How many steps a day to lose weight? How many kilometers do you have to walk to lose weight? |

In this article you will learn, among others:

• How many steps do you need to take a day to lose weight?

• Is 10 steps a day enough?

• How to take more steps a day?

• How to measure steps?

• How many kilometers do you have to walk to lose weight?

• Is walking enough to lose weight?

How many steps do you need to take a day to lose weight?

Counting the steps taken during the day is the first step to improve our condition and keep our body moving. We especially appeal to people who work remotely and spend most of the day at home, in front of the computer – it is worth starting even with small walks. And how many steps are there to be healthy or lose extra kilos?

Unfortunately, there is no clear answer to this question – it is quite an individual matter. It depends on several factors, including but not limited to:

• our age,
• body weight,
• work mode and daily activity,
• training activity,
• current state of health.

Despite the variety of factors that allow us to calculate the optimal daily number of steps, we have access to certain “ranges”, for example those recommended by the World Health Organization.

Is 10 steps a day enough?

This is perhaps one of the most popular theories. Of course, such a number of steps, especially if repeated systematically, will certainly contribute to the improvement of our condition, health and will have a positive effect on the reduction of unnecessary kilograms. What’s more, covering a distance of 6-7 kilometers at a moderately fast pace, we can burn even more than 400 calories (again, you cannot generalize here, because it depends on the above-mentioned factors + the pace with which we are moving).

Therefore, the answer to the question of whether we have to take 10 steps is no, quite the opposite. Let us not expect miracles from ourselves when we are just starting the start-up after a long pause of inactivity. According to statistics, most of us do on average just over 2 steps a day – doubling this amount should bring positive results. What’s more, “breathing a day” requires a lot of systematicity, mobilization, motivation and … condition, which can be quite difficult at the beginning. 

How to take more steps a day?

Here we have a few tricks, probably some of them are well known to you, but it doesn’t hurt to collect them in one place again. The most interesting ideas for breaking down and finding motivation are:

Abandoning an elevator in favor of stairs – of course, not everyone has to deal with an elevator every day, but if we have such a choice, let’s try to cover the route, at least one way, up the stairs. One floor of the stairs is about 25 steps, but here there is also a bit of additional activity in the form of carrying our weight.

Get in or out a stop early – maybe if you move around by train or bus, it will be a bit more difficult, but when traveling to work or school by bus and tram, consider a short walk to the stop earlier – as a reward for this little effort, we may be able to find a free seat 😉

Parking two streets ahead – just like in the case of using public transport, if we have such an opportunity, let us park ourselves a bit further from our destination. This patent will work especially when we walk on a more interesting part of the route, such as a park or a forest.

Long walks with the dog – it happens that we treat a walk with our pet as an obligation, then the dog has the opportunity to use the toilet. We do not want to cause unnecessary discussion here, because this article is not exactly about it – in any case, changing the approach to such walks with a pet will not only allow us to take more steps, but also will be very grateful in the eyes of our pooch.

Go on foot wherever you can – we are talking here primarily about shopping and other additional activities, such as going to the cinema or meeting friends. Of course, not in all situations you can afford such comfort, we are also aware that it has nothing to do with saving time, so let’s try to take a walk to relax, to rest after a hard day, calm down, and get some oxygen. 

Walk as a challenge – and this approach is understandable as walking for the sake of walking may not be attractive to everyone. And here we have several solutions, from regular sports applications (more on which in a moment), to city games in the application, such as Pokemon Go, which use our location and allow you to earn additional points for covering the next distance.

Do you have any other ideas on how to motivate yourself to cover even a short distance? Be sure to let me know in the comments!

How to measure steps?

Also, have you ever had battery-operated pedometers that were attached to a belt and measured steps based on the movements / vibrations of our body? Back then it was quite a gadget, today, of course, such a function, much more precise, can be found in almost every smartphone. In many operating systems, manufacturers automatically attach applications that measure the distance covered based on our location – it cannot be denied that this is a convenient solution.

In application stores, we can also find much more sophisticated and tailored solutions. It is worth entering keywords such as “steps”, “activity”, “training” in Google Play or in the App Store and choose something for yourself. If we really want the measurements to be ultra-precise and more comprehensive, a smartwatch or smartband can be a good solution, along with access to read our pulse and the balance of calories burned.

For traditionalists who want a break from electronics, the most effective solution should be to determine the length of the route in advance (e.g. using Google Maps, which later does not accompany us during the walk … 😬) or measuring the average length of your stride and counting them, although this task seems very backbreaking and easy to make a mistake.

How many kilometers do you have to walk to lose weight?

This is a topic related to how to measure these steps – we can also look at it. We are returning once again to several factors that will affect the route traveled (our height, pace, type of route). Let us assume, however, that while marching at a speed of 5 km / h, we should make over 6 steps within an hour.

That’s it again – how many steps to lose weight? Regardless of whether we make 5, 10 or 15 thousand of them, we will not lose weight without a caloric deficit. This deficit is simply a state in which the body burns more calories than it takes from food, and the negative energy balance forces it to use other sources of energy (including fat accumulated in our body). When calculating your daily caloric requirement, it is worth using the knowledge of specialists, so that the weight loss rate is healthy and does not cause side effects.

In this matter, we recommend the Tasty Tailored diet, and with it 5 types of menu tailored to your needs: classic, vegetarian, veg + fish, gluten-free or dairy-free – we can choose a different menu at any time. has been a leader on the online diet market for 16 years and during this time we have managed to help thousands of Poles achieve their dietary goals. You can see the entire offer here: https://.pl/dieta/online-5w1.html.

Is walking enough to lose weight?

For years, the phenomenon of walking has been investigated by a research team from the National Institues of Health (link to the entire study here: https://www.nih.gov/higher-daily-step-count-linked-lower-all-cause-mortality). Researchers have observed that the length and quality of our life is not affected by the intensity of walks alone, but the number of steps taken.

People taking 8 steps instead of 4 had a 51% drop in risk of premature death. On the other hand, 12 steps a day, compared with 4, reduced the risk by as much as 65%.

Walking is a wonderful activity that requires neither expensive equipment, nor the right circumstances, nor high intensity and excellent physical form. It’s also a great idea to relax and reset your head, especially in today’s stressful times. So let’s put on comfortable shoes, grab the hand of our loved ones or take our four-legged friends and walk!

And how many steps do you do daily? Do you like walking? Show off your records in the comments!