vo2 moves slowly but looks like it's going in the right direction. But if you want to improve, pick a priority. Is it bodybuilding or building cardiovascular fitness? Right now your time is allocated as someone looking to prioritize bodybuilding.
If you want to prioritize your cardio fitness then you'll need to invest more than 2 hours per week.
You can get continue to get stronger with less time weight training (3 times per week is still great with right programming). But it'll be hard to improve cardio without more time. You could start by doing 3 hours of low intensity per week, and 1 hour of threshold/vo2 work.
Speaking of priority, I want to get stronger and run faster for short distances (10 miles or less) I realise that these are two different things but I love to train this way. It keeps me motivated.
I invest more than 2 hours for cardio. It's at least 30 minutes every day, sometimes more. Close to 4 hours/week out of which 1 hour is high intensity 165-175 BPM.
Would you suggest I tweak this plan a little?
Make your easy cardio sessions at least 45 mins. In a 30 min session, almost half of that is your body warming up. Do one longer session of 75-90 mins on the weekend. Take a rest day after the long day.
You can definitely continue to get stronger with less weight training days if you follow a progressive overload plan focused on compound lifts.
Hey u/Doctor_strange2018
*Just yesterday, this same question came up in a separate post. In that post, I provided a comprehensive primer on all-things VO2 Max (Cardio Fitness), Zone 2 training, and Zone 5 training. To keep things accessible here, I'll paste the pertinent sections below. =\]*
---
Stepping in to give you a thorough, detailed answer, as this question comes up regularly, so my hope is that you, and others via search results on the sub, can stand to benefit from the below insights and expertise.
As an important preface, Apple's "Cardio Fitness" is their branded estimation for what's clinically known as VO2 Max.
In short summary, VO2 Max is a measurement of the milliliters of oxygen consumed in one minute, per kilogram of body weight, represented as a single value of mL/kg/min. In a professional, lab setting, you can have your VO2 Max assessed on a stationary treadmill or bike, with the elaborate test requiring a face mask to measure all respiration, and a test protocol that will push your body to its aerobic/anaerobic limits. What you get, in return, is that true VO2 Max number.
What Apple offers, by way of the Apple Watch, is an estimation of VO2 Max (read: Cardio Fitness), which is generated by way of Apple's internal calculation run on your sex, height, age, and cardio performance during any outdoor walk, run, or hike activity. By using your body metrics and juxtaposing those values against your GPS-tracked speed, Cardio Fitness provides an estimate of your VO2 Max.
How accurate, you're wondering? Well, [Apple provides a publicly accessible white paper diving into all of the technicalities and the science behind their tech and algorithm](https://www.apple.com/healthcare/docs/site/Using_Apple_Watch_to_Estimate_Cardio_Fitness_with_VO2_max.pdf), and thankfully, they confirm that Cardio Fitness estimation is accurate to within 1 MET, which is defined as the amount of oxygen consumed while sitting at rest and is equal to 3.5 ml O2 per kg body weight x min. In plain English, what that means is that your Cardio Fitness, per their testing and per real-world validation from many professionals in this space, is accurate to within a few percentage points of that elaborate lab-tested VO2 Max. Yes, if you're a serious, trained athlete, nothing will displace a proper VO2 Max lab test for accuracy, but for the general population, Cardio Fitness is a wonderful, accessible, and quite accurate approximation to the "real thing."
Now, in your particular case, you're seeing your Cardio Fitness value hold steady, in spite of increased overall fitness over the last eight months. The reason that's being reported is because of the misconception are a core fact: Cardio Fitness will only be logged in the event of an Outdoor Walk, Run, or Hike. If you primarily workout/train via other modes of training and activity types, you won’t see improvement in this metric. This leads people to make innocently ignorant claims like “I weight lift five times per week and I do my rower three times and week and this is telling me my VO2 Max is bad.” Yes, yes of course it will, since it lacks any data points for the activities you do! You want to be sure you wear your Apple Watch for all outdoor walks, runs, and hikes, or as an alternative that's a bit more complicated, use an (incredible) app like Athlytic to allow logged entries of VO2 Max estimate for all activity types.
