Better Gym

Fantastic experience: Gym is honestly great. Lots of equipment. Always space available on the free weights and barbells if you come off-peak. Plenty of space and light. Much cheaper than other smaller, crappier gyms I’ve seen. Love this place.

Fantastic experience: Lovely space to play badminton and any other activities

Fantastic experience: Good value for money!

Negative experience: Disgraceful facilities. Dirty and falling apart. Council and owners should be ashamed

Negative experience: Disgusting flies all over the women's toilet and changing room by the gym

Negative experience: There is only 2 Triceps Rope Cable available to use for the whole gym and It’s always a long time waiting. It needs at least few ones more.

Negative experience: 0 star!! AVOID AT ALL COST! Their horrible App design is full of dark pattern that trick you to loose your booking and money with no refund! The most confusing and user u friendly app and service. We couldn’t find a way to change out booking thus trying to cancel and rebook, turns out was just cancelled with no refunds, with no warning or changing book option. App is so horrible that is a disgrace to the actually potential this place has. Extremely sad and disappointed.

Negative experience: Nobody at reception. When asking the other staff for help, they all just tell us that there should be someone at reception, but don't seem interested in actually helping.

Fantastic experience: The gym was very good. Very decent facilities and available water fountains. Only thing is it doesn’t taste very good, almost as if it is tap water that hasn’t been filtered so it would be good if it had a filter so that the water quality is better. Additionally, the access is pretty good as well. You only have to walk there and the parking to get to the gym is pretty close so accessibility isn’t a big problem. Overall, it is a good gym with a solid selection of different machines and exercises to choose from. Personally, I would give it a 8 out of 10.

Negative experience: The swimming pool is very shallow and I have previously put up with dirty dusty conditions in the centre on the premise of local convenience and being charitable but am now sick of being fed up with this place, On many many numerous occasions, when I've booked a relaxing weekend swim for all session (freestyle section) the pool has been unexpectedly taken over by swimming lessons and up to 50 noisy kids, resulting in us being displaced from our designated area and kettled into a tiny area or in the lanes getting in the lane swimmers way and vice versa. Additionally, there have been instances where we've had to wait for 10 to 20 minutes, only to discover that more lessons were scheduled, with no prior warning. This situation has led to overcrowding and lane-sharing issues, causing stress and inconvenience during what should be a relaxing experience. I've consistently encountered dirty and cold pool conditions, along with occasional water shortages in the showers or cold water, Given these few of many ongoing frustrations including in pool harassment by staff, I've decided not to renew my annual membership for a third time. And I'm sure I'm not the only one not coming back. I bet you've lost a lot of customers due to piss poor management and low standards. £480 a year to be treated like that is big mistake I'd rather pay more and not be bothered elsewhere.

Fantastic experience: Nice equipment

Fantastic experience: I love this gym in the Crystal Palace, some of the equipment is a bit dated and it gets quite hot although I understand they are getting air conditioning for next summer, but it’s the staff and trainers who work there who make all the difference! They are absolutely delightful, however specifically Ethan I feel goes above and beyond to provide an excellent cardio/strength program, helps tailor and modify excersizes to clients needs, and spends extra time with clients to ensure they are getting what they need from their work out. I also see him go around and help gym goers unprompted when he sees them struggling with equipment. Give him a raise!!

Fantastic experience: A fost ok

Negative experience: In my opinion this is a poor and overpriced gym for what it provides. Limited space and free weights, so the lifting area is often cramped. One squat rack but an abundance of treadmills taking up useful space.. as I write this im cancelling my membership .. i dont mind busy gyms but atleast have decent equipment

Negative experience: The dirtiest swimming pool I’ve ever been to. Public Swimming Pool… more like Public Health Risk. Please please for your personal hygiene avoid this pool. You could tell the water had lots of horrible stuff in it … probably from all the kids and the amount of people using such a small pool. The wall was literally slimely either end of the floor. The floor not cleaned for a long time, also slimely. I know they are having problems with the main pool shut down, but this is the worst pool I’ve been in London. There is no excuse for them not cleaning it. Let’s hope Bromley remove the leisure contracts from Better like they did in Lewisham

Positive experience: Decent place just needs more people to work there and need refurbishment

Negative experience: Started going to this gym years ago, left the area and have recently come back. The machines have not changed and half of them don't work properly, the free weights area is too small - with too many cardio machines [a lot of which don't work] no wi-fi now, even though they used to have it. Swimming pools are now closed which is sad. Gym is usually messy and dusty - and half the time there are no staff. A lot of kids use the gym which is fine but there should be more supervision just for their own safety. Also gym times - it used to be annoying that the gym was only open from 8am years ago on the weekend but now it's 9am and closes early as well. It's a massive shame because the location is great but it needs some actual investment.

