Steps or Minutes? What to Track When You're Starting to Move

Steps or minutes? To get started, it doesn't matter which one you choose, the main thing is that you start moving. But if you need one simple unit, we recommend minutes during which you get a bit out of breath. Steps are useful as a supplement, but they don't capture cycling, swimming or dancing, and 10,000 as a magic number has a surprisingly questionable origin.

Key points

• The number 10,000 steps is very well known today and is often used as an easy-to-remember daily goal.
• Pooled studies show an association between a higher step count and a lower risk of death, but the benefit levels off before 10,000¹².
• Minutes of movement with mild breathlessness cover all activities, while steps cover only walking and running.
• H7 counts time: at the white belt, 9 minutes a day is enough, and the goal of 7 hours a week is just a goal, not an entry requirement.
• You can keep using your pedometer, just treat it as a guide, not as an exam.

Where 10,000 steps came from

According to a commonly cited explanation, the number spread in Japan in the 1960s. A company was selling a pedometer whose name can be loosely translated as "10,000-step meter". The round number was easy to remember and easy to sell.

That doesn't mean it's bad. Ten thousand steps is a suitable and easy-to-remember daily goal for many people. It's just not a threshold below which nothing happens and above which a health miracle kicks in.

What pooled studies say about step counts

Large analyses that follow people with pedometers over time repeatedly show a similar picture. The more steps, the lower the risk of premature death, but the curve gradually flattens out. In older adults this happens at lower values than in younger ones, roughly somewhere between 6,000 and 10,000 steps a day¹.

It's important to know what not to conclude from this. These are observational data, so they show an association, not a cause¹. The association can also be influenced by many other factors that studies were not able to fully account for.

For a beginner, one thing matters here: the biggest difference tends to be between a very small and a somewhat larger amount of movement³¹. So you don't have to wait until you reach the number from the ad. Every extra step compared to today counts.

Why H7 counts minutes of breathlessness

Steps have two weaknesses: they say nothing about how hard you are trying, and they don't capture movement that doesn't look like walking. An hour on a bike, swimming, or two hours of gardening would get lost in a pedometer. Step counting can also be less accurate, for example when you push a stroller or wear your watch on the other wrist.

The 2020 WHO recommendations for adults, meanwhile, speak in terms of time: 150 to 300 minutes a week of moderate-intensity movement⁴. That's why H7 also counts time, specifically hours per week. The yardstick is your breath: a pace at which you can still say a few words, but singing would no longer be possible³⁵. A walk to the bakery doesn't count, brisk walking does.

Time has one more advantage. It's understandable to everyone, whether they're at the white belt or much higher. The white belt is 9 minutes a day, and each next level adds an hour a week. The goal is 7 hours a week, but you can start anywhere.

How to start in practice: steps, minutes, or both

You don't have to pick one system forever. Here's an order that makes sense for a beginner.

1. Find out where you are

For a few days, don't try to change anything. Look at how many steps your phone or watch shows, and honestly note how many minutes a day you were out of breath. For most people with a sedentary job, the second number will be close to zero, and that's fine. That's exactly why the white belt exists.

2. Set a goal in minutes

Start with 9 minutes a day in which you get mildly out of breath. You can split them up, for example into three short stretches of three minutes. Brisk walking, stairs, cycling, anything from the H7 catalog of more than 60 activities.

3. Keep steps as a supplement

If you enjoy your pedometer, let it keep running. Brisk walking is for most people roughly around 100 steps per minute, but it's highly individual⁶⁷. Your breath is more reliable than the number on the display.

4. Add in small steps

When 9 minutes a day stops being a problem, move up by an hour a week. Not two. The goal is not to quickly catch up with a plan, but to keep going. If a week doesn't work out, you're not doing anything wrong, you just continue where you left off.

5. Don't forget other movement

If you spend a day on a bike or in a pool, your pedometer will make it look like you were lazing around. But in minutes of breathlessness, you'll have a solid day. This is exactly the case where time is more honest than steps.

What to take away

Steps are not a bad tool. They're great for motivation and for awareness of how little we sometimes move. But as a basic unit for a beginner, they lead to needless questions: is 7,000 enough, how is swimming counted, why does it show less today than yesterday?

Minutes of breathlessness have a simpler answer. You got out of breath, the minutes count. You didn't, the walk was pleasant, but it doesn't count toward H7. Start with 9 minutes and keep going.