Fifteen years ago, a small device appeared on the market that quickly became all the rage: the Fitbit – and now, over a decade later, our love affair with counting our daily steps has made its way into almost all areas of daily life, including as a way to boost mood and reduce the symptoms of depression.
Evidence showing the positive benefits of exercise and activity – including basic forms such as walking – are conclusive: exercise can help physical, emotional, and psychological health. That’s why lifestyle changes focusing on exercise and activity are foundational components of most treatment approaches for depression. In fact, we recently published two articles on the topic:
Can Physical Fitness and Exercise Improve Teen Mental Health?
Physical Activity and Mental Health Among Adolescents
Those blog posts offer evidence to confirm the strength and effectiveness of exercise as an evidence-based complementary therapeutic modality for depression. However, despite the robust evidence presented in those articles, and the hundreds of peer-reviewed journal articles about the benefits of exercise for overall health and wellbeing, no research exists on the relationship between daily steps and depression.
Until now.
In late 2024, a team of mental health scientists released a study that fills this void in research:
Daily Step Count and Depression in Adults: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis
In the sections below, we’ll explore the results of this new study, and learn what the research says about the connection between daily steps and depression.
Walking to Wellbeing: Exercise, Health, and Mental Health
One thing we realized when we researched this topic was that walking – preferably every day – is good for almost everyone, everywhere. When people have major health problems – from diabetes to heart problems to cancer – doctors almost always prescribe physical activity as part of the recovery process, and in most cases, walking is the first activity on the list.
That’s because it’s a viable option for almost everyone. Whether you’re an elite athlete, completely sedentary, or somewhere in between, like most of us, taking a walk is something within reach. An athlete might walk five miles, and someone new to exercise after a long period off may walk for five minutes.
Both are valid, both count, and both help.
What’s true for diagnosis of many major physical health issues applies equally to diagnosis of major mental health issues such depressive disorder (MDD). Like most chronic health conditions, depression responds well to a combination of medication, therapeutic intervention, lifestyle changes, and family, community, and peer support. And as we mention above, walking is a perfect activity because anyone can do it.
Which explains why counting daily steps became so common in such a short time. It’s an easy way to keep a record of your daily exercise. When the Fitbit came out in 2009, people loved it because all they needed to do to track their activity was put it on their wrist. And now, fifteen years later, tracking daily steps is even easier: almost every smartphone comes loaded with a step-counting app. And if yours doesn’t, you can find a wide selection available to download for free.
The popularity of counting daily steps and the proliferation of step-counting apps and devices is also what enabled researchers to conduct this study. The research team acquired data from over thirty from studies on the relationship between daily step count and the symptoms of depression and depressive disorders. The sample set was large, and diverse, and enables us to make reliable generalizations on the topic. Participants included over 95,000 adults from thirteen countries worldwide.
The goal of study was to answer this question:
Are objectively measured daily steps associated with depression in adulthood?
We’ll discuss the results below.
Daily Steps, Depression, and Mental Health
The research team analyzed daily steps for people with depression – close to 100,000 people – and established four distinct categories of activity, based on daily steps. Here are the four categories/groups:
- 10,000 steps per day or more: Highly Active Group
- 7,500 – 9,999 steps per day: Somewhat Active Group
- 5,000 – 7,499 steps per day: Low Activity Group
- 4,999 steps or less: Sedentary Group
We won’t keep you waiting on the results. Here’s the top-line outcome:
Daily steps were inversely correlated with depressive symptoms: the more steps a person reported taking every day, the fewer symptoms of depression they reported.
Here’s a summary of what they found.
Daily Steps and Depression: How Many Should You Take?
- 7,000 steps per day: participants who reported at least 7,000 daily steps showed a decreased likelihood of a depression diagnosis, compared to participants who reported fewer than 7,000 daily steps
- 1,000 steps per day: participants who increased their daily steps by at least 1000 per day showed a decreased likelihood of depression risk, whereas participants who reported increasing daily steps by less than 1,000 per day showed no decrease in likelihood of depression
- 7,500 steps per day: Participants who took 7,500 steps per day or more showed the greatest reduction in symptoms of depression
Here’s the breakdown, which compares highly active people (10k steps pr day or more) with sedentary people (5k steps per day or fewer):
Active vs. Sedentary: Does it Make a Difference?
Highly Active Participants (Over 10,000 steps per day) vs. to Sedentary Participants (Less than 5,000 steps per day):
- People in the highly active group showed significantly lower prevalence of depression than people in the sedentary group
Somewhat Active Participants (7,500 – 9,999 steps per day) vs. Sedentary Participants (Less than 5,000 steps per day):
- People in the somewhat active group showed significantly lower prevalence of depression than people in the sedentary group
Low Activity Participants (5,000 – 7,499 steps per day) vs. Sedentary Participants (Less than 5,000 steps per day):
- People in the somewhat active group showed moderately lower prevalence of depression compared to people in the sedentary group
We’ll discuss our primary takeaways from this study in the following section.
The Unexpected Health Benefits of Walking
Most of us understand that walking is good for us. In an article published by Harvard University Medical School in 2023, former director of the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) calls walking “the closest thing we have to a wonder drug.” He identifies five unexpected benefits of walking:
- Reduces the power of genes associated with weight gain.
