With regards to exercise and getting fit, one of the first things you need to know is how often should you workout/exercise every week in order to maximise your gains (either muscle growth or fat loss) and minimise injury.
This is especially important if you’re just getting started, or if you’re a little bit older (40+) when your body will require a bit of extra care.
It’s also important to understand the difference between working out and exercising – because they often get confused!
To find out the answer to these questions, I spoke to personal trainer and nutritionist, Anthony Bailey.
If you prefer listening to reading then check out my podcasts.
What’s the difference between working out and exercising?
Working out and exercising are often confused with one another but in reality, they’re two very different things.
Working out is a much more intense activity that will raise your heart rate and get you into a sweat such as a HIIT session, weights, or going for a run.
Exercise, on the other hand, is a much more gentle activity such as walking or a gentle bike ride.
The NHS in the UK has good guidelines around this subject, but as a quick illustration, some examples of ‘working out’ (intense) would be:
- jogging or running
- swimming fast
- riding a bike fast or on hills
- walking upstairs
- sports, like football, rugby, netball and hockey
- skipping rope
- aerobics
- gymnastics
- martial arts
Some examples of ‘exercise’ (moderate) would be:
- brisk walking
- water aerobics
- riding a bike
- dancing
- doubles tennis
- pushing a lawnmower
- hiking
- rollerblading
How often should you workout/exercise?
More guidelines from the National Health Service in the UK recommend that you should do at least 150 minutes (2hrs 30minutes) of moderate activity (exercise) per week or 75 minutes (1hr 15minutes) of intense activity (working out) every week.
This view is shared by the US Department of Health & Human Services.
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How much should you ‘exercise’ per week?
150 minutes of exercise per week (30 minutes per day x 5) is a really good baseline to start from and we should all be aiming to achieve at least this amount of exercise every week.
This is the minimum though.
How much should you ‘workout’ per week?
If you’re looking for weight loss, muscle growth, or want to get fitter then you need to add some workouts on top of this which are more intense.
Ideally, you should be working out three times per week on a Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for about 30 minutes, for example.
These diagrams can be used as a reference:
How much rest should you have between workouts?
After an intense workout (such as running or a weights session) you really should give yourself around 24 hours to allow your body to rest and recover.
As you can see in the final two charts above (which include intense workouts on a Monday, Wednesday, and Friday), the ideal situation is to give yourself a rest on Tuesday, Thursday, and the weekend.
However, if you’re just doing the minimum, gentle exercise such as walking every day, there’s really no need to take a rest on the days in between.
How to get started if you’re very unfit?
It all depends of course on what your goals are, but the most important thing is to start out very slowly and gradually.
If you haven’t exercised for a long time, then walking is a really good place to start. Begin with 10 minutes of walking per day and add on two minutes every day until you can easily do around 30 minutes of walking at a moderate pace.
Then you can make the step up to jogging.
If you’re just getting started with weights the same applies. Start with lower weights and fewer reps and build up gradually. You should be able to walk away from a session thinking that you could have done more.
These rules are especially important the older you get!
Related: Why I’m getting fit in my forties (and why you should too)
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For how long should you workout?
Again this depends on what you’re aiming for and where you’re starting from but as a rough guide anywhere from 30 to 60 minutes of intense working out three times a week is great.
This is stuff like weights or running.
If you’re doing a HIIT session (High Intensity Interval Training) which is really popular right now (thanks to Joe Wicks) then 20 minutes is all you need to do.
A philosophy shared by Joe Wicks himself in a recent interview.
Working out intensely for shorter periods of time is especially welcome if you’re older and time is precious with work and family commitments.
You really don’t need to spend hours in the gym every day unless you want to sculpt an Arnold Schwarzenegger-type body.
How often should you lift weights?
A lot of people say that they want to get fitter and stronger, but they don’t want to get big, which is a real misnomer because you can do resistance training every day without getting bigger, and for a lot of people, it’s actually really hard to get bigger muscles.
To do that you really have to train hard for a few hours every day, you have to be focussed and eat right too.
Don’t be afraid of lifting weights, they’re really good for your bone density, for preserving muscle mass (which starts to deteriorate after you reach 30 years old), and for making you fitter and stronger.
Training with weights twice a week is a really good start and three times a week is perfect.
These sessions should be full-body sessions, meaning that you’re pushing, pulling, and lifting working on your legs, back, chest, arms, and core.
If you’re really keen and want to work out every day (or six days a week bearing in mind that you should always have at least one rest day per week) then you can do what’s called body splits.
This means that you train different parts of the body on different days split between two pulling days per week, two push days per week, and two lifting days per week with core exercises mixed in.
Another way to do this is to isolate different body parts and do, for example, arms one day, legs another day, etc.
Should you eat differently on rest days and workout days?
This is actually an entire podcast in itself, but in short, if you’re doing high-intensity exercise then you should increase your protein to make sure that your muscles can regenerate properly.
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Remember, as always be sure to check in with your doctor before you start any kind of new exercise regime.