Can cleaning the house count as exercise?

For its part, the American Heart Association considers household chores as moderate exercise. You'd have to do it four hours a day if you were training for a marathon,” Press jokes. No one argues that doing household chores can burn calories. Any type of physical activity should help people control their weight, right? Not necessarily.

Eating sweat while cleaning won't help you lose weight, according to new research from the University of Ulster in Ireland. Most household chores burn calories with some of the same physical movements you do in the gym. With a few small adjustments, you can exercise for the whole body, build muscle, and burn more calories while tidying up your home. Cleanliness can be a virtue, but keeping ourselves clean is what keeps us fit.

NEAT, or non-exercise activity thermogenesis, refers to the energy you burn while doing daily activities other than sleep, eating, and exercising. Housework certainly counts, and the more you do, the higher your NEAT score will be. Research is finding that NEAT is a factor in maintaining a healthy weight and staying fit in the long term. In addition, household chores can also help keep the mind young and lower the risk of dementia.

If you think doing household chores will save you a trip to the gym, you might want to think again. Yes, with some considerations in mind. The tasks you do around the house and in the garden can burn calories and tone your muscles. Even short periods of mild physical activity can help improve your fitness level, especially for people who are just starting to exercise.

House cleaning can not be treated as a primary form of exercise. It is difficult to lose weight with household chores alone. For example, if you vacuum, it burns 130 cal, while cycling can burn 400 cal. On the contrary, some house cleaning jobs give you a good calorie burn.

The study states that people who regularly cleaned the house showed health advantages over those who did not. While most fitness experts wouldn't necessarily recommend housework as your regular workout, you can do this house-cleaning exercise on days when you can't go to the gym. From the above readings, you can note that the calories burned with house cleaning are more than lifting weights. Listed below are the most common house-cleaning jobs, along with how many calories a 150-pound person would burn while doing these household chores.