MadMuscles Exposed: How a Predatory Fitness App Uses Deception

AI, and "Tai Chi" as Marketing Camouflage

What You Need to Know Before You Click That Ad

If you've scrolled through YouTube, Instagram, or Reddit in the past year, you've likely encountered aggressive advertisements for MadMuscles—a fitness app promising AI-powered personal training, weight loss, and martial arts instruction. Many of these ads feature someone performing "tai chi" movements with promises of authentic training. What follows is an education in how this app operates, who it targets, and why thousands of users have branded it a scam. This article exists to protect you.

The Company: MadMuscles (madmuscles-app.com)

MadMuscles is a fitness and wellness application available on iOS and Android. On its surface, it offers workout videos, nutrition guidance, and personalized coaching through AI technology. The company operates from an unclear jurisdiction (corporate structure is deliberately obscured), and currently maintains a 2.9 out of 5-star rating on Trustpilot based on over 11,000 user reviews—the vast majority of which describe predatory billing practices.

Alternative names you may see:

  • Mad Muscles
  • MadMuscles.com
  • madmuscles-app.com


If you're searching for complaints or reviews about this company, use these exact names for best results.

How the Scam Works: The Four-Step Model

Step One: The Deceptive Ad

MadMuscles has launched approximately 18,000 AI-generated advertisements across YouTube, Instagram, Reddit, and other platforms. These ads are deliberately misleading.

The tai chi walking ads specifically:

These are among the most aggressive and health-misinforming ads the company runs. Users see AI-generated video of a fit older man discussing weight loss and physique transformation. The messaging is direct and false:
  • "Women over 50 can go from XL to M with Tai Chi walking"
  • "Your shape is incredible. How many times per week do you visit the gym? Zero. I'm just doing Tai Chi walking every day"
  • "Tai Chi heals your body and makes you lose weight faster than in your 20s"
  • "In 3 days, you'll feel better. In 7 days, your eyes will change. In one month, your son won't recognize you"
  • "One tai chi move zaps belly fat"
  • "Melt belly fat. Reduce cortisol, boost testosterone naturally"

The target demographic is deliberate: men over 50, women over 40. The comparison is always framed against gym training: "The gym only stresses your body. Tai Chi heals your body and gives you energy."

What makes these ads effective:

They promise rapid, visible transformation (one month to unrecognizable change) without effort. They use before-and-after imagery of AI-generated or stock photos. They invoke authority through the appearance of a "master" speaking. They position Tai Chi as a superior alternative to actual fitness training. And they prey on age-related anxiety—the fear that the body becomes "too fragile" for serious exercise after 50.

Step Two: The Bait—The "Free Trial"

You click. You're taken to a signup page offering a 7-day or 14-day free trial. The cost appears minimal:

  • £9.99
  • $9.99
  • €4.79
  • €9.99

The terms are buried in small print. Most users don't read them—they expect a standard free trial experience: use the app for the stated period, and either cancel or start paying for a subscription.

This is not what happens.

Step Three: The Trap—Unexpected Premium Charges

Within days of signing up, users receive billing notifications from their payment provider. The charges are significant:

  • £49.95
  • £69.99
  • €49.99
  • $99
  • €99

Users report multiple consistent patterns:

Pattern 1: Upsell Confusion
Users navigate what they think are normal app features—selecting a fitness goal, viewing workout recommendations, or exploring "personalized coaching"—and suddenly encounter a charge screen. They either accidentally tap "confirm" or don't realize they've triggered a premium upsell until they see the charge.

Pattern 2: Auto-Subscription Conversion
The "free trial" automatically converts to a paid monthly subscription. The fine print states this, but users report unclear language, hidden checkboxes, and confusing phrasing designed to obscure the auto-renewal nature.

Pattern 3: Multiple Stacked Charges
Some users report multiple charges within a short period—a charge for "personal coaching," another for "nutrition plans," another for "premium form correction." Each is technically a different service, but all were triggered by the same signup flow.

Step Four: The Refusal—No Customer Support, No Refunds

Users contact MadMuscles demanding a refund. Here's what they encounter:

Automated Bot Responses
Customer service is handled by AI chatbots. Users report speaking with "Stella" or similar bot names. These bots do not understand refund requests—they repeat automated phrases, suggest troubleshooting steps unrelated to billing, or direct users back to the terms of service.

The Terms of Service Trap
MadMuscles' refund policy includes a requirement that users demonstrate 14+ days of consecutive app usage and proper documentation of cancellation attempts. This condition is nearly impossible to prove and appears designed to deny refunds automatically.

