A timer inside your AI

Describe your session to ChatGPT or Claude and the timer appears already configured, right in the conversation. What that changes, and who it is for — setup itself lives on the connector page.

For coaches: prepare and share

In a conversation with the assistant, describe the session — "three blocks of two exercises, four rounds" — and ask for a link to share. The assistant produces an address and its QR code: paste it into your message, and your athletes open it to find the timer already set.

That is what the share_workout_link MCP tool does — shipped today, not a promise.

For athletes: from a photo to a timer

You have a programme on paper, in a photo, or in a PDF. Hand it to ChatGPT or Claude: the assistant reads it, then sets up the timer for you, without a single number being retyped by hand. What the assistant sees and what it hands on to Round & Rest afterwards are not the same thing, which is exactly the first question below.

Frequently asked questions

Does Round & Rest read my photo or PDF?

No. The assistant — ChatGPT or Claude — reads the document and pulls the session's parameters out of it: exercises, rounds, rest times. Round & Rest only ever receives an already-structured configuration afterwards, never the image or the file itself. The timer never sees your photo, and needs no permission to read it.

Do I need an account to open a shared link?

No. A session link opens the timer already set up: no account to create, no app to install, nothing to accept before you start. The athlete who receives the link opens it and goes.

Does the link carry the whole session?

Exercise names and their quantities travel in the link and its QR code: your athlete sees "21 thrusters", not "Exercise 1". One limit is deliberate — a block's name does not travel with it. An unnamed block still stays identifiable by its position and by the exercises inside it, which an unnamed exercise cannot claim.

Which assistants work?

Any assistant that speaks MCP, the open protocol that connects a model to an outside tool. Claude and ChatGPT are the two most common ones doing that today — named here to describe the setup, not because either one endorses or recommends Round & Rest.

Connecting either one

Both uses above go through the same connection. The address to paste into Claude or ChatGPT, and the steps for each assistant, are on the MCP connector page. Other ways to drive the timer — URL configuration, a BUSY Bar display — are gathered on the integrations page.