How many days in the gym?

I only go to the gym to lift and I do a full body program, so that's 2-3x per week. My other exercise is performed outside of the gym...mostly cycling and walking my dog.

It all really depends on your fitness goals. As weight loss goes, your diet is going to be far more important than how many times you get to the gym.

When I first started this journey, my goal was to move every day. I may only work out a few days a week but on the other days I'll clean or garden or walk. Just getting yourself off the couch and moving every day helps in the process of losing weight and becoming more healthy.

Depends on your goal and what you are doing at the gym. Technically I go 7 days a week, but not necessarily for exercise. My gym is also the Y, so on rest days I do a meditation yoga class after my classes (volunteer for Big Brothers/Big Sisters and adult literacy). I do cardio daily, always a dedicated walk and run 5 days a week. I lift 3 days a week.

It's a good idea to ramp up exercise gradually if you're just starting out. Start at a very manageable frequency, and a relatively low intensity**, and increase gradually. Allow some rest days. ****

IMO, you should try to accomplish three things:

1. Challenge yourself a little bit during the exercise itself (make it a little bit hard, not always super easy)
2. Finish the exercise session(s) feeling energized (not exhausted/dragging) for the rest of your daily life (after maybe a few minutes of a bit of a "whew" feeling immediately after the session).
3. Maintain exercise at its proper place in your life for good overall life balance, i.e., don't spend so much time on it that it takes away undesirably much time and energy from your family life, work, friendships, non-exercise hobbies, etc.

All of those are individual and subjective, and can change for an individual over time. The first two relate strongly to your current level of conditioning, and the 3rd relates strongly to your personal value system. That means we can't tell you a "right answer".

** Probably obvious after reading the middle part, but frequency and/or intensity can increase as your fitness improves. There's no hard and fast guideline.

**** How to schedule rest days can also vary as your fitness improves, as can what counts as a "rest day". For pretty much everyone at sub-elite fitness levels, we should not do heavy (to us) strength training of the same muscles every day, but allow a day (two sleeps) between sessions; we should not do high-intensity cardio every day (one to two sessions a week of true high-intensity is the most even most elites do); but as fitness evolves it's fine to do cardio daily at a range of intensities. Mixing up cardio modalities (not doing the same thing every day) can be good for general fitness and avoidance of overuse injuries, but there can be exceptions to this if you get very focused on a particular modality (running, biking, etc.) and learn technical aspects of conditioning for that sport. As a true beginner who's been completely sedentary, truly resting from exercise every other day can be good; as you get a little more fit, using the off days for mild activity (yoga, casual walk or bike, etc.) is fine; I'm a great believer in one true rest day weekly for almost everyone, but that can be mild activity once a particular exercise schedule is very manageable.)

Just my opinions.

I like working out, and have a stationary bike and rowing machine at home. But. My son asked me to join their gym’s family plan 9 months ago. I chose a strength and endurance class which was weights or TRX or your own body weight exercises. One day a week was core and upper body, one day was legs. I told myself I’d go every time I could, and not stress it.

Nine months later I’m much stronger everywhere and just added a third night class. Just commit to going your 3 days but don’t get frustrated with yourself if life gets in the way and you miss an occasional day. Don’t let real life derail you in your workout. I’ve worked out for 45 years, but sometimes skipped a few months here and there. Make it a habit, for your physical and mental health.