--- title: Pollution and Exercise: Why Bad Air Shouldn't Stop You from Exercising description: Air quality may not be the best in cities, but the benefits of physical activity can outweigh the harms of breathing in pollutants canonical: https://time.com/3763736/pollution-exercise/ author: Alice Park article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-03-30T18:43:57.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-22T05:32:57.635Z article:section: Health og:title: Why You Shouldn’t Let Pollution Stop You from Exercising og:description: Air quality may not be the best in cities, but the benefits of physical activity can outweigh the harms of breathing in pollutants og:url: https://time.com/3763736/pollution-exercise/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt42e9845b372beb17/698785d355a8595984a868dd/148821241.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2642 og:image:height: 1486 og:image:alt: 148821241 og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Why You Shouldn’t Let Pollution Stop You from Exercising twitter:description: Air quality may not be the best in cities, but the benefits of physical activity can outweigh the harms of breathing in pollutants twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt42e9845b372beb17/698785d355a8595984a868dd/148821241.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # This Study Busts Your Work Out Excuse > Sponsored content. 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Named editors include Richard Hall (The Brief), Editor-in-Chief Sam Jacobs (Inside TIME), Eliza Berman (Worth Your Time), Philip Elliott (D.C. Brief), Justin Worland (Future Proof) and Harry Booth (In the Loop). Health Matters is written by TIME's health desk. #### How do I sign up for a TIME newsletter? Go to time.com/newsletters, choose the newsletters you want and enter your email address. There is no cost and no subscription requirement. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-network-2026q3/newsletters?i=da08e9a1-8b2d-4441-8765-4c02d33760f2&cr=time-nl-network-2026q3-v1)  by [Alice Park](https://time.com/author/alice-park/)  ## Alice Park Senior Correspondent Mar 30, 2015 6:43 PM UTC  Runner in rush hour traffic on Fifth Avenue. Runner in rush hour traffic on Fifth Avenue. Brent Winebrenner—Getty Images/Lonely Planet Images  by [Alice Park](https://time.com/author/alice-park/)  ## Alice Park Senior Correspondent Mar 30, 2015 6:43 PM UTC Exercising outdoors is certainly preferable to being cooped up in a stuffy gym, but if you live in an urban area, the pollution from cars and buses may give you pause. It shouldn’t. Zorana Andersen from the center for epidemiology and screening at the University of Copenhagen and her colleagues report in the journal [_Environmental Health Perspectives_](http://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/) that being active trumps some of the negative health effects that breathing in polluted air might have. **MORE:** [Pollution: Dangerous to Joggers](http://content.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1661313,00.html) In a study involving 52,061 people who were followed for around 13 years, Andersen found that those who were more active were less likely to die during the study than those who were more sedentary, regardless of the pollutant levels where they lived. The researchers asked the participants to detail their physical activities, including their leisure sports, how much they walked, whether they biked or walked to work, and whether they spent time gardening. They compared these responses to the levels of nitrogen dioxide near their homes; NO2 is a gas produced from the burning of fossil fuels in cars, and is an ingredient for other harmful pollutants such as ozone and particulate matter, which can cause respiratory illnesses. Previous studies found that walking along a busy London street, for example, caused a drop in lung function and that cycling or [running near high traffic roadways also compromised](http://content.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1661313,00.html) people’s respiratory functions slightly. In Andersen’s study, however, people who participated in sports showed a 22% lower risk of dying from any cause during the 13-year followup, while those who cycled regularly showed a 17% lower risk and people who spent time gardening showed a 16% lower risk compared to those who didn’t do either of those activities — and regardless of the pollution levels where they lived. **MORE:** [Ozone Can Harm the Heart in as Little as Two Hours](http://healthland.time.com/2012/06/26/ozone-can-harm-the-heart-in-as-little-as-two-hours/) “We found an even more positive message around physical activity than we even hoped for,” says Andersen. “Physiologically it’s plausible that you inhale more particles \[of pollution\] when you exercise in polluted areas, and we thought maybe the accumulated lifetime effect of this would reduce the benefit of exercise. But we don’t see that.” Essentially, the benefits of being active were strong enough to overcome some of the negative effects of breathing in pollutants. That makes sense, she says, because even if people aren’t exercising to avoid inhaling pollutants, they are still exposed to them, and Andersen’s study shows that even if exercises might be exposed to slightly higher levels of compounds like NO2, that still doesn’t negate the positive effects of physical activity on their heart, blood sugar levels and more. In fact, for specific conditions, the benefits of exercising remained quite high; active people even in highly polluted areas had a 66% lower chance of dying early from diabetes compared to those who didn’t exercise. She notes, however, that some cities may have significantly higher pollution levels than Copenhagen, where the participants lived, and it’s not clear yet how greater concentrations can affect the exercise-pollution-mortality balance. So if you have a choice for working out, biking or walking in a less polluted area, however, such as a park or a quieter side street, that might be a good idea. But don’t worry too much if you don’t. “Being active prolongs life more than staying away from air pollution,” says Andersen. “So pollution shouldn’t be a barrier to exercise.” ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3763736/pollution-exercise/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3763736/pollution-exercise/"},"headline":"This Study Busts Your Work Out Excuse","datePublished":"2015-03-30T18:43:57.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-22T05:32:57.635Z","description":"Air quality may not be the best in cities, but the benefits of physical activity can outweigh the harms of breathing in pollutants","url":"https://time.com/3763736/pollution-exercise/","keywords":["Exercise & Fitness","medicine","Pollution","Heart Disease","Air Pollution","Running","physical activity"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt42e9845b372beb17/698785d355a8595984a868dd/148821241.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Alice Park","jobTitle":"Senior Correspondent","url":"https://time.com/author/alice-park/"}],"articleSection":"Health","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt42e9845b372beb17/698785d355a8595984a868dd/148821241.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"148821241","caption":"148821241","creditText":"Brent Winebrenner—Getty Images/Lonely Planet Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/section/health/","name":"Health"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/tag/exercisefitness/","name":"Exercise & Fitness"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3763736/pollution-exercise/","name":"This Study Busts Your Work Out Excuse"}}]}] ```