AITA for being on the phone at the gym?

So I recently signed up at a new gym about a week ago. Today I went in and I’m at one of the cable stations doing cable curls (mind you this is a really big gym and has 4 of these stations that have the cable rows, lat pull down etc), and no one is around me when I started my set. My friend calls me while I’m on the cables, and we talk for a bit and while we’re talking this guy comes on the cable row next to me and after a few minutes I hear someone say “shut up”. I thought it was this group of friends behind me talking to each other at first so I continue on with my exercise while I’m still on the phone. The guy then puts his phone right next to my foot and looks at me for like a reaction which I thought was a bit odd cause there was a lot of space and I had my water bottle and stuff to the right of me (he’s on my left). Usually I just keep to myself at the gym so I didn’t say anything. I then heard a few minutes the same “shut up” and this time I realized it was this guy next to me saying it to me. I was in the middle of my set and saying bye to my friend this time that he said it, and right as I told my friend goodbye he grabs his phone and walks away. I’m pretty sure looking back on it he put his phone right next to my foot so I would say something to him, probably so he can instigate or something. I don’t think I did anything wrong since I wasn’t talking that loud considering it’s a gym with a lot of people talking much louder than me, music playing on the speakers, and this guy has headphones in. I also checked the call log and it was about 10 minutes meaning he came in the middle of it. Am I in the wrong for talking otp during my workout?

TLDR guy roid rages at me for talking on the phone in a public gym even though plenty of people nearby talking.

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I really appreciate everyone’s insight!

I also left out some info in the original post that can clarify this a bit more, but this gym is very social and even permits recording yourself during sets which many people do (tripods etc).

Also I forgot to mention I had my earbuds in, I wasn’t on speakerphone during the phone call

13 thoughts on “AITA for being on the phone at the gym?”
  1. YTA your at the gym no one wants to hear your mobile phone call. When you got a group of people chatting it’s different as you hear what going on. It kinda becomes background noise.

  2. Did you have earplugs in? If so, there’s a good chance that you were louder than you thought. 

    But if talking is a common thing in the gym, I don’t see why it really matters where the person you were talking to was. If he doesn’t like listening to people, he should get some earplugs. 

    The only thing that drives me nuts is when people scroll on their phone between sets, because they are always sitting there a lot longer than I think they realize. 

    1. Exactly this. Dude, are you working out or not? I’m only taking a call if it’s an emergency (this was just a friend calling), because I’m at the gym to work out. If you want to take a social call, you do it AFTER your done. YTA, 100%

  3. Were you on speakerphone? Were you taking longer than necessary on the equipment because you were distracted by chatting to your friend? Did you have them on video or was it just audio?

  4. YTA. In my gym phone calls are only supposed to be in the lobby. The music on the speaker is for atmosphere. And people talking to each other is different than you having a phone conversation.

  5. YTA. Talking on the phone in a gym is one of the most annoying things you can do. I understand the argument that it’s supposedly no different than having a conversation with someone else working out, but for reason it is different and 100x more aggravating.

    I worked in gyms for a lot of years and people talking on phones was probably the biggest single complaint from members.

  6. YTA. You were being disruptive to others. You were also taking up equipment longer than needed. Next time grab your stuff and go to the lobby and talk. Most gyms that I know of have rules regarding phone use.

  7. YTA. You’re in a shared space where others are trying to concentrate on their own workouts. Work out at home if you need to have loud phone conversations while you exercise. 

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