Negative experience: The whole place has been run into disrepair and it's shocking that it's acceptable. Also, from 3-7 the gym is full of children which is literally horrendous

Negative experience: Disgusting changing rooms and a dated gym with a plethora of never used cardio machines causing congestion at the free weight section during busy periods. Not to mention the schools kids/juniors using the gym unsupervised creating a fairly unsafe and unpleasant gym experience. And the large pool is forever shut. Would not recommend

Fantastic experience: Nice crowd, great staff

Fantastic experience: Great gym . Huge amount of equipment.. a fantastic but run down building, refurbishment being carried out over the next few years,some great classes in the gym and studio, nice community feel ,

Negative experience: Too many Kids. None of them know how to workout and are just there to annoy. No thanks.

Fantastic experience: I enjoy this leisure centre. It has lots of character and the staff are friendly, cheerful and helpful.

Fantastic experience: Great gym, a little dated but still well equipped. Not too busy. Staff were helpful and friendly

Negative experience: Why are there so many kids !!!!! the gym is literally a creche for young teenagers and children.

Positive experience: I loved the Gym experience for my teen son in junior gym however was not impressed by the change in swimming teachers for my 6 year old who is new to swimming. The teacher paid no attention to my daughter and 4 other kids whilst teaching a class of 9 . This experience has completely put me off the swimming school . Despite my complaint I will be making it formal if I experienced this again.

Positive experience: Not a bad gym a tall, but slightly understaffed and under equipped.

Positive experience: Need new equipment and a refurb but I do love this leisure centre

Negative experience: Lot of kids age 8-12 between 3-6pm using all gym machines without any supervision and annoying who comes to exercise routine. Also there is NO WIFI which is essential.

Fantastic experience: Been attending this gym for a few months and has a good range of cardio, machine weights and free weight equipment. Staff are very friendly and helpful.

Positive experience: This gym is okay value for the membership. The fees are a lot lower than many posh gyms so it’s clearly not going to have all the mod cons. Having said that the changing rooms are in desperate need of renovation and I wouldn’t use the showers and toilets if my life depended on it. If you are local and go home to shower then it’s fine. The gym itself is more than clean enough for my standards which is the important part (are you there to work out or admire the surroundings?!). The equipment meets my requirements, but the gym has waaaaaay too many treadmills and cross trainers. I would estimate they have about 30 combined and I’ve never seen more than about 15 in use even at peak times. They could clear out half of these and make more room benches and space in general. It’s a huge building so maybe they are just understaffed, but no one ever puts the free weights back in the right place. A minor gripe but I would think this is standard at any gym and speaks to a lack of care. The pools have been drained for over a year, I suspect the whole thing needs some proper investment.

Negative experience: DIRTY!!!! run down old building with smelly dusty changing/shower rooms! The changing rooms are shared for male and female yet hardly any of the changing room doors shut/lock!! Rude staff that shrug their shoulders at you if you have a query.... freezing cold pools all year around and all parents put in a small room to watch their child swim on a small TV with no sound. Also they occasionally over charge you and takes months on end to get your refund!!! AVOID!!!!

Positive experience: The Bad News: There are quite a few other reviews here stating that the gym is unclean and untidy. I only joined recently, and I haven't found that to be the case. HOWEVER, I do feel that the gym is poorly resourced and far too small for the price you'll pay for it. There are only 3/4 free-weight benches, for example, no kettlebells under 16kg, and only 3 exercise bikes in the entire place. Given that I have only joined since the gym reopened under current Covid restrictions I don't know if this is normally the case, but given the space inside I can;t really see where they would put extra equipment if they did have it. PureGym and Xercise4Less, as basic as they are, have much more equipment and a greater breadth of it too. The Good News: If you pay for the full membership, you get free racquet sports, access to swimming, tennis and exercise classes. If you play badminton once a week, for example (which I tend to) that can almost offset the full membership monthly cost in itself. There are also track facilities to take advantage of. I have also found the staff here to generally be quite helpful and they provide anti-bacterial spray and cloths to help people clean equipment before/after use. Overall: Overall, if you're just going to go to the gym, it's not worth it. There is not a great deal of space and the equipment is lacking, especially for peak times. If you are going to regularly use the other facilities, such as squash, tennis or badminton courts, or go swimming/track running a lot, it probably is worth it for the price you're going to pay.

Negative experience: ELLIOT THE ASSISTANT MANAGER WAS EXTREMELY RUDE TO YOUNGER CHILDREN THREATENING THEM BY RAISING HIS VOICE AND GETTING INTO PERSONAL SPACE THE MINORS WERE ASKING FOR HELP TO GET INTO THE GYM BUT ONLY RECEIVED DISRESPECT

Negative experience: Filthy and outdated - on top of that packed with zero respect for rules post lockdown. Not worth the membership costs!

Negative experience: Old, worn down, untidy, places things are placed don’t make sense, classes are not great either with instructors who are well below average for the price.

Negative experience: Very bad gym, don't join join if you are looking to make progress or maintain your shape, you will pay for a pool that you can't use, some of the staff is very rude, they are not professional , the gym is untidy and dirty, beautiful building, great location, totally mismanaged

Negative experience: Deeply disappointing, under-resourced, unclean, unprofessional gym. Great pool though.

Negative experience: Very disappointed of phone service, trying to get through for days - either to membership or reception - don't answer or hangs up.