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The number of steps you walk each day could have a notable impact on your brain health, researchers have found.
Experts at the Baylor College of Medicine, Texas, found that those who walked a higher number of steps each day had improved cognition, causing the researchers to conclude that physical activity—like walking—could have a positive and supportive impact on brain health.
The study was published in the journal Scientific Reports on October 11.
Read More on Health
Walking has long been known to have wide ranging benefits for your body and mind, from strengthening the heart, joints, and bones to building stamina, weight loss and stress management. One previous study even found that just walking one mile a day could reduce risk of cognitive impairment by 50 percent, and it has been recognized as an important lifestyle factor that reduces dementia risk.
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What The Study Found
The researchers included more than 3,000 U.S. participants in the study, all of whom were from the All of Us Research Program, a National Institutes of Health (NIH) initiative. Their ages varied from 18 to 93, though the majority were over the age of 60.
They tracked their blood pressure and physical exercise over the course of 14 years—between 2009 and 2023—and only measured their cognition once, at the end of the 14-year period.
They identified three clusters of individuals—those who did a mean of around 5,000 steps a day (5,108), those with a mean of almost 9,000 steps a day (8,875) and those doing about 14,000 steps a day (14,161).
Their data revealed that participants who walked more steps a day and increased the number of steps they did a day by just 1,000 had better cognitive performance than those who were less physically active.
Specifically, each additional 1,000 steps a day, on average, was associated with modestly higher scores on measures regarding sustained attention (staying focused over time); attention and cognitive control (focusing on relevant information while ignoring distractions); and delay discounting (how people weigh a smaller reward now against a larger reward later).
"The functions that were linked to steps rely on frontal brain networks that are energy-demanding and rich in blood vessels, which may make them especially sensitive to physical activity and vascular health," lead author Dr. Olaoluwa Okusaga, a professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, told Newsweek.
Meanwhile, those who had higher blood pressure scored lower on a number of cognitive measures, such as on self-control and impulsivity. Although, they found that those with higher physical activity also had lower blood pressure.
The findings also indicate that it was "people's typical, long-term level of activity that was linked to cognition, not short-term changes in activity over the years," Okusaga said. "That points to the value of being consistently active over the long run."
However, this was an observational study, and cognition was measured only once, at the end of the 14-year period. Okusaga said therefore "we can say that people who walked more had better cognitive performance, but we cannot say the walking caused it. It is also possible that people with better cognitive function were more able to stay active."
"The findings provide important new evidence across the adult lifespan indicating that physical activity benefits cognitive and brain health in everyday life," Charles Hillman, a professor of psychology at Northeastern University, who was not involved in the study, told Newsweek.
"The clear take away message is that people should strive to walk at least 8,875 steps per day to promote cognitive health," he said.
How Could Step Count Affect Brain Health?
Okusaga said that there are "several plausible pathways" that physical activity could improve brain health, such as the fact that it "improves cardiovascular health, including blood pressure, and the brain depends heavily on healthy blood vessels."
"Activity also increases brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF), a protein that helps build and maintain connections between brain cells; it reduces chronic inflammation and it improves blood sugar control," he said.
"In our data, lower systolic blood pressure explained only about five percent of the link between steps and one of the cognitive measures, which suggests most of the benefit runs through pathways other than blood pressure," he said.
Hillman said that physical activity is known to have a "beneficial effect on cellular and molecular mechanisms, as well as structural and functional benefits."
Each of these benefits "underpin cognitive and mental health," he said, adding in the case of cognition, the "greatest benefits are observed for executive functions and specific aspects of memory."
He said "this is why the 2018 Physical Activity Guidelines for Americans core recommendation indicated that adults should engage in 150 to 300 minutes per week of moderate-to-vigorous physical activity."
He also said that "the best way to achieve our step goals is through incorporating physical activity throughout our day. For example, take the stairs instead of the elevator, park further away from the building, or take the dog for an extra walk."
Reference
Okusaga, O.O., Lin, YS. & Atkinson, E. (2026) Physical activity and blood pressure as predictors of cognitive function in the all of us research program. Scientific Reports. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-026-74379-6
Contact Newsweek editors on this story: Kara Dolman and Paul Donnelley.
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