Resting heart rate: what's healthy and how to lower it

Your resting heart rate is how many times your heart beats per minute while you're still and relaxed. For most adults it falls between 60 and 100. Within that range, lower is usually better. Large studies link each extra 10 beats per minute with a higher risk of heart disease and death.

Fitness is the main reason it differs between people. A trained heart pumps more blood per beat, so it needs fewer beats.

What's a good resting heart rate?

A meta-analysis of 46 studies and over 1.2 million people found the risk of death rose steadily from 45 beats per minute upward. Compared with the lowest group, people at 60 to 80 had a 12% higher risk of death from any cause, and people above 80 had a 45% higher risk.

A second meta-analysis of 87 studies found each 10 beats per minute higher was linked to a 17% higher risk of death, 15% higher risk of cardiovascular disease and 18% higher risk of heart failure.

See how yours compares with US adults your age and sex in the resting heart rate calculator.

Is it just a sign of fitness?

Partly, but not only. The Copenhagen Male Study followed 2,798 men for 16 years and measured their fitness with a bike test. Even after allowing for fitness, leisure-time activity, smoking and other risk factors, risk of death rose 16% with every 10 beats per minute. Men above 90 had about three times the risk of men at 50 or below.

These are observational studies, so a high resting heart rate is a warning sign rather than a proven cause. A very low rate in someone who doesn't train, or one with dizziness or fainting, is worth checking with a doctor.

What raises your resting heart rate

Short-term rises are common and usually harmless. Alcohol, a poor night's sleep, stress, dehydration, caffeine, heat, illness and a hard workout the day before can all push it up by several beats for a day or more. That's why a single morning's reading tells you little. Look at the average over a week or two.

Some medicines, such as beta blockers, lower it. Others, including some decongestants and thyroid medication, raise it. Don't change a medicine to move your number.

How to lower your resting heart rate

Endurance exercise works best. A 2018 meta-analysis of 191 studies found every type of exercise lowered resting heart rate, but endurance training and yoga were the only kinds that lowered it significantly in both men and women. People who started higher and younger saw the biggest drops.

Build a base of steady cardio. Two or three sessions a week of zone 2 cardio, where you can still talk, is a sustainable start. Add one harder session once that feels easy.

Sleep well and drink less. Alcohol and short sleep both raise overnight heart rate, so cutting evening drinks and keeping a regular bedtime can help.

Give it time. Training changes take weeks to show up in your resting rate.

How Ageon uses resting heart rate

Resting heart rate is one of the inputs to Ageon's cardio domain, next to VO2 max, heart rate variability, blood pressure and cardio recovery. With an Apple Watch or another device that writes resting heart rate to Apple Health, Ageon reads your recent average and compares it with US national data for your age and sex. A single high day won't move your score much, because it looks at your typical value. See the method for the reference data.