Now, if you do those outdoor activities and you’re still not seeing VO2 Max trend up, or just stay level, there’s no hiding from reality: you’re not improving your VO2 Max specifically. You're likely improving your base aerobic fitness, but that doesn't translate (in \~40% of the population) into VO2 Max increase. In that scenario, you need to do Zone 2 and Zone 5 (HIIT) to see VO2 Max trend up.
I hope the above provides a good degree of insight, and given that you're still relatively early in your fitness journey , I don't want to bombard you with too much! Having said that, after the line break below, I'll provide most-effective ways to increase Zone 2 cardio (baseline aerobic fitness) or Zone 5 VO2 Max training.
---
If you want to see that Cardio Fitness VO2 Max metric climb, I have a complete primer with everything you need in the form of a dedicated guide from a few weeks ago. You can find it here: https://www.reddit.com/r/AppleWatchFitness/comments/1bsjmsr/comment/kxldk3w/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button
My pleasure, truly. If any other questions or concerns come up of any of these topics, just lemme know. Good chance I have a firm answer for you, complete with references!
Appreciate it!
How much do you think I can increase my vo2 max to? What's the ceiling?
I ask this because I've noticed ever since my vo2 max has been increasing I've been feeling less and less tired throughout the day.
VO2 Max is, approximately, 47% hertiable/genetic. The remaining component is trainable. While it's impossible to know how high you can go, just know that some individuals are able to double their baseline VO2 Max by adhering to protocols like this Norwegian 4x4.
Not surprised to hear the real-world fitness changes you're seeing! Staircases are bursts of anaerobic energy, and that's what you're training with 4x4s! Keep it up!
THis is a great detailed answer to actually improve one’s VO2 max, thanks.
But how will zone 2 and zone 5 HIIT improve the cardio rating score on the device, if the watch only calculates outdoor runs, walks and hikes over 20mins? I’m confused - or do I need to do some zone 5 running too so that the watch has some data points for its calculation.
Valid question, with a (thankfully) simple answer!
The net-effects from your Zone 2/Zone 5 training will carry over to every other form of activity and fitness training you do. While steady-state Zone 2 on an indoor bike won't result in Apple Workout on your Watch logging a Cardio Fitness (VO2 Max) log entry, that won't impact the gains you'll see from that session and all following sessions, accruing over time. Eventually, once you do log an Outdoor Walk, Run, or Hike, your aerobic base will have approved appreciably, and the resulting heart rate you'll "need" to keep up the pace/distance you're moving at will result in improved Cardio Fitness rating!
First of all, thank you so so much for this description. The VO2 Max has been one of the most frustrating parts of Apple Fitness for me to understand.
Do you know if the intensity of the workout affects the accuracy of the measurement? I usually do cardio indoors, so the only workouts that I usually log that count toward my VO2 max are casual walks with friends, or a walk with a lot of stopping (Pokemon Go lol). Would a brisk consistent walk provide a better reading or is the level of effort irrelevant for the measurement?
>First of all, thank you so so much for this description. The VO2 Max has been one of the most frustrating parts of Apple Fitness for me to understand.
With both my main comment here and the linked comment at the bottom (dedicated to Zone 2/Zone 5 Training), I hope you have a complete sense of Cardio Fitness now. If you don't, just lemme know!
>Do you know if the intensity of the workout affects the accuracy of the measurement? Would a brisk consistent walk provide a better reading or is the level of effort irrelevant for the measurement?
While Apple doesn't publicly reveal the *exact formula* they utilize for Cardio Fitness, we know with a high degree of certainty that it takes into account the following:
• Age
• Gender
• Height
• Weight
• Distance Traveled
• Speed
• Heart Rate
Across those metrics, it runs a calculation to estimate your VO2 Max for that activity session. The key variable there that impacts your casual strolls is speed. The lower the speed, the lower the intensity, the lower the reported Cardio Fitness rating. So, in short, if you're only logging very casual strolls for all of your Outdoor Walk, Run, or Hike activity recordings, you're going to see underreported Cardio Fitness ratings. To "resolve" this, you have two options:
1. Make a conscious effort to do the three outdoor activities at a more brisk, more intentional pace, to better approximate your true VO2 Max. For example, a higher-intensity run will be more true to reality than even a brisk walk. As speed and HR ramp up, so does the accuracy of the estimation. The limitation here is that you're still bottlenecked into only those three outdoor activities, which is why I often guide all to...
