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Andrew Feinberg
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Walking 10,000 steps a day is one of the most common fitness goals in the world, but walking experts say you may not need a goal this lofty to reap many of the health benefits that come with regular walks.
Several recent studies have attempted to identify the most cost-effective number of daily steps, with most arriving at a figure in the range of 7,000 to 8,000 steps.
“It’s interesting to see that this number is replicated across a number of studies,” said Dr. Elroy Aguiar, an assistant professor of exercise science at the University of Alabama whose recent research focuses on measuring physical activity through step counts. “It’s associated with reduced risk of mortality, cancer, and cardiovascular disease.”
Are 10,000 steps a day still the magic number? Experts reveal how far we should actually walk (The Independent / iStock)
But that doesn’t mean 8,000 steps a day should be everyone’s goal. It’s a more nuanced issue. Below, we’ll debunk the 10,000 steps a day myth and explain how to set a daily step goal that’s right for you.
Why is 10,000 steps a day a common goal?
Where did the 10,000 steps a day goal come from, when study after study concludes that something like 8,000 steps a day is a worthwhile goal?
Its origins lie in a long-running marketing campaign for Japanese-made pedometers in the 1960s, around the time of the Tokyo Olympics. The devices were called “manpokei,” which translates to “ten thousand step meters.”
“There is evidence that Japanese people, similar to people in the US and possibly the UK, walk an average of 5,000 to 6,000 steps a day,” Dr Aguiar said.
“10,000 steps is a good goal because it’s a bit on the higher side. If you walk for 30 minutes, you’ll probably get around 3,000 steps. So if you add one planned bout of activity to your daily baseline, you’ll be closer to your 10,000 step goal.”
Since then, this number has become a kind of gold standard for measuring daily activity, making it the default goal on countless fitness trackers and influencing research on the benefits of walking.
“There are a lot of studies that have looked at whether walking 10,000 steps is better than less activity, which creates an artificial confirmation bias,” Dr. Aguiar explains. “People think 10,000 steps is very memorable. It’s a round number, an easy number to remember, and so it’s been used as a comparison in studies.”
How many steps should I walk a day?
We now know that walking about 8,000 steps a day is linked to a variety of health benefits, and for many people, it’s probably a more reasonable goal.
A recent study from the University of Granada supports this new goal, claiming to provide “the first scientific evidence of how many steps per day you need to walk to significantly reduce your risk of premature death.” The figure is 8,000 steps.
Meanwhile, a meta-analysis published in the European Journal of Preventive Cardiology in 2023 set a lower limit of 3,867 steps per day, arguing that this number was necessary to achieve a “substantial” reduction in all-cause mortality.
What both studies agree on is that there is no upper limit to the number of steps you can take to improve your health — in other words, the more steps you take, the better — but there is a point of diminishing returns.
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“If you want to get the most bang for your buck, after 8,000 sessions you’ve already gotten most of the benefit. After that, you start to get marginal or incremental benefits,” Dr Aguiar explains.
“To meet the World Health Organization’s physical activity guidelines of 150 minutes per week of moderate-intensity physical activity or 75 minutes per week of vigorous-intensity physical activity, these numbers equate to approximately 7,000 to 8,000 steps per day. This has a number of implications and aligns very well with the new findings.”
But he doesn’t mind the widespread adoption of the 10,000 steps a day goal, despite the rejection of the ’70s target.
“A lot of early studies adopted the 10,000 steps message, and there’s nothing wrong with that — more steps are always recommended rather than fewer,” Dr. Aguiar says, “but if you want to understand exactly what the science is showing, fewer steps than that is fine.”
How to Set a Daily Step Goal
Finding a fitness routine that works for you is a very personal task. What works for one person often won’t work for another, so if you’re looking to fine-tune your exercise routine, a customized approach is the best way to go.
The same goes for daily step goals: someone who already walks thousands of steps a day will have very different goals than a desk-bound person who struggles to get very active.
“The thing to be mindful of is setting realistic goals,” Dr. Aguiar says. “If you ask someone who is walking 4,000 or 5,000 steps a day to walk 10,000 steps, that’s double their daily activity, which can be problematic and demotivating.”
Instead, he recommends gradually increasing your daily activity levels, gradually increasing them over time, eventually reaching more than 8,000 steps per day – a fitness tracker or smartwatch can help with this.
“Many modern wearable devices, like Garmin or Google Watch, look at your current activity level and encourage you to increase it by a certain percentage,” says Dr. Aguiar. “So instead of setting an arbitrary goal like 10,000 steps, a device might track that you’re walking 5,000 steps a day, and then encourage you to walk 10-20% more than that to gradually increase your activity.”
“Generally speaking, increasing baseline steps of about 2,000 steps per day represents 10 to 20 percent for most people, enough additional activity to improve health indicators like blood pressure and body composition. But of course we ultimately want to get people to 7,000 to 8,000 steps, and eventually 10,000 or more, because that’s where we know the greatest benefits are.”
In summary, if you’re already walking more than 10,000 steps a day, you may not need to increase this number. If you have the time and want to get stronger, other more intense forms of exercise can provide additional benefits, such as running to improve your aerobic capacity and strength training to tone muscles and increase bone density.
But if you spend most of your day sitting at a desk and struggle to find time to move, walking can be an easy way to increase your activity levels and counteract a sedentary lifestyle.
Track your daily steps for seven days, then add 10 to 20 percent to come up with a goal for the next week. You can achieve this high number by parking further away from the office, getting off the bus or train one stop earlier, or going to a cafe for lunch instead of eating at your desk.
Slowly increase this goal over time to reach your optimal number of 8,000+ steps per day and enjoy the many health benefits of walking.
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