Skip the gym — and just add NEAT: How everyday activities, like taking the stairs and cleaning your house, can boost your health.
Maybe it’s been a while since you’ve been to the gym or had an hour to kill in yoga class. But that doesn’t necessarily mean your body isn’t moving — you’re crisscrossing the house as you put away laundry, mowing the lawn, dragging the trashcans to the curb or walking the kids to school. There’s even a term for all this movement: NEAT, which stands for non-exercise activity thermogenesis.
For those of us who don’t have the time (or let’s be honest, the inclination) for a formal workout, NEAT might be an easier alternative that can help improve your health. But is it just as good as, say, sweating it out in an aerobics class or lifting weights — or is it just better than nothing? Here’s what experts say about its benefits and limits when it comes to your overall fitness.
What is NEAT?
Personal trainer and nutrition coach Sarah Pelc Graca tells Yahoo Life that NEAT is the “energy your body burns through daily activities that aren’t traditional exercise, sleeping or eating.”
“It’s the small but meaningful movements that add up throughout the day, like walking the dog, cleaning the house, gardening, playing with your kids or even fidgeting,” she explains. “People often get NEAT through everyday routines — taking the stairs instead of the elevator, standing while working or simply choosing to move more during tasks like grocery shopping or tidying up.”
According to Graca, these small actions can make a big difference in boosting overall energy expenditure in a way that “fits naturally into your life.”
NEAT is just one of the four ways our bodies use energy, making up our total energy expenditure, or TEE — aka the total number of calories our bodies use throughout the day. While many assume everyone’s TEE is 2,000 calories per day (thanks to nutrition labels, which use this as a general reference point), our actual TEE is individual and varies greatly. Exceeding our TEE by eating extra calories leads to weight gain over time.
In addition to NEAT, our TEE is compromised of the following factors:
Basal metabolic rate (BMR): This is the energy our body uses at rest to keep up with functions like breathing, circulation and digestion. It makes up the largest portion of our TEE, about 60% to 70%. Our BMR tends to remain stable over time.
Exercise activity thermogenesis (EAT): These are the calories burned through intentional exercise like your morning run or weekly fitness class. Along with NEAT, it makes up about 15 to 30% of your TEE, with EAT comprising around 5%.
Thermic effect of food (TEF): This is the energy your body uses to digest, absorb and process the food you eat. It typically makes up about 10% of your TEE.
Why is NEAT important?
Getting more NEAT essentially means staying more active throughout the day, which is good for your health. NEAT breaks up the time you spend sitting, which is linked to several health issues, including a greater risk of heart disease and type 2 diabetes. Keith Diaz, an associate professor of behavioral medicine at Columbia University Medical Center, previously told Yahoo Life that our bodies need “regular activation,” and recommends moving for five minutes every half hour.
“Your muscles need to be regularly contracted for them to optimally function and do the things that they’re supposed to do, like regulate our sugar levels and the lipids or fats in our blood,” he said.
The more active you are, the more NEAT you’ll get, which can help you burn extra calories. “If you’re constantly on the move — taking the stairs, walking to work or gardening for hours — you’re already staying active and burning calories,” personal trainer Jerome Draculan tells Yahoo Life. “This can be pretty effective for general health and weight maintenance.”
How can we get more NEAT?
You may not realize when you’re getting NEAT, simply because this type of movement is a normal part of daily life. But that doesn’t mean you can’t be creative about how to get more of it, personal trainer Tami Smith tells Yahoo Life.
“To increase your NEAT, I recommend first becoming aware of what it is and then intentionally moving more throughout your day,” she says. “That might mean parking further away from the store when shopping or choosing to shop in person versus via delivery or pick-up.” Even squatting down to garden, rather than bringing a stool, can affect your NEAT, she says.
Some other things that you can do daily to increase our NEAT include:
Pacing while on a call instead of sitting at your desk
Tapping your knee under your desk
Taking the stairs as often as possible
Doing an extra lap around the store after you finish grocery shopping
Walking to errands instead of driving
Vacuuming or sweeping
Playing fetch with your pet or catch with your kid
Stretching while watching TV
Walking to a co-worker’s desk instead of sending an email
Can NEAT replace exercise?
While squeezing in more movement throughout your day is good for your health, it’s worth pointing out that there are important benefits of doing actual sustained exercise, which is why the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends at least 150 minutes of moderate-intensity aerobic activity and two days of muscle-strengthening exercises per week.
Michael Betts, personal trainer and director at TRAINFITNESS, tells Yahoo Life that NEAT isn’t enough to make gains in strength or muscle mass (which is important for supporting bone health, for example). It also won’t necessarily improve your cardiovascular fitness because of the lack of sustained elevation in heart rate.
However, for older adults or those with mobility issues, says Betts, "increasing NEAT through regular walking and daily activities may be enough for basic health maintenance." He adds: "NEAT can also support weight management when combined with proper nutrition.”
The bottom line
The more active you are, the better — so take the stairs, park a little further from a store and get up from your desk as often as possible to sneak movement in throughout the day. But don’t let squeezing in more NEAT stop you from a few exercise sessions a week — a balance of both NEAT and formal, more intense exercise, as well as resistance training, is key to maintaining longevity and good health.