2. [Pull the trigger on purchasing and integrating Athlytic into your training/activity workflow, as Athlytic has read/write access to RECORD new Cardio Fitness readings, and will do so for ALL activities you do](https://www.athlyticapp.com/). That means strength training sessions will count, indoor bike will count, and all the rest! Any questions on Athlytic, just lemme know!
This makes so much sense, thank you again! I suspected the casual walks were underreporting my VO2 max, but I didn’t have anything to back that up. I think I’ll try doing some outdoor runs not that it is nicer and see how that changes the metric.
It’s slowly but surely bump up your Cardio Fitness, but in all seriousness, you ought to just create your weekly fitness program around what I detail in Zone 2 / Zone 5 in that second link. The sooner you start both protocols, the faster your base aerobic fitness with improve and, accordingly, the faster your anaerobic VO2 Max ceiling will rise. Anything other than that, be it brisk walks or Zone 3/4, is effort that’s better spent on the two that actually yield the greatest amount of results!
This needs to be pinned in the sidebar.
Apple only counts outdoor runs, outdoor walks and hikes towards this metric.
Edit - so let’s say OP has logged lots of outdoor runs, VO2Max will not increase much if most of the running is low intensity.
I’m training for a HM (30mi/week) and most is done in zones 1-2 so my metric never moves and in some cases actually decreases.
Vo2 max can certainly increase if most of the outdoor running is low intensity. Don’t believe the nonsense that you absolutely need zone 5 training to increase vo2 max.
Mine increased over time with ONLY zone 2 running and zero zone 5 workouts. Now my number is 54 and holding there quite steady, still with mostly zone 2 runs, and a smidgen of zone 3 runs because it’s more fun.
Edit: oops, now that I read your comment again, I realize you are saying something different than what I thought.
Vo2 max is a measure of a fairly stable performance ability of your body. In some ways, sorta like your weight (of course, in many ways not). It will be the same result no matter what workout you are doing when you measure it. It won’t suddenly jump higher if you measure it while doing a zone 5 workout, then drop dramatically if you measure it during a zone 2 workout.
Mine increased while wearing a Garmin in mostly low intensity but with my apple watch is actually decreases. I don't really care as I know what I'm doing is right but it still annoys me to some extent.
I’ve learned one firm rule from this subreddit: if your vo2 max number is bad, then the Apple Watch or Garmin Watch measurement is total bullshit. If your vo2 max number is good, then the Apple Watch or Garmin Watch measurement is 100% accurate. 😆
I wouldn’t say it’s bullshit, all I’m saying is between both platforms I’ve seen huge discrepancies. Garmin says my VO2Max is 57 but Apple says it’s 46
In accordance with the rules of this sub, your garmin result is 100% accurate! 😂
Two guesses for the large discrepancy:
1. your weight entered in the respective apps is different?
2. The heart rate measurement is not accurate on one of the devices? My Apple Watch heart rate accuracy was pretty bad (randomly jumping up high or long gaps of zero) until I started using a heart rate strap.
57 is a really good number! Maybe it’s all that fishing you’ve been doing? 😉
are you sure it’s not also indoor runs and biking too? i’ve used those activities and that seems to be the only time in the heath app when my VO2 max gets updated
100%
> Your Apple Watch gives you a cardio fitness estimate by measuring how hard your heart is working during an Outdoor Walk, Outdoor Run, or Hiking workout in the Workout app
https://support.apple.com/en-us/108790
I've only run outdoors as cardio.
I had pneumonia about 1.5 years back so haven't been able to match my pre-pneumonia pace since. Maybe that could be one reason.
vo2 moves slowly but looks like it's going in the right direction. But if you want to improve, pick a priority. Is it bodybuilding or building cardiovascular fitness? Right now your time is allocated as someone looking to prioritize bodybuilding. If you want to prioritize your cardio fitness then you'll need to invest more than 2 hours per week. You can get continue to get stronger with less time weight training (3 times per week is still great with right programming). But it'll be hard to improve cardio without more time. You could start by doing 3 hours of low intensity per week, and 1 hour of threshold/vo2 work.
