Best Curved Treadmill

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Normal treadmills don’t simulate the running experience quite like any of us want, which is where curved treadmills come in to save the day. You get as close to a natural run as possible without having to leave your living room, and you actually end up with stronger leg muscles as a result.

The best curved manual treadmill forces you to engage your muscles in a way that normal treadmills simply don’t, while also offering intense cardio results at the same time. There’s a bit to learn about them, so let’s start with the five best curved treadmills for a nice natural running session and go from there.

IN10CT Health Runner Curved Manual Treadmill

Nobody makes treadmills quite like IN10CT. While it’s surely pricey as our first pick, it’s simply the best no matter how you look at it. As an improvement on their Resistance Runner model, the Health Runner comes with an excellent shock-reducing track that helps displace all the vibrations that would normally plague your joints.

While the tread itself is impressive, it’s not the only thing about the Health Runner that makes it special.

With ergonomic handles that you can lean into, your workout is entirely customizable. There are loads of folks who actually use this backward to build on their quad muscles, and push off in different ways to get the tread moving. There’s no limit to how you can use it thanks to the handle design.

While it’s not a direct feature that relates to health benefits, one great aspect of this treadmill is that you can just wheel it around with absolute ease. You don’t have to worry about the immense weight being a problem thanks to the high-quality caster wheels on the bottom. Speaking of which, this is a massive treadmill, coming in at 330 lbs.

It’s not uncommon to have heavier manual treadmills, but you really have to watch out for just how massive this thing is. With sensors built into the handles, you get excellent monitoring for your vitals and performance metrics. It’s not quite as good as a FitBit or similar device, but it gets the job done either way.

The screen itself is a little hard to see, and the console instructions can be overwhelmingly complex for such a small and simple device. Don’t focus on that, and instead keep your eye on the prize: the treadmill itself is built to last, durable as can be, and gives you 30% more calorie burn than you’ll get on a motorized treadmill.

NOHrD Sprintbok Curved Manual Treadmill

Coming in as the runner-up, we have NOHrD’s curved treadmill. While it may not be the best value curved treadmill, it is one unlike any you’ll ever use again. Instead of going with an alloy steel frame, it’s completely made of hardwood (stained ash). It’s like using a wooden rowing machine; it’s simply a different experience.

Because you can sometimes feel the reverberations from alloy steel frames in your treads when you run, NOHrD’s wooden frame feels entirely different. Wood absorbs shock in a way that steel doesn’t, so you actually feel even less of an impact on your joints than you already do with the manual tread.

One more thing that’s wholly impressive is the incline boost that NOHrD gives you. Where most treadmills go up to 12% or 15%, you get an impressive 30% incline with NOHrD. It’s a bit excessive for some, but if you’re in the market for a manual treadmill, you’re already looking to do extraordinary things.

Because wood isn’t as durable as metal, it’s no surprise that you’ll end up with more maintenance expenses and occurrences over the years that you own this treadmill. You’ll have to inspect the wood for cracks and make sure it’s up to snuff more often than you would with a metal frame.

Even with the wood frame, you still get a max user weight limit of 350 lbs, which is impressive for most treadmills that are not commercial-grade. With metal handles and an ergonomic design, it’s easy to grab on and hold tight while you roll across the tread.

One major benefit is the included HD tablet-style interface. This gives you vibrant metric tracking visuals, an overall responsive screen-touch integration, and feels about as premium as the price you’re paying for this top-of-the-line treadmill.

This isn’t for everyone, but if you’re absolutely keen on getting a curved treadmill and having a unique experience, this is exactly what you need.

RUNOW Curved Non-Electric Treadmill

RUNOW isn’t the first brand that anyone thinks of when they hear about curved treadmills, but after this, you won’t be able to forget them. You burn 30% more calories with RUNOW, just like you do with many manual treadmills, but the secret to maintaining that level of caloric burn is how user-friendly the treadmill is in the first place. If it doesn’t feel good to use, it’s not going to be easy to maintain those numbers.

There are multiple levels of the handlebar system, giving you a unique way to use your treadmill. You can stand backwards and push off with your legs to build those quads, or lean in and work out your hamstrings depending on the way you’re standing. Every detail of the handlebar and tread is designed to give you a responsive experience.

As you might expect, the LCD screen is a bit of a bust. It’s bright depending on the lighting levels you have in your home gym, but it’s not quite responsive enough to really hold your attention. Everything is displayed on-screen at the same time, mucking up the UI and making it difficult to follow.

The only other major gripe here is that the resistance levels don’t give noticeable changes in the resistance of the treadmill. If you go from the lowest setting to the highest, you might feel something, but overall it doesn’t provide a lot of differentiation in the way it shows resistance.

While it has its picadillos, the customer support you get from RUNOW is world-class and an absolute treat to talk to. It’s a low-maintenance machine with a few grievances, but overall one of the best manual treadmills you’ll ever use.

NNI 2021 Curved Treadmill

Alloy steel is about as good as you can get for durability and longevity. NNI made this extremely durable treadmill with a 375 lb maximum weight for users, making it ideal for weight loss.

On top of that, they also provide an excellent incline system that you can see in their marketing photos.

Having a good level of incline makes it easier to scale your exercise without having to boost the speed.

It’s about muscle engagement when you’re trying to lose weight, and NNI makes it easy to engage every muscle in your legs that you want. Increase the incline, or use the ergonomic multi-level handlebar system to lean in or push off in reverse, and build up all those leg muscles that you want.