- Reduces cravings for sweets.
- Decreases risk of breast cancer.
- Improves joint pain.
- Enhances immune system.
We can add those benefits those most of us know about, which include improved heart health, improved muscle and bone health, reduced risk of chronic conditions, improved sleep, and improved mental clarity/concentration.
How We Can Use This Study to Help People With Depression
Let’s take a look at the categories the researchers defined for the study participants and add what we know about steps to give the data above context and perspective.
For example, it takes an average sized healthy adult, walking at a moderate pace, around 2,000-2,500 steps to walk a mile. Based on this figure:
- Highly active people walk around 4 miles per day
- Somewhat active people walk closer to 3 miles per day
- Low activity people walk around 2 miles per day
- Sedentary people walk less than 2 miles per day
You can get a reliable estimate on how many steps it takes you to walk a mile with this free online step estimator.
There are at least two important things we learned from this study. We’ll allow the study authors to characterize the first lesson:
“Our results showed significant associations between higher numbers of daily steps and fewer depressive symptoms as well as lower prevalence and risk of depression in the general adult population.”
That’s big: evidence shows a connection between daily steps and depression: in a nutshell, more steps, fewer symptoms.
But that’s not all.
What we want to focus on – and what we want you to take away – is the information on the number of steps to decrease likelihood of depression: about a thousand. That’s right: increasing your daily steps by at least 1,000 – no matter what number of steps you take per day now – can decrease your symptoms of depression and reduce your likelihood of receiving a diagnosis of major depressive disorder (MDD).
That means taking a walk of less than half a mile.
That’s a major finding, because it means we finally have a clear evidentiary basis for telling people start where you are and build slowly – any activity is better than no activity. For sedentary people who haven’t exercised in years, half a mile is within reach. There’s no need – or expectation – for anyone to suddenly go from sedentary to highly active overnight: that’s not realistic.
Instead, it’s possible to start one short walk at a time: start where you are, do what you can, try to increase your steps by at least 1,000 per day, and you’ll see the benefit.
That’s all we have to share about daily steps and depression. However, since we’re on the topic, we’ll share the latest guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) on the amount of exercise and activity we should all engage in to keep our bodies and minds healthy and strong.
How Much Exercise is Enough? The CDC Guidelines on Exercise and Activity
CDC Guidelines for Exercise and Activity: Adults
To experience the health benefits of exercise, adults should:
- Do between 2 ½ and 5 hours of moderate aerobic activity every week
- Do 1.25 to 2.5 hours of vigorous-intensity aerobic activity every week
- Do a combination of moderate- and vigorous-intensity aerobic activity that meets the time requirements in the first two bullets
Basic Rules to Follow:
- You get the most benefit from aerobic activity when you spread it out over the week, rather than try to do it all in one day
- The more you exercise, the more you benefit: more than 5 hours per week is safe – but check with a doctor first, if you’ve been sedentary
- Adults need to add strength-building exercises at least twice a week for maximum health benefit.
CDC Guidelines for Exercise and Activity: Adolescents
- Children and adolescents age 6 to 17 should do at least (1) one hour of moderate-to-vigorous physical activity every day.
- Exercise should mix aerobic, muscle-, and bone-strengthening activities:
- Aerobic: Most activity should be moderate or vigorous, with vigorous activity at least 3 days a week.
- Muscle-strengthening: At least three times a week (e.g. lifting weights or functional strength exercises like pushups or squats)
- Bone-strengthening: At least three times per week (bone strengthening exercises include a small amount of impact, such as running, jogging, cardio-kickboxing)
For kids and adolescents, variety makes a big difference: exercise should be fun, first and foremost. Before we close, we’ll look at the CDC suggestions for specific demographic groups.
Key Guidelines for Adults With Disabilities
Adults with chronic illness or disability should follow the same guidelines as all adults. If they’re unable to follow the guidelines, they can engage in whatever level of activity is possible: the most important thing is to avoid being totally inactive.
Basic Rules Guidelines for Women During Pregnancy and Postpartum
- During and after pregnancy, women should do at least 2.5 hours of moderate aerobic activity each week.
- Women accustomed to vigorous activity before pregnancy can continue their level of activity, per adjustments related to any issues with the pregnancy identified by a physician.
- Women who become pregnant should meet with their physician about appropriate levels of physical activity during pregnancy and the post-partum period
And we’ll end with the CDC suggestions for everyone to follow.
Basic General Rules About Exercise
To exercise safely and avoid injury:
- Recognize any physical activity includes some amount of risk, but exercise – following simple rules – can be safe and fun for anyone at any age.
- Decide what kind of exercise you want to do based on your current level of activity and your goals for the short- and long-term.
- Know where you are and start there. If you can walk for ten minutes, start there. If you can run ten miles – keep it up, you probably don’t need our advice. However, it’s important for sedentary people to begin with simple, easy activities and build slowly. Starting with activities that are too difficult can increase the chance you won’t come back for more.
Finally, it’s important for people with chronic health conditions or disruptive mental health symptoms should consult a professional – a doctor, physical therapist, or certified personal trainer – to create an exercise plan that’s safe and will not have a negative impact on their physical or mental health.
