75-Day Challenge Checklist: Daily Tasks

You’ve decided to do a 75-day challenge. You don’t need another 1,500 words explaining what it is. You need the actual list of tasks on a page you can print, screenshot, or copy into a note.

This article gives you three of them. A full daily checklist for 75 Hard, a full daily checklist for 75 Soft, and a blank template for anyone building their own 75-day challenge. All three are on this page, with no email gate and no popup asking for your first name.

Hit Cmd+P (or Ctrl+P on Windows) and you’ll have a paper version in thirty seconds.

What a 75-day challenge checklist needs to cover

Every 75-day challenge worth doing covers five areas. The exact tasks change between programs, but the categories don’t.

Movement: structured workouts, not just steps.
Nutrition: a defined rule, not “eat healthy.”
Hydration: a measurable daily volume.
Learning: reading or another focused input.
Proof: a photo, a journal entry, or a tracked metric.

The checklist matters more than willpower. A 2010 study led by Phillippa Lally at University College London found that habits take an average of 66 days to form, with a range from 18 to 254 days depending on the person and the behavior. Seventy-five days gives you a built-in buffer beyond that average, which is part of why the format works. But buffer only helps if you actually check the boxes.

Writing the task down (or ticking it off) converts intention into evidence. On day 47, when your motivation has left the building, the checklist is the reason you do the workout anyway.

Daily checklist for 75 Hard

75 Hard is the program created by entrepreneur Andy Frisella in 2019. He calls it a mental toughness program, not a fitness challenge. The rules are strict, and he’s adamant that you don’t get to modify them.

Here’s the daily list for 75 Hard, every day, all 75 days:

Workout #1: 45 minutes (indoor or outdoor)
Workout #2: 45 minutes, must be outdoors, separated from the first workout by at least 3 hours
Drink 1 gallon (3.78 liters) of water
Read 10 pages of a nonfiction or self-development book (physical or e-book, no audiobooks)
Follow your chosen diet with zero cheat meals and zero alcohol
Take a progress photo

Miss any single task on any day and you restart at day 1. Even if it’s day 74. That rule is the point of 75 Hard, not a bug.

A quick note on the hydration number. One gallon is 3.78 liters, which sits above the Institute of Medicine’s adequate intake of 3.7 liters per day for men and well above the 2.7 liters for women. For context, U.S. adults average only 44 ounces of plain water per day, so a gallon is a significant jump. If you have a medical condition or take medications affecting fluid balance, talk to your doctor before committing.

For the full background on 75 Hard’s rules and the health professionals who have questioned parts of the program, see our 75 Hard vs 75 Soft comparison.

Want to track this digitally with automatic restart enforcement? The 75 Tough tracker runs in your browser with no signup.

Daily checklist for 75 Soft

75 Soft was created by Irish fitness coach Stephen Gallagher in 2021 as a more livable alternative. No restart rule. One workout instead of two. Fiction counts.

Here’s the daily list for 75 Soft:

Workout: 45 minutes (one active recovery day per week, so six proper workouts plus one walk/yoga/stretch session)
Drink 3 liters of water
Read 10 pages of any book (fiction or nonfiction, audiobook counts in most versions)
Eat well, with alcohol allowed only at social occasions

Some versions of 75 Soft add a fifth task: 5 minutes of daily meditation. It wasn’t in Gallagher’s original rules, but enough people have adopted it that you’ll see it in most modern write-ups.

The no-restart rule is the defining feature. If you miss a day on 75 Soft, you pick up the next day. That matters for people managing chronic illness, shift work, caregiving duties, or the kind of life where “two workouts, one outdoors, no exceptions” collides with reality.

Track 75 Soft in your browser with the free 75 Soft tracker if you’d rather not print anything.

Custom challenge checklist template

Not everyone wants Frisella’s rules or Gallagher’s rules. Millions of people are doing 75 Medium, 75 Tough, Glow Within, faith-based 75s, sobriety-focused 75s, and every variation in between. Competitor articles mostly ignore them. Here’s the blank template:

Task 1 (movement): ______________________________
Task 2 (nutrition): ______________________________
Task 3 (hydration): ______________________________
Task 4 (learning or mindfulness): ______________________________
Task 5 (personal goal, optional): ______________________________

A few examples from challenges people actually run:

Glow Within (wellness-focused)

Workout: 30 minutes, any style
Follow a clean-eating rule of your choice
Drink 2.5 liters of water
10-minute skincare or self-care ritual
5 minutes of journaling or meditation

75 Medium (middle ground)

One 45-minute workout
Strict diet of your choice, one cheat meal allowed per week
1 gallon of water
10 pages of any book
Progress photo 3x per week

Faith-based 75

30 minutes of movement
10 pages of scripture or devotional reading
10 minutes of prayer or meditation
2 liters of water
One act of service per day

When you’re picking your tasks, ask yourself one thing: will I still be able to do this on a travel day, a sick day, or the day my kid throws up at 2 a.m.? If the honest answer is no, the task is too ambitious. The tasks that survive day 40 (sometimes called “the wall”) are tasks that fit inside your real life with ten minutes of friction, not two hours.

