Your heart rate zones are personal — and one of the biggest reasons they differ from the next person's is age. Because every zone is calculated as a percentage of your maximum heart rate, and your max heart rate falls steadily as you get older, the exact heart rate that puts you in Zone 2 at 25 will sit in Zone 3 by the time you are 55. Training to a chart you found a decade ago means training to the wrong numbers.
This guide gives you a complete set of heart rate zones by age: the five zones, the formula behind them, and a by-decade chart you can read straight off for your 20s through your 70s. We will also cover how to find your real zones on an Apple Watch, why the textbook formula is only a starting point, and which zone matters most for long-term health.
Why heart rate zones change with age
There is one number under every zone calculation: your maximum heart rate (HR max) — the most times your heart can beat in a single minute. HR max is largely genetic, it is not a measure of fitness, and crucially it declines with age at roughly one beat per minute per year from your late twenties onward.
That decline is the whole story. A 25-year-old with an HR max around 195 bpm and a 65-year-old with an HR max around 155 bpm are both capable, both fit — but their hearts top out 40 beats apart. Apply the same zone percentages to each and you get two completely different target ranges. That is why a "target heart rate by age" chart exists at all: the percentages stay fixed, but the bpm numbers they translate to drop every decade.
The 220-minus-age formula (and its caveats)
The most widely used way to estimate HR max is delightfully simple:
HR max = 220 − your age
A 30-year-old gets an estimated max of 190 bpm; a 50-year-old gets 170 bpm. It is fast, it needs no equipment, and it is the basis for almost every age-based heart rate chart you will ever see — including the one below.
But treat it as a starting point, not gospel. The formula carries a standard deviation of roughly ±10–12 bpm, which means a 40-year-old's true max could plausibly fall anywhere from about 168 to 192 bpm. Two people the same age can have genuinely different maximums, and the formula cannot see that. It also tends to slightly under-estimate HR max in older adults. Research-grade alternatives like the Tanaka formula (208 − 0.7 × age) track real-world data a little more closely, especially past 50. We go deep on testing your real max in our max heart rate guide.
The practical takeaway: use 220 − age and the chart below to get started today, then verify your true max with a field test if you want your zones dialled in precisely.
The five heart rate zones
Before the chart, here is what each zone is and what it does. The percentages are of HR max and stay the same at every age — only the bpm numbers move.
- Zone 1 — Active recovery (50–60% HR max): Easy walking or a gentle cool-down. Effortless breathing, full conversation. Builds movement volume without fatigue.
- Zone 2 — Aerobic base (60–70% HR max): Conversational "easy" cardio. The single most valuable zone for long-term health — it drives mitochondrial growth and fat-oxidation efficiency. More on this below.
- Zone 3 — Tempo (70–80% HR max): Comfortably hard; short sentences only. Improves lactate clearance and aerobic power.
- Zone 4 — Lactate threshold (80–90% HR max): Hard. Roughly 5K–10K race effort. Raises the intensity you can hold before fatigue spikes.
- Zone 5 — Maximum effort (90–100% HR max): All-out sprint intervals. Develops VO2 max and top-end power. Sustainable only in short bursts.
For the full breakdown of how each zone feels and trains the body, see our heart rate zones explained guide.
Heart rate zones by age chart (by decade)
The table below uses the 220 − age formula at the midpoint of each decade (so the "30s" row uses age 35, and so on) to keep the numbers representative of the whole decade. All values are beats per minute and rounded to the nearest whole beat. Find your decade, read across, and you have your full Z1–Z5 target ranges.