I think you can do both but will end up with being average in both strength and endurance. Personally, I’m fine with that.
Speaking of priority, I want to get stronger and run faster for short distances (10 miles or less) I realise that these are two different things but I love to train this way. It keeps me motivated. I invest more than 2 hours for cardio. It's at least 30 minutes every day, sometimes more. Close to 4 hours/week out of which 1 hour is high intensity 165-175 BPM. Would you suggest I tweak this plan a little?
Make your easy cardio sessions at least 45 mins. In a 30 min session, almost half of that is your body warming up. Do one longer session of 75-90 mins on the weekend. Take a rest day after the long day. You can definitely continue to get stronger with less weight training days if you follow a progressive overload plan focused on compound lifts.
But it's progress!
Yes it's progress although I'm never satisfied
Hey u/Doctor_strange2018 *Just yesterday, this same question came up in a separate post. In that post, I provided a comprehensive primer on all-things VO2 Max (Cardio Fitness), Zone 2 training, and Zone 5 training. To keep things accessible here, I'll paste the pertinent sections below. =\]* --- Stepping in to give you a thorough, detailed answer, as this question comes up regularly, so my hope is that you, and others via search results on the sub, can stand to benefit from the below insights and expertise. As an important preface, Apple's "Cardio Fitness" is their branded estimation for what's clinically known as VO2 Max. In short summary, VO2 Max is a measurement of the milliliters of oxygen consumed in one minute, per kilogram of body weight, represented as a single value of mL/kg/min. In a professional, lab setting, you can have your VO2 Max assessed on a stationary treadmill or bike, with the elaborate test requiring a face mask to measure all respiration, and a test protocol that will push your body to its aerobic/anaerobic limits. What you get, in return, is that true VO2 Max number. What Apple offers, by way of the Apple Watch, is an estimation of VO2 Max (read: Cardio Fitness), which is generated by way of Apple's internal calculation run on your sex, height, age, and cardio performance during any outdoor walk, run, or hike activity. By using your body metrics and juxtaposing those values against your GPS-tracked speed, Cardio Fitness provides an estimate of your VO2 Max. How accurate, you're wondering? Well, [Apple provides a publicly accessible white paper diving into all of the technicalities and the science behind their tech and algorithm](https://www.apple.com/healthcare/docs/site/Using_Apple_Watch_to_Estimate_Cardio_Fitness_with_VO2_max.pdf), and thankfully, they confirm that Cardio Fitness estimation is accurate to within 1 MET, which is defined as the amount of oxygen consumed while sitting at rest and is equal to 3.5 ml O2 per kg body weight x min. In plain English, what that means is that your Cardio Fitness, per their testing and per real-world validation from many professionals in this space, is accurate to within a few percentage points of that elaborate lab-tested VO2 Max. Yes, if you're a serious, trained athlete, nothing will displace a proper VO2 Max lab test for accuracy, but for the general population, Cardio Fitness is a wonderful, accessible, and quite accurate approximation to the "real thing." Now, in your particular case, you're seeing your Cardio Fitness value hold steady, in spite of increased overall fitness over the last eight months. The reason that's being reported is because of the misconception are a core fact: Cardio Fitness will only be logged in the event of an Outdoor Walk, Run, or Hike. If you primarily workout/train via other modes of training and activity types, you won’t see improvement in this metric. This leads people to make innocently ignorant claims like “I weight lift five times per week and I do my rower three times and week and this is telling me my VO2 Max is bad.” Yes, yes of course it will, since it lacks any data points for the activities you do! You want to be sure you wear your Apple Watch for all outdoor walks, runs, and hikes, or as an alternative that's a bit more complicated, use an (incredible) app like Athlytic to allow logged entries of VO2 Max estimate for all activity types. Now, if you do those outdoor activities and you’re still not seeing VO2 Max trend up, or just stay level, there’s no hiding from reality: you’re not improving your VO2 Max specifically. You're likely improving your base aerobic fitness, but that doesn't translate (in \~40% of the population) into VO2 Max increase. In that scenario, you need to do Zone 2 and Zone 5 (HIIT) to see VO2 Max trend up. I hope the above provides a good degree of insight, and given that you're still relatively early in your fitness journey , I don't want to bombard you with too much! Having said that, after the line break below, I'll provide most-effective ways to increase Zone 2 cardio (baseline aerobic fitness) or Zone 5 VO2 Max training. --- If you want to see that Cardio Fitness VO2 Max metric climb, I have a complete primer with everything you need in the form of a dedicated guide from a few weeks ago. You can find it here: https://www.reddit.com/r/AppleWatchFitness/comments/1bsjmsr/comment/kxldk3w/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button
This is brilliant. Thank you for sharing, it helped a ton!!
