How Many Steps Per Day To Beat Alzheimer’s? (A Lot Fewer Than You Might Think)

“Walking is good for the health” is not, of course, breaking news.

“Exercise helps keep Alzheimer’s at bay”, meanwhile, is something that probably most people don’t know, but regular 10almonds readers certainly will.

There are numerous reasons, and the first and foremost is that “what’s good for your heart is good for your brain” (because the heart feeds the brain, and also ultimately clears away detritus, including the amyloid-β famously associated with Alzheimer’s).

For more on how this works, see: What’s Your Vascular Dementia Risk? ← includes actual numbers and a risk calculator tool and things like that

How many steps?

We previously wrote about merely moving one’s body enough to not be considered to have a “sedentary lifestyle” is already hugely beneficial.

How To Walk Away From Alzheimer’s ← this is less about how much you exercise or how intensely, and more about how much time you spend simply “not sitting”. So, for example, walking.

Most recently, researchers (Dr. Wendy Yau et al.) found that regular walking, even in modest amounts, help build cognitive resilience and delay symptom onset in preclinical Alzheimer’s disease.

How modest? To put it in numbers,

• walking under 3,000 steps/day meant faster buildup of amyloid-β and tau proteins, and quicker cognitive and functional decline.
• walking 3,000–5,000 steps/day delayed cognitive decline by about 3 years.
• walking 5,000–7,500 steps/day delayed decline by about 7 years.

In other words, even a day in which you just amble around the house, perhaps doing some housework, can probably clock up 3,000 steps per day, and is already beneficial.

Of course, more is better; as you can clearly see, there’s a dose-dependent response, at least up as far as 7,500 steps/day.

To quote Dr. Yau herself,

❝Every step counts—and even small increases in daily activities can build over time to create sustained changes in habit and health.❞

Read the paper in full: Physical activity as a modifiable risk factor in preclinical Alzheimer’s disease

As for that “build over time” part, this is very important too. For example another study recently found that being physically active over long periods (not just sporadically) was mostly strongly linked to maintaining better cognitive health. and that the more often and longer people stayed active, the stronger the protective effect became—which means that yes, those benefits grew over time.

You can read that paper in full too, here: Long-term cumulative physical activity associated with less cognitive decline: Evidence from a 16-year cohort study

So with that in mind, you might want to check out: No-Exercise Exercise! ← for ways to get that regular physical activity in, without it feeling like you are doing so

There are more things you can do too, of course; exercise is not the only tool available (albeit it is a critical one).

For a more comprehensive overview of anti-Alzheimer’s tools, enjoy: How To Reduce Your Alzheimer’s Risk

Want to learn more?

You might like this book that we reviewed a little while back:

Brain Health Action Plan: Simple, Science-Backed Lifestyle Changes that Optimize Cognitive Fitness and Reduce Alzheimer’s Risk – by Dr. Teryn Clarke

Take care!