| Age | Max HR | Zone 1 (50–60%) | Zone 2 (60–70%) | Zone 3 (70–80%) | Zone 4 (80–90%) | Zone 5 (90–100%) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 20s (25) | 195 | 98–117 | 117–137 | 137–156 | 156–176 | 176–195 |
| 30s (35) | 185 | 93–111 | 111–130 | 130–148 | 148–167 | 167–185 |
| 40s (45) | 175 | 88–105 | 105–123 | 123–140 | 140–158 | 158–175 |
| 50s (55) | 165 | 83–99 | 99–116 | 116–132 | 132–149 | 149–165 |
| 60s (65) | 155 | 78–93 | 93–109 | 109–124 | 124–140 | 140–155 |
| 70s (75) | 145 | 73–87 | 87–102 | 102–116 | 116–131 | 131–145 |
A few things jump out of this chart. Your Zone 2 ceiling drops from about 137 bpm in your 20s to roughly 102 bpm in your 70s — a 35-beat swing for the exact same training stimulus. And a heart rate of 130 bpm is comfortable Zone 2 for a 35-year-old, but firmly Zone 3 tempo work for someone in their 50s. Same number, completely different physiological demand. This is the core reason heart rate beats pace as a fair, age-adjusted measure of effort.
Target heart rate by age: the quick version
If you only want a single target range to train in, "target heart rate" usually refers to the moderate-to-vigorous band that most general health guidance points to — roughly 50–85% of your max heart rate. Using 220 − age, that works out to:
- Age 25: about 98–166 bpm
- Age 35: about 93–157 bpm
- Age 45: about 88–149 bpm
- Age 55: about 83–140 bpm
- Age 65: about 78–132 bpm
That wide band is fine for "am I working hard enough to count" general-fitness purposes. But the five-zone model above is far more useful once you want to train deliberately — because where inside that band you spend your time determines which adaptations you actually get.
Running heart rate zones by age
Running zones use the same five-zone percentages as any other cardio — the numbers in the chart above apply directly to a run. The wrinkle worth knowing is that running tends to produce a slightly higher heart rate than cycling or rowing at the same perceived effort, because you are supporting your full bodyweight and using more muscle mass. Many athletes find their running HR runs a few beats above their cycling HR for an equivalent feel.
For most recreational runners, the goal is simple and age-independent in principle: keep easy runs genuinely easy (Zone 2, using your age-appropriate row in the chart) and make hard runs actually hard (Zone 4–5). The single most common mistake is letting easy runs drift up into Zone 3 — the "grey zone" that is too hard to recover from quickly and too easy to drive real high-end gains. Checking your watch against the right by-age range is the fix.
How to find your heart rate zones on Apple Watch
Apple Watch is an excellent heart rate monitor for zone training — it samples your pulse every second during a workout using its optical sensor and stores every reading in Apple Health. To get accurate, age-appropriate zones from it:
- Set your correct age (date of birth). In the Health app on iPhone, open your profile and confirm your date of birth is accurate — Apple uses it to estimate your max heart rate and, in turn, your zones. A wrong birth year quietly throws every zone off.
- Let it learn your max. Over time, Apple Watch refines its HR max estimate from the highest readings it sees during hard workouts, which can be more accurate than a flat 220 − age. The harder you occasionally train, the better that estimate gets.
- Wear it snugly, two finger-widths above the wrist bone. A loose band creates motion artifacts and unreliable readings — especially during running and intervals.
- Start workouts in the Workout app. This triggers continuous, every-second heart rate sampling. Background measurement is far less frequent and not suitable for live zone training.
- Read your zone during the session. Apple Watch shows a live heart rate and a colour-coded zone view mid-workout, and a per-workout zone breakdown afterward — cross-check it against your decade's row in the chart above.
For the full setup walkthrough, including which models support zone tracking, see our Apple Watch heart rate zones guide.
Why Zone 2 matters most — at every age
Of all five zones, Zone 2 is the one worth protecting in your weekly schedule, and that is true whether you are 25 or 75. Sustained work at 60–70% of your max heart rate is the single best stimulus for mitochondrial biogenesis — your muscle cells building more of the tiny engines that turn fat into usable energy. More mitochondria means better fat oxidation, a higher aerobic ceiling, and improved metabolic health.