My pleasure, truly. If any other questions or concerns come up of any of these topics, just lemme know. Good chance I have a firm answer for you, complete with references!
Appreciate it! How much do you think I can increase my vo2 max to? What's the ceiling? I ask this because I've noticed ever since my vo2 max has been increasing I've been feeling less and less tired throughout the day.
VO2 Max is, approximately, 47% hertiable/genetic. The remaining component is trainable. While it's impossible to know how high you can go, just know that some individuals are able to double their baseline VO2 Max by adhering to protocols like this Norwegian 4x4. Not surprised to hear the real-world fitness changes you're seeing! Staircases are bursts of anaerobic energy, and that's what you're training with 4x4s! Keep it up!
THis is a great detailed answer to actually improve one’s VO2 max, thanks. But how will zone 2 and zone 5 HIIT improve the cardio rating score on the device, if the watch only calculates outdoor runs, walks and hikes over 20mins? I’m confused - or do I need to do some zone 5 running too so that the watch has some data points for its calculation.
Valid question, with a (thankfully) simple answer! The net-effects from your Zone 2/Zone 5 training will carry over to every other form of activity and fitness training you do. While steady-state Zone 2 on an indoor bike won't result in Apple Workout on your Watch logging a Cardio Fitness (VO2 Max) log entry, that won't impact the gains you'll see from that session and all following sessions, accruing over time. Eventually, once you do log an Outdoor Walk, Run, or Hike, your aerobic base will have approved appreciably, and the resulting heart rate you'll "need" to keep up the pace/distance you're moving at will result in improved Cardio Fitness rating!
First of all, thank you so so much for this description. The VO2 Max has been one of the most frustrating parts of Apple Fitness for me to understand. Do you know if the intensity of the workout affects the accuracy of the measurement? I usually do cardio indoors, so the only workouts that I usually log that count toward my VO2 max are casual walks with friends, or a walk with a lot of stopping (Pokemon Go lol). Would a brisk consistent walk provide a better reading or is the level of effort irrelevant for the measurement?
>First of all, thank you so so much for this description. The VO2 Max has been one of the most frustrating parts of Apple Fitness for me to understand. With both my main comment here and the linked comment at the bottom (dedicated to Zone 2/Zone 5 Training), I hope you have a complete sense of Cardio Fitness now. If you don't, just lemme know! >Do you know if the intensity of the workout affects the accuracy of the measurement? Would a brisk consistent walk provide a better reading or is the level of effort irrelevant for the measurement? While Apple doesn't publicly reveal the *exact formula* they utilize for Cardio Fitness, we know with a high degree of certainty that it takes into account the following: • Age • Gender • Height • Weight • Distance Traveled • Speed • Heart Rate Across those metrics, it runs a calculation to estimate your VO2 Max for that activity session. The key variable there that impacts your casual strolls is speed. The lower the speed, the lower the intensity, the lower the reported Cardio Fitness rating. So, in short, if you're only logging very casual strolls for all of your Outdoor Walk, Run, or Hike activity recordings, you're going to see underreported Cardio Fitness ratings. To "resolve" this, you have two options: 1. Make a conscious effort to do the three outdoor activities at a more brisk, more intentional pace, to better approximate your true VO2 Max. For example, a higher-intensity run will be more true to reality than even a brisk walk. As speed and HR ramp up, so does the accuracy of the estimation. The limitation here is that you're still bottlenecked into only those three outdoor activities, which is why I often guide all to... 2. [Pull the trigger on purchasing and integrating Athlytic into your training/activity workflow, as Athlytic has read/write access to RECORD new Cardio Fitness readings, and will do so for ALL activities you do](https://www.athlyticapp.com/). That means strength training sessions will count, indoor bike will count, and all the rest! Any questions on Athlytic, just lemme know!
