Have you heard of zone zero? The term crossed my desk for the first time last week when I read an article by Tom Brownlee, an associate professor of sports science at the University of Birmingham, about effortless exercise. Effortless exercise?! Surely that’s too good to be true.
So I contacted Brownlee to tell me more about zone zero.
What is zone zero?
Fitness trackers and smartwatches with heart rate monitors use heart rate zones numbered from one to five to show how hard your heart is working during exercise.
In zone one, your heart is beating at 50-60% of your maximum heart rate—that’s easy exercise—and in zone five, it’s beating between 90-100% and you’re going all-out.
Brownlee tells me that zone zero is an unofficial term for when you are moving, but your heart is functioning at less than 50% of your maximum heart rate. It’s a step above being sedentary, but you’re not breaking a sweat.
Which activities this applies to will vary depending on your fitness level.
“If you are very deconditioned or have certain medical conditions, climbing the stairs can get you out of breath, and that person would not be in zone zero,” says Brownlee. “So it is impacted by your fitness level, but zone zero is focusing on the lower end of our exertion: a slow walk, chair-based stretching, or really gentle yoga.”
Rather than buying and keeping an ever-watchful eye on a fitness tracker, Brownlee recommends keeping tabs on your breath.
“Can you still breathe through your nose with your mouth shut?” says Brownlee. “Can you still easily have a conversation? In zone zero, you won’t be running up and down the stairs or doing laps in the pool as fast as you can. Pay less attention to your heart rate and focus instead on how your body feels.”
That description rang bells. As I learned from talking to an exercise physiologist about the two types of walking, all steps contribute to your overall step count for the day, even the little bits of ambient walking you do when, for instance, going to get a snack.
It’s not high impact, it shouldn’t be difficult, and you’re unlikely to see a spike in your heart rate on a fitness tracker. But it all adds up to improve your health and keep your body running smoothly.
What are the benefits of zone zero?
“It’s better for you than doing nothing,” says Brownlee. “It’s going to improve your blood flow, it’s going to improve your mood.”
He explains that the main benefit of zone zero is to break up long periods of sitting. Spending long periods of time sedentary has a negative impact on your health, and getting up for small, low-impact bouts of movement can help to mitigate some of these effects.
For someone with a chronic illness, it allows them to incorporate movement into their day-to-day within the limitations of their illness, and they will see the benefits of doing so.
Brownlee explains that there isn’t really an upper limit to how much zone zero movement you want to do, because it isn’t putting any stress on your body.
“Unless there's specific reasons for you not to, zone zero can be a gateway drug to more intense exercise, and that’s great,” says Brownlee. “If you go to the gym and really slowly turn the wheels on the bike while you read a book, but you find yourself getting into it and bringing your heart rate up, that’s no bad thing.”
“If your goal is to build strength, to build stamina, to build bone health, you likely will need something higher intensity because the way that those changes come about is when you push your body beyond what it can currently do,” says Brownlee.
“But if you haven't done any exercise for a period and you want to start, then starting with a bit of zone zero is a good way of doing it.”
“It’s less about fitness gains and more about stability, quality of life and fitting it in more movement.”
Brownlee also brought up an old favorite of mine: exercise snacks. He suggests reframing your idea of zone zero exercise from doing a workout to simply moving more regularly.
“They can be sprinkled throughout the day, there’s no need to think of it in terms of workouts per week—it’s all woven into your routine,” he says. “For instance, you might have a 20-minute gap between meetings, and you might think to do a little bit of movement, rather than putting your gym kit on and doing something regimented and official. These exercise snacks dotted around the week add up.”
Dr Tom Brownlee, PhD, has 15 years’ experience in elite sport and over 30 peer-reviewed papers. His PhD focused on strength training in soccer while at Liverpool FC. He is an associate professor at the University of Birmingham, consulting for Premier League clubs and global brands, and speaking internationally on sport performance
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