NordicTrack 2950 vs Peloton Tread

I’ve had a lot of people ask me about the NordicTrack 2950 vs Peloton treadmill and I figured I had a pretty good opportunity to compare the top two treadmills. I would say in the residential home market, they are the top ones out there right now.

Nordictrack 2950 vs Peloton tread comparison

So, I have these two treadmills, the Peloton treadmill and NordicTrack Commercial 2950 which I bought a year ago and have put about 1500 miles on over the last year or so. While I have both treadmills and I haven’t sold the NordicTrack 2950 yet, so I am going to put together a little review in comparison for you guys then you can make a better decision at home rather than having to just bite the bullet and make the big purchase not knowing if it’s for you. 

Peloton Tread
Peloton Tread
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Nordictrack Commercial 2950
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Overall Design and Appearance

So, first thing first, the biggest difference I noticed between the two treadmills it’s their appearance. The Peloton was so much sleeker, it’s obviously a brand-new design something from the ground up and I think that’s true once you get in really get into the user interface and the software that the Peloton treadmill comes with. There’s just a huge difference it’s really hard to compare the two. 

The comparison I always would give is it’s like comparing a Chevy Volt to a Tesla. It’s like this old dinosaur company that tried to build something super modern and new and yeah, it’s all right but it’s not that good versus the Peloton where they just built it from the ground up. 

Software & Technology

Peloton uses the most advanced technology to do it so I mean in terms of what’s available on it. The Peloton treadmill has its own software, if you pay a subscription for you get the live programming and all that stuff. NordicTrack 2950 has the same thing as ifit. Ifit is a monthly subscription that you can get but I don’t even bother. It’s useless, I don’t like it. I think that the user interface is clunky and it’s not very fast.  

I don’t think that the processor is that great and I don’t know, I just wasn’t super happy with the user interface. I used the NordicTrack treadmill for the last year, rarely would I interact with the touchscreen and all the bells and whistles. I just get on it and I would run.  

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Treadmill Belt

So, the one of the other major difference is that most people notice is the belt. The belt on the Peloton is the thick rubber slats versus the belt on the NordicTrack 2950 which is like your standard belt. So, for those of you that are run on a treadmill before can imagine, the traditional belt which is super squishy and the whole deck itself is designed to have shock absorption.

So, it’s very comfortable, it gives you a nice feel and a lot of us are used to it. It’s quite a bit easier than running outside which is why they say I’ll put your treadmill on but a 1 percent incline and stuff like that to try to simulate a more realistic effort for running outdoors.  

Now the peloton treadmill is different because the deck itself has absolutely no shock absorption. It’s solid as a rock and the deck weighs like 300 pounds. All of the shock absorption’s that you get is in the thick rubber slats.  

Peloron treadmill deck
Peloron Treadmill Deck

So, if you look closely at the images, you can see that it has a nice thick rubber slat. That’s on a steel or aluminum. It rotates around so all of your shock adsorptions are right here versus you know a super-thin belt where all your shock absorption comes from the deck itself. It makes a pretty big difference in the comparison.  

Peloron Treadmill Deck
Peloron Treadmill Deck

I would say running on a Nordictrack treadmill is kind of its own unique experience. It’s a little bit squishy very forgiving. The treadmill is in the peloton is I would compare to running on a track like a high school track. It’s got just about that amount of cushion on it, which for some people is not a good thing because the more the firmer the surface all of your form issues with running in terms of heel striking and how you run that’s going to magnify.

Nordictrack Treadmill Deck
Nordictrack Treadmill Deck

When you don’t have all of that squishiness the traditional treadmill that cast so you might notice that all maybe your knees are a little sorer. Maybe you’ve got some hip flexor issues or some IT band tendonitis all of that stuff is going to be magnified on a firmer surface. So, I’ve seen on forums online a lot of people complaining that the treadmill they notice that their joints are hurting more things like that. 

I don’t think their joints must be sore, I think that they’re getting tendinitis, they’re flaring up because their form issues for running are being magnified and they’re getting some inflammation in places that they would be getting if they were running outside more. 

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Treadmill Deck

Now the other thing about traditional treadmill belts is they slip. Treadmill belts are rotating on these little steel are on these drums at the front at the back and the heavier you are and the more you heel strike that belt is going to skip every time you hit it and you might not even feel it but there’s a little bit of micro slippage on that belt every single time your foot hits the deck. 

Now if it slips a lot if you’ve been on a treadmill that’s poorly adjusted and it’s pretty dangerous if it slips a lot. It can make you stumble the trip. In the Peloton treadmill there’s absolutely no slippage. The way the belts design zero slippage at all which is pretty nice and what I’ve noticed is it allows you to do a lot of times in the peloton classes. They’ll have you do like a side shuffle on the treadmill itself and it’s not that comfortable or possible on a traditional treadmill belt.