The Charge Continuation Problem
Users report that even after successfully canceling their subscription and receiving cancellation confirmation emails, they continue to be charged. Charges appearing weeks or months after cancellation are documented across multiple reviews. When contacted again, customer service claims the cancellation "didn't process" and demands additional proof.

The Payment Processor Wall
MadMuscles operates through third-party payment processors, making it difficult to trace the company directly. When users file disputes with their banks or credit card companies, MadMuscles often contests the disputes with their own documentation of terms-of-service agreement.

The Tai Chi Problem, Part 1: "Tai Chi Walking" and the Belly Fat Lie

The "Tai Chi Walking" campaign represents a new low in fitness marketing dishonesty. This is not simply a misrepresentation of what Tai Chi is. It's a deliberate health claim that has no factual basis and preys on people's legitimate desire for effective, accessible fitness.


What the Ads Promise
MadMuscles' "Tai Chi Walking" program is sold with these specific claims:
Body transformation:

  • "Go from XL to M in one month"
  • "Your son won't recognize you after one month"
  • "Unrecognizable after a month"

Health claims:

  • "Melt belly fat"
  • "Reduce cortisol"
  • "Boost testosterone naturally"
  • "Lose weight faster than in your 20s"
  • "One tai chi move zaps belly fat"

Comparative claims:

  • "The gym breaks you after 50. Tai Chi heals your body"
  • "The gym only stresses your body. Tai Chi works better"

Timeline claims:

  • "In 3 days, you'll feel better"
  • "In 7 days, your eyes will change"
  • "In one month, complete transformation"

Equipment-free selling point:

  • "No machines, no pressure, no brutal workouts"
  • "Just 7 minutes a day"
  • "No equipment needed"

These claims are delivered through AI-generated video of a man with a fit physique, creating the false impression that Tai Chi Walking produced those results.

Why These Claims Are False

Walking is not Tai Chi:

Walking—even mindful walking—is cardiovascular exercise. Tai Chi is a martial art system. They are fundamentally different activities. Walking can improve cardiovascular health. Tai Chi can improve balance, proprioception, internal energy cultivation, and martial skill. Marketing walking as Tai Chi is the definition of false advertising.

Tai Chi does not "melt belly fat" in 7 days:
No legitimate fitness practice produces visible fat loss in 7 days. The human body doesn't work this way. Adipose tissue loss requires sustained caloric deficit over weeks to months. Anyone claiming otherwise is either lying or ignorant. MadMuscles is doing both.

"Tai Chi Walking" has no scientific basis:
There is no recognized martial arts or fitness practice called "Tai Chi Walking." What you're actually getting is a person walking while performing generic tai chi-inspired movements. This is not a traditional Tai Chi practice. It's not a recognized training method. It's a marketing fiction.

Tai Chi does not replace gym training for men over 50:
This claim is designed to discourage users from any actual structured fitness program. While Tai Chi has genuine health benefits (improved balance, joint health, stress reduction), it does not build the muscle, bone density, and cardiovascular capacity that aging bodies need. The comparison is false. The right answer is not "do Tai Chi instead of the gym"—it's "do both."

The "reduce cortisol, boost testosterone" claims are unsubstantiated:
While some research suggests Tai Chi may have minor effects on stress hormones, the claims here are wildly exaggerated. A 7-minute daily "Tai Chi Walking" video will not significantly alter hormonal balance in measurable ways. This is pharmaceutical-style health claiming without pharmaceutical-level evidence.

The Legal Problem

These claims cross the line from marketing exaggeration into false health advertising. In most jurisdictions, making unsubstantiated health claims about a fitness product violates consumer protection laws:


  • United States (FTC): False or misleading health claims are prohibited
  • European Union: Health claims must be scientifically substantiated
  • United Kingdom: Advertising Standards Authority prohibits unsubstantiated health claims
  • Australia: Therapeutic Goods Administration regulates health claims
  • Canada: Health Canada prohibits false health claims

MadMuscles is making specific, quantifiable health claims ("reduce cortisol," "boost testosterone," "melt belly fat in 7 days") without scientific evidence. This is not a gray area. It's clear violation of consumer protection standards across multiple jurisdictions.

