The Best CPD Courses for Personal Trainers

​Continued Professional Development (CPD) is vital for PT's because of the level of personal care they need to invest in their clients' health. The level 3 personal trainer qualification allows you to work with healthy adults. You can show them the proper exercise technique for their workouts, and teach them the general guidelines of nutrition. 

​But it doesn't equip you with knowledge or skills to teach a particular population, such as pregnant women, clients with specific requirements around their diet. It won't give you the skills either to work with clients that have a specialist performance goal. That's where the best CPD courses for personal trainers come in.

Perhaps you need a little more guidance in actually coaching someone through the movements, as so much of coaching is about teaching - and many trainers don't have experience with this.

In this article, we'll list the best CPD courses in specific areas based on forum conversations and personal trainer recommendations. Once you know what direction you'd like to take your personal trainer career, you can look at the below courses to find the one that will benefit you the most.

Pre/Postnatal Courses

If you provide personal training services to female clients, it's likely at some point you're going to need to support their training around pregnancy. Postnatal symptoms can last for years after giving birth for some women, even developing years after birth. If a female client has ever given birth, she is considered postnatal. 
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In the UK, Burrell Education consistently ranks as one of the most highly recommended courses for pre and postnatal personal training. There's a level 3 CPD qualification available through Active IQ which qualifies a personal trainer to be insured to train pre and post-partum women. ​

GP Referral Course

GP Referral qualifications allow you to work with patients with chronic physical conditions or illnesses to improve their health and wellbeing. You work closely with the NHS or private medical practices to support people who are under the care of a doctor to improve their wellness and quality of life. There's a highly recommended level 3 Diploma available through Origym, and this can be studied at a higher level too if more specialisation is required.

Kettlebell Course

Kettlebell instruction is a beneficial, flexible qualification. It can be suitable for someone brand new to exercise and an experienced athlete. The kettlebell itself also takes up almost no space, and it can be pursued as a sport within its own right. The 2-day practical course from Future Fit seems to be among the most highly rated CPD courses for kettlebell instruction. They are rated as having over two decades in the fitness industry, and the course is recognised by CIMSPA, making it insurable.

Nutrition Courses

Personal trainers are allowed to make recommendations about dietary guidelines laid out by their government. With additional qualifications, they can make more specific recommendations as they will have a better understanding of the client's nutritional needs. There are three main courses in this area rated highly by personal trainers.

Ben Coomber's BTN Academy, which has diverse offerings that include a business element, so you know how to market, sell and retain clients in your nutrition services. 

There's Precision Nutrition, which offers learn at your pace modules accompanied by a high-quality textbook and online support. This course has an emphasis on habit-based coaching. 

Finally, there's MacNutrition Uni which is a 12 month, highly rigorous course with formal exams and in-person seminar workshops. The emphasis in MNU is in empirical research and evidence-based learning. ​

Strength & Conditioning Course

Strength and conditioning style training will be used primarily with populations with athletic training goals. If you train people who are active in sport - whether recreationally or professionally - this qualification will help you to programme effectively for those athletes. 

In the UK, the governing body for strength and conditioning is The UK Strength and Conditioning Association. This qualification can be studied at university, at undergraduate and postgraduate levels. If this depth of education isn't necessary for you and your clients, there are CPD options available.

This offering from Brendan Chaplin at Strength and Conditioning Education includes a Fundamentals phase which could springboard an aspiring strength and conditioning coach into pursuing this at a higher level.

Obesity Course

Sadly, obesity is a growing market still. The ability to safely design and programme for overweight clients to allow them to progress safely through their exercise regime is critical for personal trainers dedicated to helping society fight obesity. 

You may work alongside a GP referral team to get the clients, but you will be helping the client to progress towards long-term weight loss and management, and helping them to build long-term improvement to their quality of life. The Obesity and Weight Management Certificate level 4 qualification from Origym is CIMSPA accredited. ​

Low Back Specialist Course

The HFE Level 4 Low Back Pain Certificate is the most highly rated qualification specialising in managing lower back problems. Low back pain is probably one of the most frequently reported symptoms in adult populations, with recent surveys recording around 49% of adults having back problems that last over 24 hours.


This makes the ability to solve this issue a highly desirable, in-demand skill. The NHS spends over £1b annually, treating lower back pain and it's related issues. Completing such qualification could lead to you working alongside a larger medical referral team.

Senior Fitness Course

Fitness for the elderly is a very much desired service and surprisingly under-served by personal trainers. They need special attention in particular areas and for that reasons they are not covered in the general L3 Personal Trainer course.

If you find that you connect to the ageing generation easily, you may want to consider specialising in that area, because it's very rewarding when you experience how much you are able to improve their quality of life while you won't need to worry about payment issues. Most PT course providers will have a course in fitness for seniors, like the Level 3 Exercise for Older Adults by HFE.

One of our community members, Greg Mikolap has done his PhD on this topic and as part of the process he developed an online course for personal trainers that feature video lessons and a much broader approach than the L3 qualification. You can check out a snippet of Strong Ageing in the iPT courses that are available to Unlimited Members, or head over to the official Strong Ageing website.

Olympic Lifting Course

There are two levels of qualifications for Olympic lifting in the UK. The level 1 British Weightlifting course allows you to assist another coach. The level 2 BWL course enables you to run sessions yourself, unsupervised, and take athletes to a weightlifting competition. In other countries, there will likely be an equivalent, but in the UK, British Weightlifting is the standard and necessary to compete at weightlifting meets.

The course itself is assessed in person over two days and is highly practical. At level 1, you learn to demonstrate and properly cue the weightlifting movements (snatch, clean and jerk) and identify and help to correct errors in individual athletes. At level 2, you can support groups of athletes, and the emphasis is on developing your skills are a coach.

Wrapping Up

​There are many routes if you choose to specialise, and this list is not exhaustive. Nor does one qualification preclude you from taking another and having multiple specialisms.

Making sure that you're able to provide exceptional levels of service to client populations that you enjoy working with will be a sure way to build a personal training business that you enjoy in the long term. It will also help you to attract the clients that you enjoy working with most. Developing your coaching skills as a personal trainer is always a substantial investment of time and effort.