More road-like experience: Peloton
More forgiving experience: Nordictrack 2950

Treadmill Motors

Just because of the slippage and when you plant your foot in the front there it’s just it doesn’t feel the same and it’s not as friendly. For that the other thing I   liked about that the motors. A lot of people look at the horsepower of the motors themselves to determine whether or not it’s a good treadmill or a bad treadmill and there were a lot of concerns skaters the Peloton treadmill has a two-horsepower treadmill motor.  

Which is one of the weakest voters out there the NordicTrack 2950 treadmill has a four and a half horsepower motor. Now I’m not an electrician, I don’t know I’m not that great with the difference between AC and DC and all of that stuff but what I can tell you is this the two horsepower motor on the Peloton gets up to speed and incline much faster than the NordicTrack treadmills.  

So however, the design is I don’t know if it’s AC versus DC or what it is the treadmill the tread peloton has more than enough power. So, don’t sweat about that, I’ve seen a lot of concerns about that and I was concerned about it too.  

Treadmill's Vibration

  • Advantage: NordicTrack 2950

Now let’s see here what else a lot of people have complained about the vibration of the Peloton treadmill. The Peloton does indeed vibrate more especially when the incline goes up the front feet come off the floor and then it’s supported. Just on this little riser bar and I noticed that you do see a little bit more shaking.

Honestly it’s not that big of a deal for me. I think that a lot of people have severe shaking or vibrator shakiness issues because defeat arm level front to back or side to side and that’s causing the shaken to be even worse. Between the two more vibrations when the Peloton treadmill is on an incline with a pug dog flat. I don’t think the vibration is a whole lot more than the NordicTrack 2950 in terms of noise on both treadmills.

Machine Noise

Advantage: Nordictrack treadmill is quieter but I prefer the humming noise on Peloton vs the sound of pounding footsteps on NordicTrack.
Peloton-vs-norditrack-noise-measure-in-db 4evafit.com
Peloton vs nordictrack 2950 -noise measure in db

Now what I would say the biggest difference is in terms of noise is what you hear on the peloton is just this constant hub of the motor. It’s just louder in Peloton versus the NordicTrack 2950, the motor is very quiet and what you hear is the thud thud thud of your feet hitting the treadmill. That’s I would say the biggest difference in the noise area.  

In NordicTrack treadmill you’re going to hear footsteps, in the Peloton you just hear this constant hum and you don’t hear any footsteps which for me is not a big deal because I put them in my garage so it doesn’t matter how loud it is but if you put them in a guest bedroom or somewhere in the house then I would say that the constant hum of the Peloton treadmill might be less annoying than the hearing footsteps.  

I downloaded a vibration meter on my phone and you can see in the image, when measured at the tray, the Peloton treadmill vibrates significantly more than the NordicTrack treadmill even at 0% incline. 

Interestingly, as you can see in the nest photo, the vibration, when measured on the Peloton treadmill deck is substantially less than the NordicTrack 2950.

So, a lot of these you’re going out and you’re running up in a mountain somewhere with this guy. It’ll adjust the incline based on the elevation of the mountain. The problem is it doesn’t adjust smoothly, it like by point one continuously so all you hear the whole time is some “waa waa” sound that it makes. You are running and it’s always going up and down and up and down. I found it to be extremely annoying to the point where I was done. I really didn’t want to use it at all.  

One other advantage you might point out is knowing track does have a fan hooked in here where the peloton doesn’t all.

Space Convenient

Now in terms of convenience for the two there’s no question the NordicTrack 2950 treadmill is more convenient because you know the NordicTrack treadmill, it’s easy. You just save yourself a little bit of space. If you want you can tilt it back and roll it around. With Peloton treadmill forget about that. It is so incredibly heavy.

Now you can incline the pellets on the treadmill and you can lift it on some rollers in the front but it’s a 2 or 3 man job for sure because it’s so heavy. So that elessedil is an advantage for the NordicTrack 2950 being able to move around especially if you live in a tight space.

User Interface

Now, Let’s go through and look at the user interface on both of them. So, in Nordictrack 2950 treadmill with iFit, they do have like these runs you can do with these trainers. You can browse they have a workout library and I think they’re starting to feel the heat with Peloton and they’re really starting to up their game with this but I found them to be very jerky in terms of the video quality was very jerky and the way that the treadmill itself adjusts to the terrain. 

Peloton user interface
Peloton user interface
Nordictrack 2950 user interface
Nordictrack 2950 user interface

Let’s get to the Peloton’s user interface. This is kind of my homepage, my calendar, all the workouts that I’ve done, my badges and you know the profile. You can tell the screen is so much crisper and so much brighter. It’s much more like using an iPhone versus that which is just a lot clunkier.

We can go to classes, see what classes are coming up. You can go through there’s probably a thousand that you can do and you can filter them all by walking, running, boot camp, floor workouts. So, you’ve got the floor strength, stretching, yoga, meditation, cardio.  

They’ve got a lot; I’ve done the yoga classes and things like that and they’re actually quite nice. They’ve got some awesome classes anywhere from a five-minute warm-up up to an hour-long endurance run.  

