitness subscription service called Fitness+. Subscribe to CNBC PRO for access to investor and analyst insights on Apple and more: https://cnb.cx/3dIH56N

Apple’s subscription fitness app, Fitness+, launches Monday. I’ve been using it for the past several days and I think it offers a nice variety of workouts that people will like. You need an Apple Watch to take the prerecorded exercise classes, which are available on iPhones, iPads and the Apple TV.

It’s a smart way for Apple to make the Apple Watch even stickier. If people get really into the fitness classes, like I have, it will be yet another way Apple keeps people locked in to its ecosystem of products. Why buy another phone, tablet or watch if you really like Fitness+? It also comes at a great time, when people aren’t in gyms and are at home looking for ways to exercise.

Like other fitness apps, including Peloton’s, which starts at $12.99 a month for classes that don’t need the company’s connected spin bike, you don’t need anything to use it. But, you’ll get more out of it if you have any indoor cycle, treadmill, rowing machine or free weights, since some of the classes require equipment. But you don’t need anything special. I’ve been riding a hand-me-down exercise bike, for example.

Fitness+ costs $9.99 a month or $79.99 a year. It’s also part of the Premier Apple One plan, which costs $29.95 per month, and includes other Apple products like Apple Music, Apple TV+ and extra iCloud storage bundled together at a discount.

Here’s what Apple Fitness+ is like.

I started taking my health a lot more seriously a few months ago and have cut a bunch of weight. A great deal of that was through diet, but I’ve also been addicted to Peloton’s iPad app, which I use on a regular indoor bike and not a real Peloton and that, like Fitness+, has a variety of noncycling workouts.

The Peloton instructors are really encouraging. (Shout out to Alex Toussaint, Emma Lovewell and Kendall Toole.) So, I was worried that I wouldn’t find that kind of coaching in Fitness+. If the coaches weren’t good, I’d go back to Peloton.

But, after I took about eight cycling classes on Fitness+, I started to get used to and enjoy the different Apple Fitness+ instructors. My favorites so far are the cycling instructors Emily Fayette, Bakari Williams and Tyrell Desean, but I haven’t taken a class with all the 21 instructors for a variety of workouts yet. There are a lot to choose from with classes like high-intensity interval training (HIIT), spin, yoga, treadmill, rowing, strength and dance.

I love that Fitness+ syncs seamlessly with the Apple Watch. You just pick the workout you want and then hit start. Your heart rate, the time elapsed (or time left if you want) and your Apple Watch Fitness rings (red for calories, green for exercise minutes and blue for standing minutes) appear on the screen and close as you continue to work out. Any Apple Watch owner knows how addictive it can be to try to close all of your rings every day, and I like that the app puts this right on the screen to encourage me to close mine.

You can stream workouts to your iPad, iPhone or Apple TV, or download them for when you don’t have an internet connection. I preferred cycling with an iPad, but liked that I could come upstairs and do a cooldown or a quick yoga class while watching on the Apple TV. Also, as long as you own an Apple Watch and subscribe to Fitness+, you can workout on any Apple TV with Fitness+ installed. So, if you’re staying in a hotel that has one, or more likely an Airbnb, it’ll see your watch nearby and let you take classes even if the owner of the Apple TV doesn’t pay for Fitness+. This will be fun when we can all travel again.

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