This matters more, not less, as you age. Zone 2 is highly recoverable, so you can accumulate several hours of it per week without the fatigue cost of high-intensity work — and that durable aerobic base is strongly associated with long-term cardiovascular health and healthy ageing. Longevity-focused researchers routinely point to a minimum of around three hours of Zone 2 per week as a baseline for health maintenance. The catch is that as your max heart rate falls, your Zone 2 bpm ceiling falls with it — so an older athlete genuinely has to ease off the pace to stay in zone, even though it can feel almost too easy. Trust the number, not the ego. Our Zone 2 training guide covers the science in depth.
Recalculate your zones as you age
Because HR max drifts down by roughly a beat a year, zones built in your early 30s will be a few percent too high by your late 30s. You do not need to recalculate weekly, but it is worth refreshing your numbers every couple of years — or any time your old "Zone 2 pace" starts feeling noticeably easier than it used to. Fitness gains do not raise your max heart rate; what they raise is the pace and power you can hold at any given zone, which is exactly the point of training.
How Underdog handles age automatically
Keeping a by-age chart in your head while you train is a chore. Underdog removes that step entirely. It reads your heart rate data straight from Apple Health after every workout — using the max heart rate Apple has dialled in from your age and your own training history — and breaks every session down by zone for you. There is no chart to memorise and no zone math to redo on your birthday: as your max heart rate shifts with age, your Zone 2 always means your current 60–70%, automatically.
Underdog then turns your time-in-zone into a weekly points score and drops you into a league against other people, with promotion and relegation. Because it scores effort relative to your own physiology rather than raw pace, it is a genuinely fair contest across ages — a 60-year-old logging Zone 3 time is rewarded the same as a 25-year-old doing the same, since both are working equally hard relative to their own maximum. It works with any workout type and any Apple Watch that syncs to Apple Health. Download Underdog free on the App Store and let your zones adjust themselves as you go.
FAQ
What are my heart rate zones for my age?
Find your decade in the chart above and read across for your full Z1–Z5 ranges. The quick method: estimate your max heart rate as 220 minus your age, then Zone 1 is 50–60% of that, Zone 2 is 60–70%, Zone 3 is 70–80%, Zone 4 is 80–90%, and Zone 5 is 90–100%.
What is a good target heart rate by age?
For general fitness, a common target band is 50–85% of your max heart rate. That is roughly 98–166 bpm at age 25, 93–157 bpm at 35, 88–149 bpm at 45, 83–140 bpm at 55, and 78–132 bpm at 65. For deliberate training, use the five-zone breakdown rather than a single wide band.
How do I calculate max heart rate by age?
The standard estimate is 220 minus your age — so 190 bpm at 30, 180 at 40, 170 at 50. It carries about ±10–12 bpm of variance, so treat it as a starting point and verify with a field test if you want precision. See our max heart rate guide for testing methods.
What should my Zone 2 heart rate be for my age?
Zone 2 is 60–70% of your max heart rate. Using 220 − age, that is roughly 117–137 bpm in your 20s, 111–130 in your 30s, 105–123 in your 40s, 99–116 in your 50s, 93–109 in your 60s, and 87–102 in your 70s. Confirm with the talk test: you should be able to speak in full sentences.
Why do heart rate zones decrease with age?
Because every zone is a percentage of your maximum heart rate, and max heart rate falls by roughly one beat per minute per year from your late twenties. The percentages stay the same at every age, but the bpm numbers they translate to drop each decade — which is why the chart shifts downward as you read down it.
Is the 220-minus-age formula accurate?
It is a reasonable starting estimate but not precise for everyone — the standard deviation is around ±10–12 bpm, and it slightly under-estimates max heart rate in older adults. Two people the same age can have genuinely different maximums. For accurate zones, verify your true max with a ramp test or let an Apple Watch refine the estimate from your workout history.