So, I would say the best feature by far the Peloton treadmill and for me, one of the biggest selling points versus just buying a subscription for the app and then just using your old treadmill would be the leaderboard.  

peloton treadmill leaderboard
peloton treadmill leader-board

So, if I just go to a class, I’ll show you guys the leaderboard in case you’re interested. If we go to running when I go to 30-minute intervals run, I start it and there’s a heart rate. You got to make sure you connect your heart rate and there’s Bluetooth audio if you want an audio speaker or headphones to hook up to but I would say the biggest thing is the leader board.  

This is awesome because it gives you a point total based on how many calories you have burned during your workout and put you on the leader board and ranks against everybody else. Now the cool thing is not only if you’re doing a live class it will rank you against everybody in the class live but what if I take this class is pre-recorded.

So, if I go in it’ll give me the all-time point leaders for this class. So, you can still compete with people even if you’re not taking it at the same time as them which I really liked. 

You don’t get this feature if you’re just using the app and you’re streaming the app and using a different treadmill because it doesn’t know how fast you are going; it doesn’t know you’re inclined. I love this feature and to me this is one of the biggest selling points of the Peloton treadmill. 

Sound Quality

I think the music and the speakers are pretty good in Peloton treadmill. They are not like you know awesome but I think that they’re adequate when I’m running with the noise of the treadmill, I can hear it. I can hear the audio through the speakers just fine with it at about 75% volume. I could imagine that if you had any sort of hearing loss that it could be a challenge and you might have to use Bluetooth headphones to help you hear the audio. 

Screencast Feature

The other thing that’s pretty cool about the Peloton treadmill is you can do a screencast, so you can cast this off the screen to a TV nearby. You have to have a certain casting device. I have a Google Chromecast, I have an Amazon fire stick neither of which will work to cast.

I heard that the only one that really works is a Roku so I guess I’m gonna have to get a Roku but apparently, the older version of the Amazon fire sticks would do it but the newer versions don’t for some reason and Google Chromecast I guess doesn’t work.  

Anyway, that would be cool. When I do my workouts, I plan on casting it up to the TV up on the wall because I’ll do my floor workouts down on the floor.

Accessories Holder

So, in terms of space to put things, there’s a big tray here for that for the Peloton treadmill which is nice although then I’m running if things do pretend to rattle on here. Which can be a little bit irritating. 

Peloton accessories holder
Peloton accessories holder

With the NordicTrack commercial 2950 you have a tray and you also have two water bottle holders. So, I kind of like that feature a little bit better. One of the biggest features in the Peloton treadmill is the fact that it’s a brand-new design with a speed knob and an incline knob. Which I have to say is super convenient. 

OneTouch Incline Vs Free Mode

In the NordicTrack treadmill, actually the design of the speed control does have OneTouch incline and speed are pretty convenient as well but the ones where you have to sit there and individually hit up and down and it’s a deal-breaker for me. 

peloton treadmill free mode
peloton treadmill free mode

Peloton Treadmill has the free mode; free mode is super cool. So, you hit the free mode and it disengages the motor and you can just push the tread belt yourself so there’s a lot of workouts. They’ll put you in free mode for five or ten minutes and it is brutal. Unfortunately, there is no such free mode in NordicTrack commercial 2950. 

Is it worth buying a Peloton treadmill?

I think both of them have some good and bad features about them and you know the price that I paid for NordicTrack treadmill a year ago was about $2,400 and the price that I paid for the Peloton obviously is at $4,000, so huge difference in price. Is it worth it? I mean I think if you talk to a financial adviser and you trying to like break it down in a way like if I don’t go to the gym it’ll pay itself off.   

I think it’s a luxury product and I think that if it’s going to break the bank for you then don’t buy it. If you’re a super serious runner and you spend a lot of time on the treadmill then go for it. I put about 60 or 70 miles a week on it. The more realistic running experience like with the new belt was worth it to me and having the leaderboard up there is the icing on the cake because I really enjoy having that competitive factor to it.  

There were a lot of people wondering about the peloton treadmill said you have to have a dedicated circuit for the peloton itself. I have to say, I didn’t really buy it and so I have my peloton plugged into this little surge protector which also is powering my sony’s speaker and my control box.

I also had other things plugged into it and I’ve never once had an issue. So I wouldn’t really sweat it in terms of having a dedicated circuit, I think that as long as you have a grounded outlet it’s probably fine to just plug it and go with it but I suppose if you blow in your circuit then you have to figure something out.

What i feel about Peloton and Nordictrack treadmill now?

I was happy with NordicTrack 2950 treadmill when I got it and it is a much softer running experience, if that’s important to you. I’m super happy with the Peloton treadmill, I think the customer service has been great.

The warranty, it’s three years and you can extend it for two to three years which is what I would highly recommend anyone for buying a first-generation product but I think that’s it I can answer any questions in the comments all right take care you.

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