You may not need 10,000 steps if some of them are taken at a faster pace

Device data from more than 100,000 adults show how the pace of the day’s most active stepping minutes changes the relationship between total steps and long-term mortality risk.

Study: Combinations of stepping intensity and daily step counts against all-cause and cardiovascular disease mortality: insights from a device-based prospective study. Image Credit: zkolra / Shutterstock

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Different combinations of daily step counts and stepping intensity are associated with lower risks of premature mortality, according to a new study published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine.

Background

The emergence of wearable step monitoring devices has significantly improved the measurement of step-based activity, which has been associated with lower risks of morbidity and mortality.

Studies investigating the health benefits of step-based activities have predominantly focused on step counts, which are a fundamental dimension of stepping. Stepping intensity, the other fundamental dimension, has also been linked to lower mortality risk. Yet existing studies have rarely considered a combination of stepping intensity and daily step counts as a physical activity paradigm to explore mortality outcomes.

This type of paradigm is particularly relevant for older adults who cannot achieve sufficient physical activity because of age-related physical challenges; for adults who lack leisure time to achieve sufficient amounts of steps per day; or for those who are unable to increase stepping intensity because of perceived physical capability or environmental barriers, such as residential density.

Given the potential benefits of combining stepping intensity and daily step count, researchers at the University of Sydney, Australia, investigated the associations between various combinations of stepping intensity and daily step count and all-cause and cardiovascular disease-related mortality risks.

Study design

The study included 103,684 UK Biobank participants with available step-based physical activity data collected using wrist-worn accelerometers.

Peak 30-minute cadence (PK30) was used to measure stepping intensity by averaging the number of steps per minute across the 30 highest-activity minutes of the day, which did not need to be consecutive. Daily step counts were categorized as less than 5,000, 5,000-7,500, 7,500-10,000, and above 10,000 steps per day.

The reference group comprised participants who performed fewer than 5,000 steps per day, with a PK30 at the fifth percentile, corresponding to about 45 steps per minute.

Key findings

The assessment of different combinations of stepping intensities and daily step counts revealed that, compared with the reference level, higher stepping intensity was associated with a significantly lower risk of all-cause and cardiovascular disease-related mortality among individuals taking fewer than 5,000 steps per day. This lower risk was comparable to that observed in individuals performing 5,000-7,500 steps per day at a lower stepping intensity.

A higher stepping intensity was associated with a progressively lower risk of all-cause mortality among individuals taking fewer than 7,500 steps per day. Among the modeled associations, lower all-cause mortality risk was observed in individuals who performed 7,500-10,000 steps per day at higher stepping intensities. Across all four step-count groups, lower modeled risk estimates were observed around a PK30 of 100 steps per minute.

A comparable pattern of lower modeled risk was observed for cardiovascular disease-related mortality.

Study significance

The study indicates that considering both daily step counts and stepping intensity may help identify activity patterns associated with lower mortality risk in middle-aged and older adults, especially those with barriers to increasing either. These findings may contribute to evidence informing future step-based public health and clinical guidelines.

Previous research has linked both greater physical activity volume and higher intensity with lower mortality. Consistent with that evidence, the current study shows the relevance of both the amount and intensity of physical activity to mortality risk.

The study also found that a PK30 of about 90–100 steps per minute was associated with lower mortality risk across daily step-count groups, ranging from less than 5,000 to above 10,000 steps per day. Because PK30 aggregates the 30 highest-cadence minutes across the day, those minutes do not need to be consecutive.

Around 100 steps per minute is commonly used as a heuristic cadence for moderate-intensity physical activity in adults, based on previous laboratory-based and field-based studies. The authors relate the findings to the global guideline recommending 150–300 minutes of moderate-intensity physical activity per week, but PK30 should not be interpreted as a recommendation to complete 30 continuous minutes at that cadence each day.

The researchers also examined results after excluding participants with a history of cardiovascular disease or cancer to test whether the associations persisted. The study also used sample weights to improve sample representativeness.

Even with these measures, the possibility of reverse causation from undiagnosed or unrecorded disease cannot be fully ruled out. Because the study was observational, it cannot establish that changes in step count or cadence cause lower mortality, and residual confounding remains possible. Wrist-worn accelerometers used for step-based activity monitoring may misclassify non-step-related wrist movements as steps and may also fail to detect steps during ambulation when wrist movement is minimal.

Journal reference:

• Wei L, Ahmadi MN, Koemel NA, et al. Combinations of stepping intensity and daily step counts against all-cause and cardiovascular disease mortality: insights from a device-based prospective study. British Journal of Sports Medicine. Published Online First: 08 September 2026. DOI: 10.1136/bjsports-2025-111173, https://bjsm.bmj.com/content/early/2026/09/01/bjsports-2025-111173