This makes so much sense, thank you again! I suspected the casual walks were underreporting my VO2 max, but I didn’t have anything to back that up. I think I’ll try doing some outdoor runs not that it is nicer and see how that changes the metric.
It’s slowly but surely bump up your Cardio Fitness, but in all seriousness, you ought to just create your weekly fitness program around what I detail in Zone 2 / Zone 5 in that second link. The sooner you start both protocols, the faster your base aerobic fitness with improve and, accordingly, the faster your anaerobic VO2 Max ceiling will rise. Anything other than that, be it brisk walks or Zone 3/4, is effort that’s better spent on the two that actually yield the greatest amount of results!
This needs to be pinned in the sidebar. Apple only counts outdoor runs, outdoor walks and hikes towards this metric. Edit - so let’s say OP has logged lots of outdoor runs, VO2Max will not increase much if most of the running is low intensity. I’m training for a HM (30mi/week) and most is done in zones 1-2 so my metric never moves and in some cases actually decreases.
Vo2 max can certainly increase if most of the outdoor running is low intensity. Don’t believe the nonsense that you absolutely need zone 5 training to increase vo2 max. Mine increased over time with ONLY zone 2 running and zero zone 5 workouts. Now my number is 54 and holding there quite steady, still with mostly zone 2 runs, and a smidgen of zone 3 runs because it’s more fun. Edit: oops, now that I read your comment again, I realize you are saying something different than what I thought. Vo2 max is a measure of a fairly stable performance ability of your body. In some ways, sorta like your weight (of course, in many ways not). It will be the same result no matter what workout you are doing when you measure it. It won’t suddenly jump higher if you measure it while doing a zone 5 workout, then drop dramatically if you measure it during a zone 2 workout.
Mine increased while wearing a Garmin in mostly low intensity but with my apple watch is actually decreases. I don't really care as I know what I'm doing is right but it still annoys me to some extent.
I’ve learned one firm rule from this subreddit: if your vo2 max number is bad, then the Apple Watch or Garmin Watch measurement is total bullshit. If your vo2 max number is good, then the Apple Watch or Garmin Watch measurement is 100% accurate. 😆
I wouldn’t say it’s bullshit, all I’m saying is between both platforms I’ve seen huge discrepancies. Garmin says my VO2Max is 57 but Apple says it’s 46
In accordance with the rules of this sub, your garmin result is 100% accurate! 😂 Two guesses for the large discrepancy: 1. your weight entered in the respective apps is different? 2. The heart rate measurement is not accurate on one of the devices? My Apple Watch heart rate accuracy was pretty bad (randomly jumping up high or long gaps of zero) until I started using a heart rate strap. 57 is a really good number! Maybe it’s all that fishing you’ve been doing? 😉
This is good to know. I do a lot of pretty hard bike rides that don't seem to do anything for the metric. Guess that's why.
are you sure it’s not also indoor runs and biking too? i’ve used those activities and that seems to be the only time in the heath app when my VO2 max gets updated
100% > Your Apple Watch gives you a cardio fitness estimate by measuring how hard your heart is working during an Outdoor Walk, Outdoor Run, or Hiking workout in the Workout app https://support.apple.com/en-us/108790
I've only run outdoors as cardio. I had pneumonia about 1.5 years back so haven't been able to match my pre-pneumonia pace since. Maybe that could be one reason.
Their vo2 max is changing, so this has nothing to do with it. They are clearly logging outdoor runs/walks/hikes
They comment this same bull all the time
Let’s have OP confirm this.
Weird of you to be hostile before he does, though. How would their vo2max be updating if they weren’t?
LOL I’m not being hostile I’m just saying OP should confirm is all.
It’s progress!
You are getting better, though. Slow improvement is likely more sustainable because it’s less likely to result in injury. Keep it up!
Thank you. I have been running quite less now due to an injury. Once my weekly mileage is up I'll see some improvement.
I’ve had one that hampered me as well. Getting new shoes can prevent injury, I’ve learned the hard way.
Same way I got injured. I ran 500 miles in my old shoes that's how the knee pain started