How to prompt ChatGPT as a health coach

Here are the best prompts for getting ChatGPT to act as your personal AI health coach.

OpenAI’s ChatGPT is an impressively powerful tool. Its vast range of applications includes adopting the role of virtual health coach. The truth is that a simple but well-crafted prompt could transform your health and wellbeing. If you’re hoping to do just that, you’re in the right place.

But first, why would someone want ChatGPT as their health coach?

Imagine having a tool at your fingertips that’s studied more books than any human could read in a lifetime. A programme that’s absorbed knowledge from health, fitness and wellbeing; one that can provide personalised, non-judgmental responses 24/7. You have the power to do this with ChatGPT or another large language model (LLM) of your choosing.

Whether you have specific goals around weight loss or fitness gains or just want to be a bit healthier for life, ChatGPT, prompted as a health coach, offers a unique and convenient way to achieve your ambitions.

ChatGPT as a health coach

So what is ChatGPT and how does it replicate the thinking and methodology of a health coach? ChatGPT is a large language model (LLM), which is the type of artificial intelligence that’s able to understand and mimic human interaction. LLMs don’t “think” or have beliefs, emotions, or consciousness, but they can generate text that’s engaging and insightful based on their training.

You can think of ChatGPT as having read a vast library of information; books, articles, web pages, etc. This extensive reading doesn’t mean it fully understands or experiences things like emotions, but it can generate text that feels like it does because it has learned how humans write about them.

So when you ask ChatGPT to adopt the role of a health or fitness coach, it generates responses based on patterns it learned during its training. Through its pre-trained data, it knows how health coaches operate; the information they’ve studied, the results they can achieve and methods through which they do it.

Here's how ChatGPT works as a health coach

We now understand how ChatGPT can be prompted to be a health coach, but what is its interpretation of what a health coach is? How will it actually behave?

According to ChatGPT itself, to embody the role of a health coach, it said its approach would involve:

Personalized guidance: Tailor advice based on individual needs, preferences, and health goals.
Goal setting: Help set realistic and achievable short-term and long-term health goals.
Nutritional advice: Provide balanced diet plans and healthy eating tips.
Exercise routines: Suggest customized workout plans suitable for different fitness levels.
Mental health support: Offer stress management techniques and mental wellness strategies.
Progress tracking: Monitor progress and adjust plans as needed to stay on track.
Motivation and encouragement: Provide regular motivation and positive reinforcement.
Educational resources: Share reliable information on various health topics.
Holistic approach: Emphasize the importance of overall well-being, including sleep, hydration, and lifestyle habits.
Accessibility: Ensure support is available anytime through continuous interaction and check-ins.

Limitations of ChatGPT as a health coach

There are limitations with ChatGPT acting as a coach of any kind. LLMs are very general pieces of software, trained on billions of pieces of data. This means its guidance is going to be highly generalised.Firstly, it doesn’t know you personally and doesn’t have a real-world context or experience, which when it comes to a topic that is very individualised, this is a clear limitation.

It’s also not licensed or certified in any filed relating to health, fitness or wellbeing. If you need professional help, especially in a medical sense, you need to seek help from a real life practitioner. ChatGPT is simply not a replacement for that.

Finally, if you’re seeking guidance on form or technique for exercises, ChatGPT will struggle to asses you and offer effective support. It’s not going to accompany you to the gym and motivate you to keep going through those final tough reps. Not yet anyway!

Prompting ChatGPT to be a health coach

Prompting ChatGPT is a skill. It can only work with what it’s been given. Thankfully, prompting ChatGPT as a health or fitness coach can be very simple.

Simple ChatGPT health coach prompt

“Adopt the role of a health coach”

If you start a conversation with “Adopt the role of a health coach”, ChatGPT will do just that:

As you can see, ChatGPT is asking for more specifics about your needs, just like a good coach would. It will go on to understanding your current situation, goals and challenges. It can then offer guidance and advice based on that.

Even with such a simple prompt, ChatGPT will give you a helpful exchange. It is capable of asking follow-up questions to gain more context and understand your needs better, but this requires additional conversation turns so there is a more efficient way to achieve the outcome you’re looking for.

The above prompt lacks specificity. It doesn’t provide much guidance on what topics you want to discuss or what kind of assistance you’re seeking. This could lead to a more general and less useful conversation.

Providing more specific information in your prompt can help guide ChatGPT’s responses and make the conversation more efficient and effective.

Advanced ChatGPT health coach prompt

“Adopt the role of an experienced health and fitness coach. I would describe my current level of health as [describe your health and fitness as you would to a real-life coach]. My goals are to [describe your goals in detail and be specific]. Begin a back and forth conversation where you delve into my current circumstances, previous training or health issues, and challenges I currently face achieving my goals. Ask me questions one at a time. Ultimately, provide suggestions on how to achieve my goals through lifestyle improvements.”

You can copy and paste that into ChatGPT and complete the two sections in square brackets. You can also tweak other parts of the prompt to suit your needs more directly. This more comprehensive prompt provides context and direction for ChatGPT. It also ensures it asks questions one at a time, not hitting you with a barrage of questions.

But there’s really only one way to find out how effective it is for you; go ahead and try it!

Keep the conversation going

Beyond that initial prompt, it’s important that you continue the conversation effectively. No language model is able to pick up on your body language, facial expressions or vocal tone so everything you communicate has to be through the words you type. This means you must be clear in your wording – don’t leave room for interpretation.

LLMs work best when you are clear, concise and detailed. Be specific in your answers and requests to get the best output. If something the AI says isn’t what you wanted, you can re-prompt it to clarify what you meant to what you were expecting.

As you would with any coach, you should try to be open, honest and clear whilst avoiding sharing sensitive information. It’s best to assume everything you enter is publicly available.