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All these studies show that while more activity brings more benefit, the greatest comes from doing a small amount of walking as often as you can rather than doing nothing.

In other words, it's not about marathons, expensive gyms or Lycra. Small strolls – the faster the better – to the shops, up and down the stairs, even a loop around the kitchen whi... See more

However, people who walked the most were 23 per cent less likely to develop chronic lower back pain than those who walked the least, according to a study published in JAMA Network Open last month.

The research monitored more than 11,000 adults (who all started out without back pain) for more than four years.

Crucially, the back-protecting benefit cam... See more

Walking can also help prevent musculoskeletal pain – something which might seem counterintuitive.

Brain scans revealed that brisk walkers had larger, healthier hippocampi (the part of the brain involved in memory) and less white matter damage, meaning their brains were ageing better.

As part of the UK Biobank project (a huge database of British participants' health information and samples), a study published earlier this year, where people were asked how fast they usually walked, found that those who walked at a steady to brisk pace (above 3mph) were about half as likely to develop dementia as those who walked more slowly.

The takeaway? While more activity brought more benefit, the biggest jump comes from doing something rather than nothing. It is true, however, that the faster you walk, the better, as numerous studies have shown – not just for your fitness, but for your brain.

The evidence that even a small amount of walking can make a big difference was proven beyond doubt in a landmark study in 2023, where researchers at the University of Cambridge reviewed nearly 200 of the largest and best studies, monitoring more than 30 million adults, to answer a simple question: how little exercise can you do to see a benefit?

The... See more

Sensors placed on their muscles showed why: even though the overall exercise time was the same, because the muscle fibres still contract for a while after stopping exercise, the muscles were spending longer periods of time literally sucking glucose out of the blood to feed them.

This was proven in a study by Zhejiang University in China, published last year in the Scandinavian Journal of Medicine & Science in Sports.

Overweight office workers were put through two regimens: one day they stayed seated except for a single 30-minute walk, mid-shift. On the other day, they went for a brisk three-minute stroll – ten in total ... See more