How Long Should a Walk Be?

For most adults, the target is about 150 minutes of brisk walking a week, which is 30 minutes on five days or a little over 20 minutes every day, and each walk can be as short as you like, because every few minutes of brisk walking count towards the total. That figure comes from both the World Health Organization and the CDC, and it's a starting line rather than a finish line: going up to 300 minutes a week brings more benefit. If you're starting from very little, one brisk 10-minute walk a day is a real start. Here's how the numbers break down, how to fit them into a normal week, and when a longer walk is worth it.

150 minutes a week, split however suits you

The WHO's 2020 guidelines ask adults for at least 150 to 300 minutes a week of moderate-intensity activity, or 75 to 150 minutes of vigorous activity, plus muscle-strengthening exercise on two or more days. Brisk walking, fast enough that you can talk but not sing, is moderate intensity, so for walkers it's the 150 to 300 minutes that matter. The CDC frames the same target as "30 minutes a day, 5 days a week" and adds that you can "spread your activity out during the week and break it up into smaller chunks of time." In other words, the guideline is a weekly total, and there's no single right length for one walk. A few ways to make 150 minutes:

Pick the pattern your week can carry. A daily 20-minute walk is easier to fit in for some people, while others find three longer walks on fixed days easier to keep.

Photo: MART PRODUCTION, Pexels

Ten-minute walks count, and so do shorter ones

The WHO's 2010 guidelines said activity only counted in bouts of at least 10 minutes. The 2020 update dropped that rule: the guidelines now say that bouts "of any duration" count towards the target, because the evidence points to the total amount of activity, not how it's packaged. That changes what a walk can be. The walk to the station, a loop round the block at lunch and ten minutes after dinner all add up, as long as they're brisk. If your days are broken up by work, children or a commute, several short walks are a perfectly good way to reach 150 minutes, and they're often easier to fit in than one long one.

If you're starting from nothing, start with 10 minutes

The NHS says a brisk 10-minute daily walk "has lots of health benefits" and counts towards your 150 minutes, and the CDC puts it simply: "Some physical activity is better than none." The WHO's advice for people below the target is to start with small amounts and gradually increase how often, how hard and how long they move. In practice that means a 10-minute walk a day for the first week or two, then adding a few minutes once it feels routine, rather than jumping straight to 30 minutes and giving up when your legs complain. For adults living with common long-term conditions, the WHO says activity is considered safe where there's no medical reason against it, and that the benefits generally outweigh the risks, but if you have a heart condition, another health problem, or haven't been active for a long time, check with your doctor about where to start.

Longer walks pay off up to around 300 minutes a week

Both the WHO and the CDC say that going beyond 150 minutes a week brings further health benefits, and the WHO's upper figure is 300 minutes, a little over 40 minutes a day. So if 150 minutes is easy for you, there's a reason to keep going, and longer weekend walks are a natural way to add time. Because the target is a weekly total, a two-hour Sunday walk counts for a big share of it, though the CDC still suggests spreading activity across the week rather than saving it all for one day. If you're planning a longer route and want to know how much time to set aside, you can work out how long a walk will take from its distance and your pace.

In steps, the benefit levels off between 6,000 and 10,000 a day

If you count steps rather than minutes, one of the largest pieces of evidence is a 2022 analysis in The Lancet Public Health that pooled 15 studies of 47,471 adults, who wore step counters and were then followed for a median of seven years. The more steps people took, the lower their risk of dying during the study, and the people in the most active quarter (a median of about 10,900 steps a day) had a 53% lower risk than those in the least active quarter (about 3,550 steps). The benefit didn't rise forever, though. It levelled off at around 6,000 to 8,000 steps a day for people aged 60 and over, and 8,000 to 10,000 for younger adults. These steps are everything you do in a day, not just your walks, and the studies were observational, so they show a link rather than proof that the steps themselves caused the difference: people who walk more may be healthier in other ways too. Still, it's a useful check that you don't need to hit some huge number. If you want to know how far those steps take you, a steps to kilometres converter works it out from your height.

Photo: Duc Tinh Ngo, Pexels

After 65, walking plus balance and strength

For adults over 65, the WHO's target for walking and other aerobic activity is the same 150 to 300 minutes a week. What it adds is "varied multicomponent physical activity that emphasises functional balance and strength training" on three or more days a week, "to enhance functional capacity and to prevent falls". Walking alone doesn't cover that, and the same goes for the muscle-strengthening part of the adult guidelines at any age, so a weekly routine that's all walking still leaves something out.

Keep count without thinking about it

Once you know the weekly target, the easiest way to reach it is to see it add up. Walk With Me counts your steps through Apple Health or Health Connect, with a daily goal ring and week and month rings, so a few short walks on a busy day still show as progress. When you want company for the longer ones, it also shows walks near you on a map that you can join, or you can set up your own. It's free on the App Store and Google Play.

Sources

• Bull FC, Al-Ansari SS, Biddle S, et al. World Health Organization 2020 guidelines on physical activity and sedentary behaviour. British Journal of Sports Medicine, 2020.
• Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Adult Activity: An Overview. CDC, 2023.
• NHS. Walking for health. NHS, 2022.
• Paluch AE, Bajpai S, Bassett DR, et al. Daily steps and all-cause mortality: a meta-analysis of 15 international cohorts. The Lancet Public Health, 2022.