Real Tai Chi Walking vs. MadMuscles' Invention

Authentic Tai Chi Walking (from lineage practitioners):

  • Part of a complete martial arts system requiring years of study
  • Focuses on internal energy cultivation and proper weight distribution
  • Teaches alignment principles: feet forward (like railroad tracks), weight originates from waist
  • Develops what practitioners call "cotton-like sole"—a feeling of weightlessness despite carrying body weight
  • No specific fat-loss claims—benefits are improved balance, proprioception, and internal awareness
  • Requires proper instruction to develop correctly
  • Practiced as part of broader Tai Chi training
  • Timeline: noticeable improvements in 3-6 months of consistent practice

MadMuscles' "Tai Chi Walking":

  • Standalone video product
  • No instruction in proper alignment or principles
  • No understanding of internal cultivation
  • AI voice narration explaining generic movement
  • Specific fat-loss claims
  • No teacher to correct form
  • Promised results in days to weeks
  • Designed to maximize quick purchases, not develop skill

The distance between these two practices is the distance between learning from a qualified master and watching a fitness video.
This targeting is intentional. These demographics are statistically more likely to:
  • Have anxiety about aging bodies
  • Be susceptible to rapid-transformation promises
  • Have disposable income for subscriptions
  • Be less familiar with digital scams
  • Trust authority figures in marketing

The Reddit and Social Media Backlash

The "Tai Chi Walking" campaign has sparked significant criticism across martial arts communities:

From Reddit's r/taichi (Jan 2026):
"These AI-generated ads featuring a fit older man claiming that Tai Chi builds muscle more effectively than the gym are flooding YouTube and TikTok. I suspect this campaign will only provoke backlash against Tai Chi rather than draw people to the practice."

The concern expressed by authentic Tai Chi practitioners is clear: these ads don't just scam people—they damage the reputation of Tai Chi itself by associating it with false claims and predatory business practices.

Critical observation:
One authentic Tai Chi instructor noted that these ads will likely cause backlash against the entire Tai Chi community: "The harm isn't just to individuals who get scammed. It's to everyone trying to teach authentic Tai Chi and seeing their credibility undermined by association with this marketing fraud."

The Broader Tai Chi Problem: "Tai Chi" as Marketing Word

How Fitness Marketing Exploits "Tai Chi"

The misuse of "Tai Chi" isn't unique to MadMuscles. It's a widespread problem in fitness marketing:
What happens to "Tai Chi" in fitness culture:

  • Stripped of martial content
  • Stripped of philosophical grounding
  • Reduced to a collection of flowing movements
  • Rebranded as "stress relief," "gentle exercise," or "weight loss"
  • Commodified as a 30-minute class
  • Sold as an alternative to "real" fitness

Why "Tai Chi" sells:
The word carries legitimacy. It evokes:

  • Ancient wisdom
  • Asian martial arts mastery
  • Genuine internal practice
  • A complete system, not just exercise

People who hear "Tai Chi" believe they're getting something real—something rooted in tradition and actual knowledge.

The Three Versions of "Tai Chi" in Modern Marketing

Version 1: Honest "Tai Chi-Inspired" Fitness
Company: "We offer tai chi-inspired movement classes for stress relief and flexibility"
Assessment: Honest. Acknowledges what it actually is.

Version 2: Watered-Down "Tai Chi" Classes
Company: "Learn Tai Chi for balance and wellness"
Assessment: Problematic. Teaches the external form without internal work or martial context. Creates false impression of learning authentic Tai Chi.

Version 3: Fraudulent "Tai Chi" (MadMuscles)
Company: "Our AI Tai Chi Walking melts belly fat, boosts testosterone, and replaces gym training"
Assessment: Scam. Makes unsubstantiated health claims and appropriates Tai Chi branding for false authority.

MadMuscles operates at Version 3—the fraudulent end.

What Real Tai Chi Training Actually Requires
As someone who spent three years in the Wudang Mountains studying under traditional masters and holds the 16th generation transmission of the Sanfeng lineage, I can describe what authentic Tai Chi training involves:
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Time:

  • Minimum 3-5 years to understand basics
  • 5+ years to develop real skill
  • Lifetime commitment to deepen practice
  • Direct transmission:
  • In-person teacher-student relationship
  • Physical correction of form
  • Detailed attention to individual practice
  • Teacher evaluating your development

Content:

  • 4 forms in the Sanfeng line alone
  • Martial applications (tui shou, weapons, combat principles)
  • Internal cultivation practices (qigong, energy work)
  • Philosophical study (Daoism, martial philosophy)
  • Understanding of how energy flows through the body

Results:

  • Improved balance and proprioception (genuine)
  • Better joint health (genuine)
  • Reduced stress (genuine)
  • Developed martial skill (genuine)
  • Lifetime practice journey (genuine)

What you do NOT get:

  • Visible fat loss in one month
  • Testosterone boost from flowing movements
  • Replacement for strength training
  • Measurable results in 7 days
  • 7-minute daily videos producing transformation

Authentic Tai Chi is genuine but slow, requires commitment, and makes no false promises.

