Does Walking Burn Fat?

Walking has many wonderful benefits: improving fitness, strengthening bones, and easing joint pain. It can also improve mental health. For those trying to burn fat, walking can also help accomplish your goals. Here is everything you need to know about walking to burn fat and calories.

Walking to Burn Fat

There are two keys to burning more fat when walking. The first is that you need to walk with enough speed and/or intensity to burn fat for energy. And the longer you walk, the more you burn stored fat (rather than the sugars your body uses for quick bursts of exercise). While any exercise can burn calories, brisk walking and other aerobic exercises are especially good for burning internal abdominal fat, called visceral fat. This type of fat not only contributes to your waistline but also raises your risk for diabetes and heart disease.

What is the Fat-Burning Zone?

The American Heart Association (AHA) categorizes brisk walking at a pace of 2.5 miles per hour as a moderate-intensity aerobic activity. According to the AHA, your target heart rate for exercising at this level of intensity should be 50% to 70% of your maximum heart rate. (For more vigorous activities, your heart rate should be about 70% to 85% of your maximum heart rate.)

Working out at a low to moderate intensity can help you burn fat because your body uses stored fat as fuel compared with workouts of higher intensity that rely on carbohydrates.

The heart rate range for this zone varies by your age. You can use a chart of heart rate zones by age to find the right numbers. Take your pulse while exercising to check your heart rate. There are heart rate apps and pulse monitors built into many activity monitors and smartwatches.

While exercising in this zone, you are breathing heavier, feeling increased exertion, and sweating, but still able to carry on a conversation. Beginners should build up their walking time and speed gradually. A beginner's walking plan starts with 15 minutes per day, five days per week, working on good walking technique. Increase walking time by 5 minutes per session each week.

Ways to Boost Walking Intensity

If you find your heart rate is still below 60% of your maximum, you need to make your workout more intense in order to burn fat. There are several ways to do this.

Add Distance and Time

Make your walk longer to keep your body working harder. Keep your pace brisk. Walking for additional minutes will burn additional stored fat. However, since not everyone has time, you might find other options more feasible.

Walk Faster

Work on walking faster using good posture, arm motion, and a powerful stride. Even if you go out for a short walk, aim to do it faster than normal. It may help to time yourself walking a set route and challenge yourself to complete it faster each time.

One study looked at people walking 3.6 miles per hour, 4.1 mph, and 4.6 mph. The acceleration to 4.6 mph burned more than 50% more calories than jumping from 3.6 mph to 4.1 mph.

Add Intervals

Use the above strategies to walk faster to incorporate intervals, where you rev up your speed for a set distance or time, alternating with a slower pace. Intervals add intensity and also help to increase the overall pace. Research on people with diabetes found that those who did interval walking workouts for four months lost six times as much weight as those who walked at a steady pace.

Add Hills or Stairs

Incorporating hills or stair-climbing into some of your walks also helps keep you challenged and makes your workout more intense. If you don't have access to a hilly outdoor route or stairs, you can use a treadmill (start with a slight incline and work up to a steeper one) or a stair-stepping machine at the gym.

And you don't need to walk briskly on hills: One study showed that walking slowly on an incline was an effective workout that didn't cause stress on the knee joint, especially for people who were obese.

Use Walking Poles

When you walk with poles, you add intensity (not to mention an upper-body workout) without feeling like you are working much harder.

Switch Up Your Workouts

For best results, mix up different walking workouts: intervals, short and fast walks, and long and moderate walks. More meditative, mindful walks also have stress-reducing benefits. These walks help lower cortisol, which can contribute to weight gain.

If you can't spend 45 continuous minutes walking, make the most of the time you have. Fit in two to four 15-minute walks at a brisk pace. You will be burning calories, building your walking speed and ability, and achieving the minimum recommended physical activity level for health.

It's also a good idea to include other types of exercise. Other moderate-intensity exercise activities include bicycle riding on level terrain, water aerobics, using an elliptical trainer, ballroom dancing, gardening, and doubles tennis. Challenge your body in new ways and balance your muscle development by doing physical activities.

In addition to burning fat, you are also building muscle and raising your basal metabolic rate. With a boosted metabolism, you are burning more calories all day long.

Sample Fat-Burning Walking Workout

You can use a treadmill or walk outdoors for this workout. You will need good athletic shoes that are flat and flexible and have the proper support and cushioning for a long walk. Wear clothing that allows freedom of movement and wicks away sweat.

• Warmup: Walk 5 to 10 minutes at an easy pace, increasing your speed gradually. The warmup is important to burn stored blood sugar and deplete the ready energy stored in your muscles. This signals your body that you are doing a longer exercise session. As a result, your body gets ready to burn stored fat.
• Speed up until you are in the fitness zone (heart rate of 60% to 70% of your maximum). Check your heart rate every 10 minutes to ensure stay in the zone.
• Walk in the fitness zone for 30 to 50 minutes or more. If your heart rate dips, pick up your speed.
• Cool down: End with 5 to 10 minutes at an easier pace for a cooldown.

A Word From Verywell

The first step to burning fat is to get moving. Use a quick-start walking program to build your walking time, technique, and speed if you haven't walked briskly for 30 minutes or more daily. Taking it easy at first and working on the basics steadily can get you to your goal.