The welded steel frame is wobble-free, which helps keep the shock-absorptive tread properly in place. In fact, even though NNI didn’t rank higher on this list, the tread might actually be one of the best we were able to test out.

Despite being on an alloy steel frame, there’s little to no reverberation at all. You don’t feel the shock go through your joints, and that’s a big plus.

IN10CT Resistance Runner Manual Curved Wide Treadmill

While IN10CT won the best manual curved treadmill spot on the top of this list, their previous model actually broke through to the bottom of the list as well. This looks similar to the Health Runner model, but this is a previous version called the Resistance Runner. There are few differences, so let’s go over them quickly.

The shock resistance and absorption underneath the tread makes for impeccable running, although the feet are a little less stable than we would like to see. They’re fairly small and can result in slippage, especially with this being a manual treadmill, so we advise caution and a treadmill mat for underneath this maschine.

There is no console screen whatsoever. While we’re usually critical of the LCD screens that most treadmills include, whether it’s for lack of brightness or lack of features, the option is at least nice when you’re paying this much money for a treadmill.

If you don’t want to integrate your workout onto a FitBit but you still want data, well, now you don’t really have much of a choice.

The PU belt offers an excellent platform to run on, and helps to reduce joint impact to your knees and spots on your feet. The resistance feels more natural and less abrasive.

While this is a heavy machine, it’s also designed to be used by larger users that may be starting a weight loss journey. Users up to 400 lbs can safely use the Resistance Runner.

Last but not least, utilize the magnetic resistance by operating on ten different levels. This lets you completely custom tailor your cardio experience, and changes your workout in a big way from the minute you use it.

The extended ergonomic handles will help you create extra momentum at the start so you aren’t left with any problems when you begin to run.

Best Curved Treadmill FAQ

How Accurate is the Curved Treadmill Calorie Counter?

Calorie counters are imperfect. If you’re shorter and outputting more energy to make the treadmill move because you have less leg leverage, a tall person will technically have an easier time moving a curved treadmill, and it makes for different results.

However, those are semantics. Overall, research proves that you burn about 30% more calories on a curved treadmill than you do on a motorized treadmill, so even if the counter is off or you don’t fully believe the data it’s providing, just know that every step on a curved treadmill is equal to 1.3 steps on a flat running deck treadmill.

100 calories on a motorized treadmill becomes 130 on a curved treadmill, and so on. You’re doing more for your body; ignore the calorie counter and aim for a specific amount of time.

FitBit watches and similar products have a hard time detecting whether or not you’re on an incline, which can make the data a bit difficult to decipher. In any case, don’t use caloric burn or metrics from a smartwatch as your sole measure of success.

A watch can’t perfectly tell you how deeply you’re working on your leg muscles by using a manual treadmill.

Is it Harder to Run on a Curved Treadmill?

Yes, even the cheapest curved treadmill comes with increased difficulty. It’s the point of using one. Motorized treadmills offer too much assistance, and while they do help you break a sweat and burn hundreds of calories in a half-hour time block, they’re also not doing as much for your leg muscles as they could.

You know how they say “never skip leg day?” A curved treadmill is like including leg day into your cardio, killing two birds with one stone. You’ll feel better off with more results to show, even though the difficulty is increased. Put in the work, and the results will follow.

Are Curved Treadmills Better for Knees?

Old curved belt manual treadmills used to have a problem when it came to joint health. The treads were a little too rough, but they were smooth to run on, so a compromise had to be made. Now, treads are made out of an impact-absorbing rubber.

Now when you run, that shock and force is absorbed instead of reverberating into your knees and joints. So curved treadmills actually offer more benefits to your joints than standard flat running decks on motorized treadmills.

Because of the angle from the curve, you’re not putting all of that force directly on your joints either, so it displaces differently into the tread and you’re basically good to go from there. If you’ve never used a curved treadmill before and suffer from joint pain, there’s one word of caution to keep in mind.

At first, you may feel worse. That’s because your body is using more of your muscles that surround your joints, so while it’s good to engage those muscles and they will help stabilize your joints even better in the future, you’re working them out harder than you were before.

Keep it in mind; a few sessions with some increased joint pain is normal, and not an indicator of a bad treadmill or experience.

Why Does Curved Treadmill Burn More Calories?

A self-powered curved treadmill is just that: self-powered. When a motorized treadmill kicks on and you put it to a specific speed, the motor is providing one force that’s pointed right at you. That force is producing speed, and you’re trying your best to run against it.

With a manual treadmill, you have to provide the force to move the tread from your own running. There’s no motor assistance.

As a result, you lean into your steps more, engage your muscles on a deeper level, and receive entirely different kinetic feedback from the tread that tells your body what it needs to do to keep things moving.

In short, it demands more from your body to run at the same speed of a motorized treadmill, only without any electrical assistance whatsoever. You’ll notice better gains across your quads and glutes, so that’s a nice bonus as well.

Curved Treadmills Are an Entirely Different Ride

When you use a curved treadmill, it feels entirely different and works differently from a standard motorized treadmill. It’s definitely a learning curve (get it?), but it’s one that’s entirely worth it. After you use a curved treadmill for the first time, motorized treadmills feel like easy mode.

Now you know which one is right for you, and you’ll be able to make a solid, quality decision with all the options you’ve been presented with. There are pros and cons, but we’d argue that the benefits greatly outweigh any setbacks. Welcome to your new exercise.