Study Says 5 Minutes of Exercise a Day May Lower Blood Pressure

While we’re all familiar with having our blood pressure taken, many don’t know what is actually being measured—or why knowing your numbers is important. Blood pressure is the pressure the blood exerts on the walls of the arteries as it flows through them. And arteries are the blood vessels that carry blood from the heart to other parts of the body. 

Systolic blood pressure, the top number in your blood pressure reading, is the highest amount of pressure the blood exerts when the heart muscle contracts (or beats), and diastolic blood pressure, the bottom number, is the lowest amount of pressure the blood is exerting on the artery walls just before the next heart contraction. 

Hypertension, a consistently high blood pressure level, is a known risk factor for heart disease and stroke—both leading causes of death in the United States. Nearly half of U.S. adults have hypertension, and in 2022, it was a primary or contributing cause of 685,875 deaths in the U.S.

The good news is that there are relatively simple ways to help manage blood pressure, beyond taking medication for it. And a new study published in Circulation shows how easy it may be for many to reduce their blood pressure. Let’s see what they found. 

How Was This Study Conducted & What Did They Find?

This study included almost 15,000 individuals, about half female, with an average age of 54. Researchers took data from six previous studies from the United Kingdom, Netherlands, Australia, Denmark and Finland. These were then pooled into one cohort named the Prospective Physical Activity, Sitting and Sleep consortium (ProPASS).

All the individuals wore an accelerometer on their thighs for a full week, 24 hours a day. (An accelerometer is like a fancy pedometer that tracks many types of movement beyond just steps.)

Researchers were looking at six types of behaviors: sleep, sedentary behavior, standing, slow walking, fast walking and combined vigorous “exercise-like” activities. Vigorous exercise-like activities included things like running, cycling, stair climbing and walking up an incline.

Several statistical analyses were run, including ones that considered covariates that can influence blood pressure—like age, sex, smoking status and alcohol intake. 

Researchers found that resting systolic blood pressure was reduced by an average of 0.68 mmHg and diastolic by 0.54 mmHg (mmHg is the measurement used for blood pressure) just by replacing 5 minutes of sedentary time with vigorous exercise-like activity.

Researchers also ran various statistical models to estimate the effect on blood pressure for different scenarios. They found clinically significant reductions in blood pressure were experienced when exercise-like activities replaced each of the other activities—like standing or slowly walking—resulting in an average reduction of 2 mmHg in systolic blood pressure and 1 mmHg in diastolic. For example, they found that replacing sedentary behavior with 20-27 minutes of vigorous exercise per day could potentially reduce cardiovascular disease by up to 28 percent.

“Clinically significant” means that the changes are enough for your healthcare practitioner to consider changing how your condition is being treated. For example, if you’re on medication to help manage your blood pressure, they may reduce the dosage if your blood pressure is improving due to other factors—like exercise or weight loss. 

What Does This Mean?

“The finding that doing as little as five extra minutes of exercise per day could be associated with measurably lower blood pressure readings emphasizes how powerful short bouts of higher intensity movement could be for blood pressure management,” study author Emmanual Stamatakis, Ph.D., said in a press release.

These researchers also note that “exercise-like activity” includes movement you may already naturally engage in throughout your day—like running to catch your Uber ride, riding your bike to the market or using the stairs instead of the elevator. It’s the extra movement done in short bursts outside of formal exercise.

How these findings relate to you will depend on several factors, including your current fitness level. If you’re already at a higher fitness level—exercising regularly at a vigorous intensity for the recommended minimum of 75 minutes per week—and your blood pressure is in a healthy range, you most likely won’t see much difference in your resting blood pressure by adding 5 minutes of vigorous exercise-like activity a day. 

If, however, you’re not meeting current exercise guidelines or walking on flat surfaces at a slow to moderate pace is your main form of exercise, you might benefit from adding spurts of more vigorous activity throughout your day. 

Basically, it’s the vigorous bursts of movement these researchers feel make the difference for people who either aren’t currently engaging in regular physical activity or those who do more low-intensity exercise. Bumping the intensity up, even for short bursts, challenges the cardiovascular and respiratory systems more, which means greater health gains.

How Does This Apply to Real Life?

The body has an amazing ability to adapt to its environment. It’s like learning a new language or other skill. At first, it’s a struggle and you have to really think about it. But over time, it becomes a habit and is no longer a challenge. This applies to exercise, too—doing the same routine will become easier over time and while you’ll maintain the benefits you’ve gained, you probably won’t add any more benefits until you change things up.

If you’ve been doing the same exercise routine for a while and want to experience greater health gains, add some higher-intensity bursts into your routine. If you’re a walker and use the same route, switch it up and add some hills. Or add short bursts of running into your walk. If you’re not able to run, then increase your walking pace as fast as you can for your bursts. Skipping is another great option to add to your walks, and can really increase your heart rate—especially if you get your arms involved.

You can also incorporate these bursts into your daily routine. If you have a choice between stairs and the elevator or escalator, choose the stairs when you can. If you can easily go up the stairs, make it more difficult by running up them or taking them two at a time. 

While it might sound silly, run one or two bags of groceries at a time from your car into your house. Park at the far end of the parking lot and run to the store entrance. If your laundry is on a lower level than the bedrooms, take smaller loads up the stairs so you have to do more flights of stairs. Vacuum with vigor for an added burst—and the bonus of getting it done more quickly.

If you’re unable to do any of the aforementioned activities that involve lower body movements, you could consider an arm ergometer, which is like bike pedals for your arms. You could also do upper body movements, like raising your arms over your head, arm circles, perform boxing movements—and eventually add light dumbbells when these movements become easy.

The Bottom Line

These researchers found that adding short bursts of activity—even adding up to just 5 minutes a day—may improve blood pressure. But it’s important to remember that exercise isn’t the only factor that influences blood pressure. Diet matters, too. The DASH diet was designed specifically for blood pressure management. Sleep and stress can also influence blood pressure, as can alcohol intake and smoking. And these are all factors that you have some control over. 

Adding short bursts of activity to your day may be the easiest one to start with—and may help you to ease into the other habits since people who get more physical activity tend to sleep and handle stress better. Set your alarm as a reminder to do a few jumping Jacks or burpees at different times throughout the day. Take the stairs—and take them two at a time, or run up them. Park further from the store and jog to the entrance. Break out in song and dance—and encourage your family or coworkers to join you. Get creative and look for ways to add short bursts of vigorous activity to your day. And who knows? You might inspire others to do the same.