What is a MET?
You’re probably aware that your body burns energy all the time, no matter what you’re doing.
One way to calculate your body’s energy expenditure is with metabolic equivalents, also known as METs. You might see METs listed on exercise equipment or mentioned by personal trainers to help you measure your physical activity. MET
One metabolic equivalent (MET) 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. The MET concept represents a simple, practical, and easily understood procedure for expressing the energy cost of physical activities as a multiple of the resting metabolic rate. The energy cost of an activity can be determined by dividing the relative oxygen cost of the activity (ml O2/kg/min) x by 3.5.
A MET is a ratio of your working metabolic rate relative to your resting metabolic rate. Metabolic rate is the rate of energy expended per unit of time. It’s one way to describe the intensity of an exercise or activity.
One MET is the energy you spend sitting at rest — your resting or basal metabolic rate. So, an activity with a MET value of 4 means you’re exerting four times the energy than you would if you were sitting still.
To put it in perspective, a brisk walk at 3 or 4 miles per hour has a value of 4 METs. Jumping rope, which is a more vigorous activity, has a MET value of 12.3.
SUMMARY
METs = metabolic equivalents.
One MET is defined as the energy you use when you’re resting or sitting still.
An activity that has a value of 4 METs means you’re exerting four times the energy than you would if you were sitting still.
To better understand METs, it’s helpful to know a little about how your body uses energy.
The cells in your muscles use oxygen to help create the energy needed to move your muscles. One MET is approximately 3.5 milliliters of oxygen consumed per kilogram (kg) of body weight per minute.
So, for example, if you weigh 160 pounds (72.5 kg), you consume about 254 milliliters of oxygen per minute while you’re at rest (72.5 kg x 3.5 mL).
Energy expenditure may differ from person to person based on several factors, including your age and fitness level. For example, a young athlete who exercises daily won’t need to expend the same amount of energy during a brisk walk as an older, sedentary person.
For most healthy adults, MET values can be helpful in planning an exercise regimen, or at least gauging how much you’re getting out of your workout routine.
Examples of METs for various activities
Researchers who have monitored oxygen consumption in the muscles of people performing various activities have been able to assign MET values to those activities. These values are based on a person weighing 70 kgTrusted Source, or 154 lbs.
This chart provides approximate MET values for a variety of light, moderate, and vigorous activities.
METs
MET stands for the metabolic equivalent of task. One MET is the amount of energy used while sitting quietly. Physical activities may be rated using METs to indicate their intensity. For example, reading may use about 1.3 METs while running may use 8-9 METs.
METs can also be translated into light, moderate, and vigorous intensities of exercise.
- Sedentary—Uses 1.5 or fewer METs. Examples are sitting, reclining, or lying down.
- Light intensity—Uses from 1.6-3.0 METs. Examples are walking at a leisurely pace or standing in line at the store.
- Moderate intensity—Uses from 3.0-6.0 METs. Examples are walking briskly vacuuming, or raking leaves.
- Vigorous intensity—Uses from 6.0+ METs. Examples are walking very quickly, running, taking an aerobics class, or shoveling snow
What’s a good goal to shoot for with METs?
The American heart association recommends at least 150 minutes of moderate-intensity aerobic exercise each week for optimal cardiovascular health. That’s equal to about 500 MET minutes per week, according to the Department of Health and Human ServicesTrusted Source.https://health.gov/sites/default/files/2019-09/Physical_Activity_Guidelines_2nd_edition.pdf
How you reach those goals — whether it’s through running, hiking, weight training, or any other activity — is less important than simply striving for those targets.
What’s the connection between METs and calories?
Measures of Exercise Intensity
Although just moving more and sitting less offers health benefits, how much energy you use while exercising can increase those health benefits further. This is referred to as energy intensity.
Borg Scale
The Borg Scale of Perceived Exertion measures your exercise intensity by rating how you feel. It is based on observations like higher heart rate, heavier and faster breathing, increased sweating, and muscles feeling tired. It does not use actual measurements of these occurrences but a personal self-check.
The scale uses numbers from 6 to 20. The lowest rating is “no feeling of exertion,” at number 6, and the highest rating is “very, very hard,” at number 20. Moderate activities register 11 to 14 (“fairly light” to “somewhat hard”) while vigorous activities usually rate 15 or higher (“hard” to “very, very hard”). Dr. Gunnar Borg, who created the scale, set it to run from 6 to 20 as a simple way to estimate heart rate—multiplying the Borg score by 10 gives an approximate heart rate for a particular level of activity. [1]The Borg Scale of Perceived Exertion
| How you might describe your exertion | Borg rating of your exertion | Examples (for most adults <65 years old) |
| None | 6 | Reading a book, watching television |
| Very, very light | 7 to 8 | Tying shoes |
| Very light | 9 to 10 | Chores like folding clothes that seem to take little effort |
| Fairly light | 11 to 12 | Walking through the grocery store or other activities that require some effort but not enough to speed up your breathing |
| Somewhat hard | 13 to 14 | Brisk walking or other activities that require moderate effort and speed your heart rate and breathing but don’t make you out of breath |
| Hard | 15 to 16 | Bicycling, swimming, or other activities that take vigorous effort and get the heart pounding and make breathing very fast |
| Very hard | 17 to 18 | The highest level of activity you can sustain |
| Very, very hard | 19 to 20 | A finishing kick in a race or other burst of activity that you can’t maintain for long |
Exercise workouts may vary in intensity throughout the session. You can use the Borg Scale to change the intensity, by speeding up or slowing down movements or applying more or less resistance (such as increasing the incline on a treadmill or turning the resistance control knob on a stationary bicycle).
Target Heart Rate
Calculating your heart rate and target heart rate can be used to measure exercise intensity. First determine your maximum heart rate: subtract your age from 220 (example: the maximum heart rate for a 40-year-old person would be 220 – 40 = 180 beats per minute). The target heart rate for moderate-intensity exercise is between 65-75% of your maximum heart rate (or 77-93% of maximum heart rate for vigorous exercise). So for the 40-year-old person with a maximum heart rate of 180, the target heart rate falls somewhere between 117-135 beats per minute for moderate exercise, or 139-167 for vigorous exercise.
Then measure your actual heart rate in either of these two ways:
- Midway through the exercise, stop to check your pulse. Place the tips of your index and middle fingers at the wrist and press lightly on the artery in line with the thumb. Count the heartbeats for 30 seconds and multiply by 2.
- Wear a heart rate monitor. Some pedometers have a built-in heart rate monitor that displays your current heartbeats per minute.
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