You know that feeling of a heart-pumping workout. But how fast, exactly, should your heart rate be? And is having a high heart rate while working out always the goal? 

Your heart rate is a measure of how hard your body is working, and during exercise, your heart rate increases to meet the demands of your muscles. How much your heart rate increases depends on the intensity of your exercise and your overall state of health.

A higher heart rate during exercise can lead to greater fitness, metabolic efficiency, and cardiovascular health. But it’s just one piece of the puzzle. 

Lower-intensity exercise—like yoga, Pilates, and walking—may not increase your heart rate as high as other workouts, but can still deliver a number of important benefits for your health.

Member tip: With Automatic Activity Detection, Oura captures your average heart rate and heart rate zones after an activity is automatically tracked or manually added. Under the Activity details, you’ll see a heart rate chart and how many minutes you spent in each of six heart rate zones (from 0 to 5). 

What Happens to Your Heart Rate While Working Out

When you exercise, your body’s demand for energy and oxygen increases to support your working muscles. To meet this demand, your heart has to pump more blood to the muscles so they are sufficiently oxygenated. This causes an increase in your heart rate.

Your heart rate can increase substantially depending on the type of exercise you’re doing. There are many ways to categorize the different heart rate zones, but generally, they are based on how close you are to your maximum heart rate (MHR). Your MHR is the highest number of times your heart can beat per minute during physical activity, and is highly correlated with your age. 

Oura categorizes heart rate zones based on a formula that includes your maximum heart rate and your age, among other metrics.

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How to calculate your maximum heart rate (MHR)

If you are not an Oura member, the most accurate way to calculate your MHR is by doing a stress test. A stress test uses an electrocardiogram (ECG) to monitor your heart rate while you walk on a treadmill or cycle on a stationary bike. The medical professional overseeing this will have you increase the intensity until you reach your maximum output.

Most people don’t have access to this level of testing, so a simple alternative way to calculate yours is by using a formula: subtracting your age from 220. For example, for a 50-year-old, it would be 220 minus 50, so 170 beats per minute is their MHR.

RELATED: Heart Rate Recovery: Why It Matters and How to Calculate Yours

Understanding Heart Rate Zones on Oura

In the Oura App, you’ll see six heart rate zones.  All six deliver benefits to your overall health. While vigorous exercise is great, remember that low-intensity activities and everyday movement can improve your energy and mood, help you manage your weight, and benefit your metabolic health. The more intensely you work out (e.g., zones 3 to 6), the more it will benefit your cardiovascular system and muscle strength. 

In general, zones 0-1 are considered low-intensity, zones 2-3 are considered moderate intensity, and zones 3 and above are considered high intensity.

Heart Rate Zones
Oura uses six heart rate zones. The ranges assigned to each zone are calculated using an age-based estimate of your max heart rate (max HR).
Zone 0 ≤ 49% of max HR You’re either fully at rest or moving slowly. This zone is associated with recovery.
Zone 1 ≥ 50-59% of max HR You’re moving at a light, steady pace, promoting circulation without much strain. It’s still easy to speak in full sentences. This zone is associated with metabolic health, and is common in warm-ups, cool-downs, and low-intensity activities.
Zone 2 ≥ 60-69% of max HR You’re moving at a light-to-moderate pace that may cause mild strain but feels sustainable. At this intensity, you’re still able to talk in full sentences, but it feels a bit harder than zone 1. This zone builds endurance and supports metabolic and cardiovascular health.
Zone 3 ≥ 70-79% of max HR You’re expending moderate-to-high amounts of energy and feeling more strain. Your breathing is more labored and it’s becoming difficult to maintain a conversation. Zone 3 benefits your cardiovascular fitness and muscle strength.
Zone 4 ≥ 80-89% of max HR You’re exerting near-max effort—moving with high intensity and really challenging your body. Time spent in this zone has high cardiovascular benefits but should be balanced with recovery. At this intensity your breathing is much quicker and you can only speak a few words at a time.
Zone 5 ≥ 90-100% of max HR You’re working at an all-out effort, and your heart and respiratory system are working at maximum capacity. This zone should leave you breathless while fortifying your cardiovascular and metabolic health.

Do You Need a High Heart Rate While Exercising? 

Having a high heart rate isn’t a requirement for an effective workout. However, research points to clear advantages to getting your heart rate up during a workout.

Potential advantages of higher-intensity exercise:

  • Improves overall cardiorespiratory fitness: A 2014 study in the British Journal of Sports Medicine found that high-intensity training was twice as effective as moderate-intensity exercise for improving cardiorespiratory fitness.
  • Improves insulin sensitivity: A 2017 study showed that HIIT counteracted elevated glucose, insulin, and free fatty acids in male participants, helping maintain insulin sensitivity even in an insulin-resistant state.
  • Helps build and maintain muscle mass: One study concluded that high-intensity training is “an efficient training protocol, which takes less time and produces a better improvement in anaerobic power.”
  • Delivers benefits in a time-efficient manner: As few as four minutes of a Tabata-style HIIT has been shown to improve speed, VO2 max, and anaerobic capacity by 28%, outperforming moderate-intensity workouts.
  • Lowers LDL cholesterol levels and blood pressure
  • Helps to improve maximal oxygen consumption (VO2 max)

Potential drawbacks of higher-intensity exercise:

For some people, having an elevated heart rate can be a health risk. For example, if you have a history of heart disease, high blood pressure, arrhythmias, anginas, or are pregnant or elderly, you should always consult your doctor before performing high-intensity exercise.

Too much high-intensity (and thus, high heart rate) activity can increase your risk of atrial fibrillation, a risk factor for stroke. A study found that participants who exercised intensely for more than five hours per week were 19% more likely to develop atrial fibrillation by 60, compared to those who did it once per week.

Member Story: Dave K., an avid CrossFitter, saw an abnormally high spike in his resting heart rate. This prompted a doctor’s visit, who diagnosed him with atrial flutter. He was advised to switch to lighter-intensity exercise until he recovered.

Potential advantages of lower-intensity exercise:

  • Activates the parasympathetic nervous system: When this system is activated, your heart rate and blood pressure lowers, and important autonomic functions, like digestion, occur.
  • Improves markers of heart health: A meta-analysis published in the European Journal of Epidemiology found that walking for 30 minutes a day, five days per week, decreases the risk of coronary heart disease by 19 percent.
  • It’s accessible: Many people of all fitness levels can do low-intensity exercise, such as walking and stretching, and reap the benefits.
  • Improves sleep quality: A study in the journal Sleep Health, researchers found that low-impact, low-intensity physical activity improved multiple markers of sleep quality.
  • Promotes recovery: Low-intensity exercise can reduce post-workout muscle soreness by keeping your muscles flexible, speeding up the overall recovery process.

READ MORE: How Sleep Helps Muscle Recovery and Growth 

The Bottom Line

While you don’t always need to see a high heart rate during exercise to get healthier and fitter, a workout routine that combines high heart rate activities (>80% of MHR) with lower heart rate activities (<70% of MHR) leads to the best health and performance outcomes. 

In fact, during lower-intensity exercise, your heart rate may not be substantially elevated but it still has an array of health benefits that make it a vital component of your fitness routine. Lower-intensity exercise improves heart health, is suitable and safe for all, and can help combat stress without needing to put your body under strain. 

Member tip: Oura’s Cardio Capacity feature provides an estimate of your VO2 max, or how efficiently your body delivers and utilizes oxygen during intense physical effort. This provides a window into the status of your entire cardiovascular system and holistic, long-term health.