A review of nine studies involving more than 480,000 adults found that regularly climbing stairs was associated with substantially lower risks of premature death and cardiovascular mortality, suggesting even brief bursts of everyday movement may carry meaningful health benefits.
By yourNEWS Media Newsroom
Choosing the stairs instead of an elevator may be one of the simplest ways to incorporate heart-protective physical activity into everyday life, according to research linking regular stair climbing with substantially lower risks of premature death and cardiovascular disease.
Researchers at the University of East Anglia reviewed nine studies involving more than 480,000 participants and found that people who climbed stairs had a 24% lower risk of death from any cause and a 39% lower risk of dying from cardiovascular disease.
The analysis, published in the American Journal of Cardiovascular Drugs, also associated stair climbing with lower rates of heart disease, heart attack and stroke.
“Taking the stairs is a practical and often overlooked way to build physical activity into daily life,” said Prof. Vassilios Vassiliou, a cardiovascular medicine expert at the University of East Anglia and lead author of the study. “We wanted to better understand how this everyday activity could have life-saving potential.”
The participants ranged in age from 35 to 84 and included people with no known cardiovascular disease as well as those with a history of heart problems. The research covered a period of approximately 14 years.
Although the analysis found benefits associated with stair climbing generally, researchers have not established precisely how much is necessary to achieve the greatest effect.
One of the studies included in the review suggested that climbing approximately six flights of stairs per day could provide the greatest benefit. The researchers cautioned, however, that more work is needed to determine an “optimal dose.”
The broader message was that substantial exercise sessions may not be required to produce measurable benefits. Even small amounts of stair climbing incorporated throughout the day were associated with improved outcomes.
That finding is consistent with earlier research examining what are sometimes called exercise “snacks” — short periods of physical activity performed intermittently rather than as one prolonged workout.
Canadian researchers supported by McMaster University and the University of British Columbia Okanagan found that spending several minutes climbing flights of stairs every two or three hours could significantly improve cardiovascular fitness.
Another analysis published in the Journal of Nutrition, Health and Aging found that brief exercise “snacks,” including stair climbing, could produce fitness improvements comparable to those achieved through longer continuous exercise sessions.
Research has also found that inactive people can improve cardiorespiratory fitness by performing exercise bursts lasting approximately five minutes twice per day.
Those findings could have particular significance for people who struggle to find time for formal workouts.
“Unlike going to the gym or doing a workout, climbing the stairs is something you can easily fit into your day at home, at work or when you’re out,” said Dr. Sophie Paddock, a cardiologist at Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital. “Even brief bursts of physical activity have beneficial health impacts.”
The researchers pointed to physical inactivity as a major public health problem.
More than one-quarter of adults worldwide fail to achieve recommended levels of physical activity, according to the report. In the United Kingdom, physical inactivity is estimated to contribute to approximately one in six deaths, according to the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities.
Cardiovascular disease remains the leading cause of death in the United Kingdom, accounting for approximately 170,000 deaths annually, according to the study authors.
Vassiliou said cardiovascular disease is “largely preventable through a healthy lifestyle,” with regular exercise playing a major role.
British National Health Service recommendations call for adults to complete at least 150 minutes of moderate-intensity activity or 75 minutes of vigorous activity each week.
Physical activity has long been recognized as beneficial for people at risk of cardiovascular disease, hypertension, diabetes, osteoporosis, obesity and other health conditions.
The challenge is that everyday life has become increasingly sedentary. Many jobs require little physical exertion, while elevators, escalators, vehicles and other conveniences have removed movement that previous generations routinely performed.
Stair climbing offers one way to reintroduce some of that activity without requiring specialized equipment, a gym membership or a dedicated workout schedule.
Researchers said that ease of access makes stairs potentially useful beyond individual fitness and into public health policy.
With so many adults falling short of activity recommendations, the research team described increased stair use as a “realistic, scalable intervention.”
“Encouraging people to take the stairs in workplaces, public buildings and homes could form part of a wider strategy to reduce cardiovascular disease at population level,” the researchers stated.
The concept of building movement into routine daily tasks has been tested previously.
In the Cooper Institute’s Project Active study, participants assigned to a “lifestyle group” were taught to incorporate physical activities such as walking and stair climbing into ordinary daily routines instead of depending on a structured gym-based exercise program.
The new stair-climbing findings also fit into a much longer body of evidence showing the health consequences of prolonged inactivity.
One of the classic studies in occupational medicine compared London bus workers whose jobs required very different levels of movement. Coronary heart disease was found to be approximately half as common among physically active bus conductors as among sedentary bus drivers.
More recent research has continued to identify potential benefits from surprisingly short periods of vigorous movement.
Studies published in the European Heart Journal have suggested that brief episodes of intense daily activity may reduce the risks of premature death and chronic disease.
Research released in 2026 has further sharpened attention on the possible consequences of sedentary behavior.
A University College London-led study found that reducing vigorous activity by only a few minutes per day was associated with a 15% greater risk of cancer, according to the report.
Another 2026 study found that each additional hour spent sitting may increase the risk of developing and dying from several forms of cancer.
Taken together, the research supports the idea that health outcomes may be influenced not only by formal exercise sessions but also by the accumulation of small amounts of movement throughout the day.
That does not mean stair climbing should replace broader physical activity recommendations. Rather, it provides an accessible option for increasing daily movement, particularly for people who otherwise spend much of their day sitting.
For someone working in a multistory office, living in an apartment building or regularly encountering stairs in public spaces, repeatedly choosing to climb rather than ride can turn an ordinary part of the day into short periods of cardiovascular exertion.
The University of East Anglia review does not establish that stair climbing itself caused participants to live longer. The findings show an association between stair use and reduced mortality risk, and other lifestyle or health differences among people who routinely use stairs could influence the results.
Still, the consistency of findings across more than 480,000 people suggests that simple everyday movement deserves greater attention.
With stair climbing associated with a 24% lower risk of death from any cause and a 39% lower risk of cardiovascular death, researchers say one of the most readily available forms of exercise may also be among the easiest to incorporate into daily life.
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