How to Become a Certified Personal Trainer
If you’ve seriously considered becoming a certified personal trainer—either for a career change, as a side gig, for personal development — you should know that most gyms, whether a big-box gym or boutique gym, require certification.
Becoming a Certified Personal Trainer involves first choosing the organization through which you’d like to earn your certification.
There are well over 100 personal trainer programs and sets of courses, but only about a dozen are certified by NCCA.
An NCCA accredited course will set you up for long-term success. NCCA accredited personal trainer courses, like NESTA, are more recognized and take longer to study because they include more educational material necessary to train your clients properly.
NESTA’s interactive home-study program is delivered 100% online. You’ll have access to 40-hours of NESTA’s Certified Personal Fitness Trainer education materials for a lifetime.
Your certification process could take anywhere from a few weeks to six months–it all depends on how driven you are and your own resources.
Before jumping into your course work, there are often other prerequisites for a Personal Trainer Certification. Typically, you have to be 18 years old, have a CPR and AED certification, and have a high school diploma or GED.
Once you have confirmed that you can meet all of the prerequisites, follow the steps below to enroll in your NESTA course.
How to Enroll in a NESTA Certification Course
- Go to: https://www.nestacertified.com/programs/. Select your course(s) and click on Add to Cart button
- Purchase and complete transaction
- Receive registration email and create an account
- Access online training courses through your online training portal
- Watch the introduction video
- Begin your studies and complete at your own pace
- Assistance is available by email, phone, or live chat
- When ready, take your exam
- Receive immediate results
- Download your free digital certificate
- Receive a physical 8×10 wall certificate mailed within 4-5 weeks or sooner (Note: If this option was selected at the time of ordering, a certificate will be mailed)
- Take our short online survey
- Download promotional logos to promote yourself and your new certificate
- Trend with us on Social Media
Starting Your Personal Training Career
Now it’s your turn to take action. Did you know that most fitness careers don’t require formal education or a degree?
Learn more about the variety of fitness industry careers. There is always something exciting about earning a new training or coaching certification and applying that new knowledge of how you train your clients. This also helps you hit the reset button.
Check out what it takes to start a career in personal fitness training. This is your most affordable and fastest way to become a highly qualified personal trainer.
Is your recertification coming up? Learn more about earning your CEU credits. You can find the full list of CEU courses here.
If you are ready to start your online personal training or coaching business, don’t forget to learn more about our online coaching course. You will also really enjoy this very comprehensive training course called Online Expert Empire.
There is always something exciting about earning a new training or coaching certification and applying that new knowledge of how you train your clients. This also helps you hit the reset button.
NESTA and Spencer Institute coaching programs are open to anyone with a desire to learn and help others. There are no prerequisites.
Thanks for reading!
The NESTA/Spencer Institute Team
PS: Click here to see many helpful business/career resources
