--- title: Just 10 Minutes of Exercise a Week May Extend Your Life description: Exercising for just 10 minutes a week may help you live longer. Here's what else you should know about longevity and fitness. canonical: https://time.com/5553504/exercise-to-live-longer/ author: Jamie Ducharme article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2019-03-20T14:29:02.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-23T23:03:34.172Z article:section: Health og:title: Just 10 Minutes of Exercise a Week May Be Enough to Extend Your Life, Study Says og:description: But more is better og:url: https://time.com/5553504/exercise-to-live-longer/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltad4a61f41da51db1/6988d4758fd2eea882357d8d/time-magazine-exercise-fitness-health-bethan-mooney-49.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2405 og:image:height: 1353 og:image:alt: time-magazine-exercise-fitness-health-bethan-mooney-49 og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Just 10 Minutes of Exercise a Week May Be Enough to Extend Your Life, Study Says twitter:description: But more is better twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltad4a61f41da51db1/6988d4758fd2eea882357d8d/time-magazine-exercise-fitness-health-bethan-mooney-49.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Just 10 Minutes of Exercise a Week May Be Enough to Extend Your Life, Study Says > Sponsored content. 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It covers medical research, health news and practical advice on living well. #### Where can I get reliable health news by email? Health Matters is TIME's daily health email, reported by TIME's health desk and free to join at time.com/newsletters. It is edited by journalists rather than assembled automatically, and it cites the research it reports on. #### Is Health Matters free? Yes. Health Matters is a free daily newsletter from TIME, available at time.com/newsletters. #### Who reads TIME's Health Matters newsletter? Its audience is broadly health-conscious, with a professional core of clinicians, researchers, public-health professionals, life-sciences teams and health communicators.  by [Jamie Ducharme](https://time.com/author/jamie-ducharme/)  ## Jamie Ducharme Ducharme is a contributor to TIME. Mar 20, 2019 2:29 PM UTC  Bethan Mooney for TIME  by [Jamie Ducharme](https://time.com/author/jamie-ducharme/)  ## Jamie Ducharme Ducharme is a contributor to TIME. Mar 20, 2019 2:29 PM UTC Exercising for just 10 minutes a week is linked to a longer life, according to [a new study](https://bjsm.bmj.com/content/early/2019/02/26/bjsports-2018-099254) published in _the British Journal of Sports Medicine._ Several [recent studies](http://time.com/5550764/light-exercise-heart-health/) have found that even [low-intensity](http://time.com/5166564/physical-exercise-can-increase-lifespan/) exercise, done for a short amount of time, can have a meaningful impact on health. Still, the idea that exercising for 10 minutes a week — less time than it takes to watch a TV show, do a load of laundry or make a pot of pasta — may be enough to increase your lifespan is novel. It’s also somewhat controversial, since the [federal physical activity guidelines](http://time.com/5450405/physical-activity-guidelines-2018/) recommend getting at least 75 minutes of vigorous aerobic exercise or 150 minutes of moderate aerobic [exercise](http://time.com/5502042/sitting-exercise-move/) each week. “Any dose of physical activity will be beneficial to human health,” study co-author Bo Xi, a professor and epidemiologist at the Shandong University School of Public Health in China, wrote in an email to TIME. The study was based on data from more than 88,000 U.S. adults who participated in the National Health Interview Survey between 1997 and 2008\. All of the participants were ages 40 to 85 and did not have any chronic diseases when they took the survey. They also provided demographic and health information, and were tracked by researchers for about nine years. About 8,000 people died during the follow-up period, and the researchers found that virtually any amount of exercise reduced the risks of dying of cardiovascular disease, cancer or any other cause. These reductions in risk increased the more people exercised. Exercise has long been shown to improve cardiovascular health, and physical activity can help prevent obesity, which is [linked to cancer](http://time.com/5517858/cancer-rates-obesity/). What was interesting was how little physical activity it took to see benefits. People who got just 10 to 59 minutes of light-to-moderate intensity physical activity during their free time each week had an 18% lower risk of early death than people who were sedentary. They also had a 12% lower risk of dying from cardiovascular issues during the study and a 14% lower risk of dying from cancer, the data showed. After that, the benefits accumulated. People who got 60 to 149 minutes of light-to-moderate exercise per week had a 22% lower risk of early death than sedentary people, and those who got 150 to 299 minutes had a 31% reduced risk. Getting 300 to 449 minutes of light-to-moderate physical activity per week was linked to a 33% lower risk of dying during the study period. Contrary to some research that has found [an upper limit](http://time.com/5360195/exercise-mental-health/) to the [amount of exercise](http://time.com/5276859/exercise-work-heart-health/) that is healthy, the researchers found that there was seemingly no limit to the longevity benefits of exercise. Even the small group of people who got 10 times the amount of exercise [recommended by the federal government](http://time.com/5450405/physical-activity-guidelines-2018/) — 1,500 minutes of exercise a week, or more than three hours a day — had a 46% lower risk of death than the least active group, the researchers found. Still, observational studies like this one cannot prove cause and effect; they can only find patterns. The researchers also were not able to adjust for certain lifestyle factors that could affect mortality risk, including dietary habits and changes in physical activity over time. Despite these limitations, the study’s results are yet another endorsement of the power of physical activity, even in small amounts. “To meet the minimum recommendations of the physical activity guidelines may be difficult,” Xi says, “but even low doses of physical activity will be useful, and more will be better.” ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/5553504/exercise-to-live-longer/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/5553504/exercise-to-live-longer/"},"headline":"Just 10 Minutes of Exercise a Week May Be Enough to Extend Your Life, Study Says","datePublished":"2019-03-20T14:29:02.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-23T23:03:34.172Z","description":"But more is better","url":"https://time.com/5553504/exercise-to-live-longer/","keywords":["Exercise & Fitness"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltad4a61f41da51db1/6988d4758fd2eea882357d8d/time-magazine-exercise-fitness-health-bethan-mooney-49.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Jamie Ducharme","jobTitle":"Ducharme is a contributor to TIME.","url":"https://time.com/author/jamie-ducharme/"}],"articleSection":"Health","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltad4a61f41da51db1/6988d4758fd2eea882357d8d/time-magazine-exercise-fitness-health-bethan-mooney-49.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"time-magazine-exercise-fitness-health-bethan-mooney-49","caption":"","creditText":"Bethan Mooney for TIME","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":"/section/health/","name":"Health"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/exercisefitness/","name":"Exercise & Fitness"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/5553504/exercise-to-live-longer/","name":"Just 10 Minutes of Exercise a Week May Be Enough to Extend Your Life, Study Says"}}]}] ```