The Tai Chi Question: Why This Appropriation Matters

From my perspective, what troubles me most is the systematic appropriation of "Tai Chi" as a marketing word by companies that have no knowledge of what Tai Chi actually is.


Tai Chi has become a brand label in fitness culture—something people think they understand but rarely do. The word conjures images of graceful, flowing movements performed by people in classes designed to improve flexibility, balance, and general wellness. These are legitimate benefits. But marketing a fitness routine as "Tai Chi" is like calling a car engine a "vehicle." The engine is part of what makes the vehicle work, but it isn't the whole thing.

The Knowledge Gap

When I spent three years in the Wudang Mountains studying under traditional masters in the actual traditional class (not the separate class for Western students), I wasn't learning choreography for wellness. I was entering a transmission of internal kung fu rooted in Daoist philosophy, passed directly from teacher to student for sixteen generations. The thirty-five forms I mastered weren't designed as fitness sequences. They were maps for cultivating internal energy, developing martial application, and understanding the principles that govern how the human body functions.


MadMuscles' AI cannot understand any of this. It has no access to lineage knowledge, no capacity for real transmission, no understanding of what it's demonstrating.

What Gets Lost in the MadMuscles Translation

The internal cultivation component vanishes.

Authentic Tai Chi practice involves attention to subtle energy circulation, the development of what traditional practitioners call "qi" or life force. This isn't mysticism—it's trainable awareness of proprioception, nervous system regulation, and the coordinated firing of deep muscular stabilizers. MadMuscles' video has no access to this.

The martial foundation gets erased.
The movements exist within a complete combat system with centuries of refinement. Each stance, each hand position, each weight shift has a martial application. When you strip this away and call it "Tai Chi Walking for belly fat," you've removed the structure that gives the movements their coherence and actual function.

The philosophical context disappears entirely.
In authentic practice, Tai Chi emerges from Daoist principles about balance, non-resistance, following natural law. The practice teaches you something about how to live—how to act without forcing, how to find power in yielding, how to move through resistance with efficiency rather than aggression. This is inseparable from the physical movements. When you remove it and replace it with "melt belly fat," you have abandoned the entire purpose.

The teacher-student relationship is impossible.
Tai Chi transmission requires direct contact between a qualified teacher and a sincere student. This cannot happen through an app. A teacher can see what your body is actually doing and correct it. A teacher understands your personal development. A teacher can guide you toward genuine understanding. An app cannot.

The Deception at the Core
MadMuscles isn't simply offering a fitness service with an unfortunate branding problem. They're deliberately appropriating the authority of a 16-generation lineage tradition to legitimize something completely different.

Someone attracted by the word "Tai Chi" in the ad believes they're learning something real—something that touches body, mind, and character. Instead, they're getting AI-generated video narrated by artificial intelligence, with explicit promises of belly fat loss.

This is not a legitimate translation of Tai Chi for modern fitness culture. This is a betrayal of it. It's taking a tradition that requires commitment, knowledge, and genuine transmission, and replacing it with marketing fraud.

Be Careful!

If you've been targeted by MadMuscles ads—especially the "Tai Chi Walking" ads promising rapid transformation—I hope this article helps you understand what you're looking at. The company relies on quick decisions, small fonts, unsubstantiated health claims, and customer confusion. The antidote is education and skepticism.


You deserve fitness instruction that is honest about what it offers. You deserve customer service that treats refund disputes respectfully. You deserve apps designed around your benefit, not your exploitation. You deserve to know the difference between an actual martial arts tradition and a marketing fiction.

MadMuscles fails on all these counts.

If you've been scammed by them, you're not alone—11,000+ people have documented the same experience. And if you see their ads, you now know exactly what to expect if you click: deceptive charges, false health claims, appropriation of a genuine tradition, and customer service designed to deny you refunds.
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There is no 7-minute daily video replacement. There is no AI instruction. There is no belly fat melting in 7 days. There is only the real work of learning a tradition, or the fraud of pretending to.


Choose wisely. Stay skeptical. And if something promises ancient martial wisdom through artificial intelligence, walk away.

Your money—and your body—deserve better.

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