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Walking for weight loss is effective and has , including reducing the risk of heart attack and stroke. Even a few thousand steps a day can help you shed pounds if you’re consistent. Walking can also help you develop lean muscle, says Cedric Bryant, Ph.
D., the president and chief science officer of the American Council on Exercise. Bryant recommends walking 45 minutes to an hour, five or six days a week.
And you can break up that time into smaller walking sessions if that helps you to fit in the steps. "It doesn't have to be an all-in-one walking session; you can break it up through the course of that day," he says. "Maybe you go for a in the morning, and then maybe it's another 15- or 30-minute walk following dinner or during your lunch break," Bryant says.
"Try to accumulate 45 minutes to an hour of walking, which tends to correlate best with reasonable weight loss or ." The frequency and are determining factors, Bryant says, but everyone’s physiology is different. For example, postmenopausal women who are overweight may lose more weight by walking at a slower pace than a rapid one, according to a 2022 study published in the Registered dietitian Samantha Cassetty explains that "the average 40-year-old woman who's 5 foot 4 inches and 165 pounds might lose 5 pounds in two months if she went from inactive to walking for an hour five times a week.
" But you can't walk off a bad diet, Cassetty says. "She would have to make some healthy tweaks to her diet, which result in a (around 100 calories a day)." However, walking can help you to make diet changes.
Just a 15-minute walk can reduce cravings for sugary snacks, such as chocolate, and therefore decrease the amount of sugar that walkers eat overall, studies . Along with supporting weight loss, walking can improve mental health, increase metabolism and decrease the risk of cardiovascular disease and dementia. "I would tell people to pay attention and focus on how walking makes them feel, because I think that can serve as a great motivator," Bryant says.
Marisa Moore, a registered dietitian in Atlanta, Georgia, agrees. People “will likely notice a difference in how they feel by incorporating more movement and sprucing up the diet," she says. "You may or may not lose weight with diet and exercise changes, though.
Whether you lose weight can vary with personal genetics and , age, overall physical activity level, stress levels and even ." Walking is one of the easiest exercise routines to start — just pick a route and get moving! Bryant recommends wearing comfortable footwear, but there's no need to . A good speed to start at is walking at a pace of about 3 miles an hour, or walking one mile in twenty minutes.
If you're looking for a metric to compete with, Bryant recommends trying to work your way up to , which will help you burn about 1,000 calories. Recent lowered mortality risk, so even if you can't quite hit the 10,000 step benchmark, you'll still be making strides for your health. Tips from Start TODAY members to include focusing on mental health benefits, documenting your journey with pictures, being flexible with changes to your routine, focusing on , and using walking as a way to learn more about your community.
If you're looking for a , it's possible to amp up your walking routine by changing the terrain. "Walking uphill or increases the intensity and challenge of the walk," Bryant says. "You can also introduce some intervals where you .
If you're outside, maybe walk really briskly from a stop sign to a stop sign and walk at a normal pace until you get to your next stop sign. If you're ..
. walk comfortably for three minutes and then for the next minute or two, walk a half a mile an hour faster." You can also add weights, though Bryant recommends avoiding hand weights and instead investing in a weighted vest, which can make you push yourself harder without putting stress on the joints.
If you're looking for an equipment-free way to burn more calories, you can try doing something as simple as waving your arms. A study by the American Council on Exercise found that moving the arms vigorously expends more calories. "It may look a bit odd but but vigorously ," Bryant says.
Of course, there are more than just losing weight. Like any other aerobic exercise, walking will help improve the function of your cardiovascular system, boost blood sugar control and lower blood pressure. "Any benefit you can get from other forms of , like cycling, running, swimming, you can derive all those same benefits while walking," Bryant says.
Walking can also have benefits for mental health. Bryant says that the exercise and anxiety. "I would tell people .
.. to really pay attention and focus on how walking makes them feel, because I think that can serve as a great motivator to kind of keep them in the game in terms of continuing to walk," he says.
Kerry Breen is a reporter and associate editor for , where she reports on health news, pop culture and more. She holds a master’s degree in journalism from New York University..
