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Exercise intensity, not just volume, is essential to reduce the risk of serious conditions, including type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and dementia, according to a new study.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Physical activity guidelines tend to focus on how much, or total volume, people should exercise each week. For the average adult, that recommendation is But a new study published on Sunday in the European Heart Journal<\/a> found that people who get even small amounts of vigorous exercise each day may be less likely to develop eight major diseases.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cIn our study, even a small proportion of vigorous activity\u2014just over 4% of total activity, which may translate to only a few minutes per day\u2014was associated with meaningful health benefits,\u201d Minxue Shen<\/a>, PhD, a professor at Xiangya School of Public Health, Central South University, Changsha, China, and co-author of the research, told Healthline.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Vigorous doesn\u2019t mean extreme, but it should be enough to mean that you are breathing hard and can\u2019t speak more than a few words at a time. Shen told Healthline that even everyday activities like carrying heavy groceries or climbing stairs quickly can be intense enough to count.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n For some diseases, both volume and intensity were important, but for others, like immune-related conditions, the benefit relied almost entirely on intensity.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Although the study is observational, meaning it doesn\u2019t establish a causal link between exercise intensity and specific health conditions, the results align with other research suggesting that there\u2019s more to physical activity than just volume.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n The researchers used data from the UK Biobank<\/a>, which includes de-identified health data for half a million adults living in the United Kingdom.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n For their analysis, they focused on two groups: <\/p>\n<\/div>\n The fitness trackers continuously logged movement over a 7-day period, allowing researchers to estimate not only how much people moved but also how intense their activity was.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Participants were on average 56 to 62 years old, and just over half were women. Researchers calculated each person\u2019s total physical activity and the proportion that qualified as \u201cvigorous\u201d exercise, defined as higher-intensity movement such as running. Participants were followed for about 9 years in the device-measured group and over 14 years in the self-reported group. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n During that period, researchers tracked whether they developed any of eight major chronic conditions:<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Across both datasets, people who did a higher proportion of vigorous exercise had consistently lower risks of developing major diseases, even when their total amount of exercise was the same. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n