Browse the full set of tracker templates we’ve built, including 75 Tough, 75 Soft, 75 Hotter, and a 75-day calculator, in our free tools directory.

Printable PDF vs. app tracking

A quick comparison, since both options have real trade-offs.

Factor	Paper checklist	App checklist
Setup time	30 seconds (print)	2 minutes (install)
Tactile satisfaction of ticking a box	High	Medium
Risk of losing the sheet	Real	Zero
Automatic streak math	No	Yes
Photo timestamping for progress pics	Manual	Automatic
Works during no-phone evenings	Yes	No
Mid-day reminders	No	Yes
Cost	Paper + ink	Free for most apps

Paper wins on tactile feel, zero setup, and being able to stick it on the fridge. Apps win on streak calculation, timestamped progress photos, and the fact that a phone is harder to lose than a piece of printer paper.

A 2023 user study summarized on Cohorty’s blog found that hybrid users (paper plus app) completed their 75-day challenges at the highest rate, around 71%, compared with 59% for paper-only and lower subjective satisfaction (though decent completion) for app-only. Translation: many people put the paper on the fridge for the daily tick and keep the app open for photos, streak numbers, and the automatic restart logic.

If you want the app option without paying anything, Reset75 runs on iOS and Android, supports strict restart mode and forgiving mode, and includes templates for 75 Hard, 75 Soft, 75 Tough, Glow Within, and custom challenges. The printable checklist above works just as well if paper is your thing.

How to use this checklist (day 1 to day 75)

Printing the list is the easy part. Finishing the 75 days is where most people drop off. A few habits separate finishers from restarters.

Night-before ritual

Every evening, check tomorrow’s row and decide when each task happens. Block the time on your calendar. When you wake up without a plan, the day decides for you, and the day never picks the gym.

Photo first, then box

On workout days, take the progress photo before you check the workout box. The photo is the hardest task to remember after the fact, so front-loading it stops the “I’ll do it later” drift that kills day 47 for most people.

Weekly 5-minute audit

Sunday, five minutes. Scan the last seven days, count the tasks you actually completed, and note any pattern. If you missed hydration three days in a row, fix the water bottle situation before Monday.

Pick the right response when you break

On 75 Hard, the rule is a restart. On 75 Soft and custom challenges, you continue. Before day 1, decide which rule applies to your challenge and write it at the top of the sheet. Making the decision in advance means you don’t negotiate with yourself on day 47 when you forgot your evening read.

If you’re the type who responds to gentle structure, run forgiving mode and let missed days go. If you respond to consequences, run strict mode and accept that you might restart. The checklist is a guide, not a guillotine, but the rule you picked before day 1 is the rule.

The bottom line

A 75-day challenge checklist has two jobs: tell you what to do today, and make “today” easy to execute. The lists above handle job one. Printing, app tracking, or both handle job two.

If you’re ready to start tomorrow, pick the version that matches your life. Print the page, set a start date, and begin.

For more on how the programs compare, browse the Reset75 blog or see our full comparison and roundup library.

Frequently Asked Questions

What’s on the 75 Hard daily checklist?

Five tasks: two 45-minute workouts (one outdoors), 1 gallon of water, 10 pages of nonfiction, a progress photo, and strict adherence to a chosen diet with no alcohol or cheat meals.

What’s on the 75 Soft daily checklist?

Four tasks: one 45-minute workout (six days a week, one active recovery), 3 liters of water, 10 pages of any book, and eating well (alcohol allowed socially).

Is there a free 75-day challenge checklist PDF?

Yes. Our checklist is printable directly from this page, hit Cmd+P (or Ctrl+P) and print the checklist section. No email signup required.

Can I use a paper checklist instead of an app?

Absolutely. Paper works. Research actually shows hybrid users (paper + app) finish at the highest rate (~71%), so many people do both: paper on the fridge for daily checking, app for progress photos and streak tracking.

What happens if I miss a day on the checklist?

For 75 Hard, you restart at day 1, that’s Andy Frisella’s rule. For 75 Soft and custom challenges, you simply pick up the next day. The checklist should be a guide, not a guillotine.

Do audiobooks count for the reading task?

Not for 75 Hard, Frisella explicitly requires physical or e-book reading. 75 Soft is flexible; audiobooks are fine. For custom challenges, you decide.

How do I build a custom 75-day challenge checklist?

Pick 4 to 5 tasks you can realistically complete every day for 75 days. Cover movement, nutrition, hydration, learning, and one personal goal (prayer, journaling, sobriety, etc.). Use the blank template in the Custom Challenge section.

Is a digital tracker better than a printable PDF?

Neither is universally better. Paper wins on tactile satisfaction and no-phone evenings. Apps win on photo timestamps, streak math, and never losing the sheet. Reset75 is free if you want the app option, but the printable in this article is enough if paper is your thing.

Ready to start? Download Reset75 or print this page and begin tomorrow.