For various reasons I’m looking to move off of Trainer Road. I’ve been there quite a while and haven’t tried anything else.
I’m self coached, so what I really need is a calendar, a workout creator and a workout player that controls my trainer. The TR workout player has always just worked.
recommendations welcome 
would Zwift be viable?
Yes, Zwift is 100% viable. The in-game workout creator is OK. If you know some basic coding, you could write the workout in a text file.
The calendar and user experience on TR is really good. The workouts are what they are and nothing they don’t need to be, the plans get you excited and motivated.
I got bored though, and after my FTP bouncing around in a 15watt window for 2 years I jumped ship to Zwift.
It doesn’t have the calendar and planning capacity of TR, so I just keep a bank of workouts and do a couple of useful looking options each week. I’ve really enjoyed the racing; much more than I thought I would. Closer to real racing than I expected.
I’m still not really improving but I have bigger issues and factors in my like affecting this, but I’m having more fun on zwift than I was on TR.
I do think fun is an important part of training 
And if Zwift works for you, you can choose your own interaction level. I typically do long Z2 rides and structured training, and I just drop Ride Ons to people without really interacting otherwise. You can do the big group events like you would a Gran Fondo (i.e. some people do it at Z2, some people do it more spicily). You can join a team and interact a lot with people. You can race, and be aware the starts are brutal. There’s possibilities. On average, Zwift tilts away from structured training types, and its own workouts are not really all that productive (mishmash of too many things in each workout).
I’ve tried most of them. I use Xert and Zwift. Xert’s magic bucket feature is great for combo of indoor and outdoor riding. Incorporating zwift racing and Strava segments among intervals by ensuring you’re hitting the right energy systems. It can adapt daily to whatever I throw at it.
If you just need the basics - workout design and trainer control - then Trainer Day is worth looking at. I run it on my phone and watch videos on a Rapsberry Pi with an old screen connected and it works for me. I never got on with Zwift, and got bored of watching the same video on other plaforms when I repeated a workout. It has a huge library of workouts, and various training plan features as well. For me the main benefit is having workouts that I’ve planned that I can fit into my day. Oh, and it’s affordable (or cheap as we used to say) and doesn’t need a PC to run it.
Have a look at Traningpeaks. You can build your workouts, ride on Virtual and have a calendar to organize your plan. Plus several different features
I swtiched from Trainier Road to CoachCat and never looked back.
Hadn’t heard of that one 
does it control the turbo as well?
Yes, it does
Training Peaks will also export your workout files to Zwift so you can do them there if TPV is not your vibe.
TrainingPeaks
If you want to keep the Zwift workout experience, you can build your calendar in Intervals.icu and have it sync to Zwift automatically. I’m about one more block of uninspiring progress with the new AI stuff away from ditching TrainerRoad and trying to implement @Jem_Arnold ‘s Sustainable Training philosophy in Intervals.
Thanks for posting that article. There’s probably some novelty in it, but this looks like a solid, sustainable framework to drop workouts of one’s choice into. Like the author is alluding to, I struggle to find the motivation and time to focus on and perform at “important” events. If I can keep reasonable fitness most of the time I’m happy.
This is what I did when I left TrainerRoad and did my own thing for a season. It has pretty much the same interface as TrainerRoad which was nice and made it easy to jump right in. It also has a massive library of workouts (almost too big since it’s all user created and there are a number of duplicates). And the workout creator is really quick and easy to use. The calendar is fine, not as good as TR but it allows you to schedule things out and see the big picture.
I am back on TR again this year though as I missed having a few things (progression levels, adaptive training, and power pr’s that you could break down by season)
TrainerRoad’s strongest feature day-to-day was how fast you could get going. TrainerDay is like that, and what I switched to a few months ago. Zwift can sometimes take 3-5 minutes to update (seemingly at random), start up, connect devices, load the map, etc. and required user interaction each step of the way; so it wasn’t viable as a primary tool.
Have y’all thought about a personal coach I use train right out of Colorado Springs Colorado once a week. I have an hour phone call I get next week’s plan to do and they give me power zones and different workouts to do the following week. For example we talked about fueling and and recovery having a personal coach talking time sharing that informationI Ithink is a wonderful experience!!!
You could link TR to Zwift. You’re paying for two services, but then you get the structure and the dynamic environment.
the learning curve is steep and you need to be able to do intermed computer tings but if you just want a calendar, real and flexible analytics, workout building, and .erg/.mrc importability, golden cheetah will do it for free. no video game isht though.