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Were those intended to be "do it in this order" or were they just options?

I got the feeling they were more options and you could reorder them if you wanted or shuffle or just do one or another.

To me a more casual / getting started is just about doing the thing.

I'm not sure a beginner would know what order to place them in nor would they recognize the potential injury risk associated with stacking some of these exercises.

Beginners should be focusing on form and simple compound lifts. Throwing them into things like heavy accessory lifts with no regard for exercise choice or format is a quick way to get hurt. Again, I want to applaud OP for doing this. The fitness industry is in a terrible place and tools like this have a great place. I just think it needs a ton of work to make it useful. Maybe if I find some time, I'll try and contribute but in it's current state I would never recommend something like this to anyone.

What are the odds someone is going to get hurt?

Pretty high if you don't know what you're doing with a weight that you're not strong enough to handle.

Pretty high.

Even without weights, you can permanently injure yourself with bad form. Bringing weights into the picture makes it much easier.

Agree. IMO a simple 5x5 is going to be the better option for someone just starting out. Stronglifts is one flavor with a great app that just works and tracks all the little stuff (progression, giving you a specific rest time) and, once you plateau, you can start digging in to other options.

I also wanted to say that for people starting out keep it super simple. I wouldn't even use an app. At most a notebook or spreadsheet. Do "Starting Strength" (squats, bench, deadlift. 3 sets of 5). Start with a weight you can handle with good form, even if it's just the empty bar. When you can do that add 5 pounds at the next workout. Increasing the load is important but don't let your form break down. An app is not going to help you with form, and proper form is critical to avoiding injury, especially if you are at all older.

Couldn't agree more about form and keeping it simple. I would note, though, that an app can help with that, e.g. the one I mentioned has videos demonstrating proper form, and what I would do when starting out is video myself from the side and compare. An app will also track progression more easily on something you naturally carry around (your phone), versus needing to remember a notebook.

I'll second that, no app needed. A small notebook with a "table" per planned exercise and a ball pen are always in my sports bag, so its ready to go when its training time.

The phone appears to be a distraction for many people I watch at the gym, over-extending the rest between sets while watching social media. The minimalism provided by the paper notebook is what I prefer instead.

Honestly for beginners just building a habit of regular lifting is by far the most important thing. Progressive overload, going to failure, periodization etc won’t do much if you don’t have consistency. My advice to beginners would be to go to the gym 3 times a week and do whatever interests you for about 45 minutes. Once you have that habit nailed down for 6 months then we can talk about more advanced stuff.

Hardly anybody would recommend 5x5 these days for anyone, much less beginners.

Why?

5x5 and 3x5 are out of vogue for lots of reasons but it largely boils down to:

* Not enough volume

* Non-periodized

That first bit means different things at different phases of a lifting "career". But generally speaking "time under tension" and research into effective rep ranges has changed modern thinking on set sizes and volume.

These days people, including World's Strongest Men, tend to recommend higher rep ranges for beginners and those coming back to the gym to build work capacity and reduce risk of injury.

Weird. I've lifted on and off for 25 years. For most of that time I did the stereotypical 3x8-12 and saw much slower progression. During the past couple years I switched to a 5x5 plan and saw massive gains in strength, even while I was cutting weight via a caloric deficit (was eating 1500-1600 calories a day, but had lots of protein and adequate carbs).

For reference, I went from a dumbbell bench press of 45lb to 75lb in 4.5 months (5x5). Previously my progress was much slower.

I'll caveat that I've obviously not closely controlled for all factors and I'm an n of 1. Additionally my interest is in having a great strength to weight ratio, rather than being a body builder. I'm a climber and that's an important consideration.

It's not that weird; Stronglifts (SL aka 5x5) and Starting Strength (SS aka 3x5) both utilize progressive overload to stimulate gains.

Progressive overload works. Those programs "work".

They are just out of vogue for beginners, and they are both targeted towards beginners.

Out of vogue for beginners according to what/who? This is the first I'm hearing of a falloff of 3x5/5x5 for beginners, so I'm confused where this is coming from.

I'm sorry but what?

You have been lifting weights somewhat regularly for 25 years, majority 3x8-12, and the switch to 5x5 increased your dumb bell bench press from ~20kg to ~35kg?

There is just no way. That is extremely light weight. Like, most beginners who follow any sort of progressive overloading system will be at that level in 4 weeks starting from essentially 0

Just jumping in here to feed my ego :D

after 15 years of lifting, I'm currently pushing 4x10 with 50kg dumbbells on the bench. So yeah, 35kg after 25 years seems odd unless those 25 years weren't exactly "serious" or "consistent" let's say.

No judgment, but yeah

If you are just starting out all that matters is going in to the gym regularly and lifting some weight. 3x5, 5x5, or some complicated periodized program with a lot of accessories are all going to work.

That's why I recommend keeping it simple. Build the habit and build some strength. Once you've done that, you can get fancy if you find that you're really into it.

A better training plan gives you a chance of winning competition. Most of us wouldn't win no matter what plan we follow (at my age only drugs could make me a winner and those have side effects I don't want), we just want enough strength for general life and health. With those more modest goals 3x5, 5x5, or since something not as good still will get us there.

What are your goals?

3x5 like done by Starting Strength continues to work well for beginners looking for strength. After you tapped out the easy gains, you can use a periodized program for body building described by "the science" if you wish, but can do more useful weights because you are stronger.

Community-made working plans would be a killer feature.

But I do agree with your assessment. Each exercise needs a categorization (compound, isolation), compliments (if an exercise is a push, then what are some pulls), companions (if you're working arms at the cable stack, might as well do a bunch of arm/shoulder/back cable exercises), and a est. time to perform (including warmup, setup). This will allow plans to be generated in a way that makes sense.

Though, I think community made exercise plans are a better solution than trying to devise algorithms to generate good plans. Though, an LLM integration might work well for beginners, send a prompt with a list of exercises and goals (i.e., beginner looking for a 3 day a week strength plan, build one using these 20 exercises).

My next question would be why are we trying to use algorithms to generate good plans? Good and simple plans have been around for decades that are easy to find.