Fitness
Exactly how to do the viral ‘7-minute workout’ — it works, but there’s a catch – NewsBreak
With work, family, and life piling up, hitting the gym often feels impossible. Enter the 7-minute workout, a high-intensity exercise routine that promises results in no time.
The viral regimen includes 12 basic moves you can do at home with just your bodyweight, a wall, and a chair. Sounds like the perfect solution for the time-strapped, right?
Not so fast. To reap the full benefits, the workout’s creator says you’ll need to repeat the circuit two or three times, turning your “7-minute” workout into 14 or 21 minutes. It’s not as effortless as it sounds, but still a lot quicker than your average gym session.
What is the 7-minute workout?
Developed in 2013 by exercise physiologist Chris Jordan, the 7-minute workout popularized high-intensity interval training. Known for being quick, effective, and accessible for a variety of fitness levels, the routine has remained a viral favorite for more than a decade.
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The workout consists of 12 bodyweight exercises:
- Jumping jacks
- Wall sits
- Push-ups
- Abdominal crunches
- Step-ups on a chair
- Squats
- Tricep dips on a chair
- Plank
- High knees (or running in place)
- Lunges
- Push-ups with rotation
- Side planks
Each move should challenge you, but not leave you gasping for air. Aim for “about an eight on a scale of effort from one to 10,” Jordan told The Washington Post .
But keep in mind, that’s based on “your perception of an eight,” he said, stressing that everyone’s 7-minute workout should be customized to fit their own fitness level. You can also modify each move to suit your ability.
The order of exercises matters. Do them in the circuit shown above to avoid overworking any muscle group. For example, while someone is performing a push-up, the lower body gets a break and recovers, ensuring it has enough energy for squats later in the workout.
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The structure also alternates between exercises that pump up your heart rate and those that let it calm down.
Does the 7-Minute Workout Work?
A study featuring the 7-minute workout was first published in the American College of Sports Medicine’s Health and Fitness Journal in 2013.
Jordan and his colleagues reviewed existing research and found that just a few minutes of high-intensity circuit training can help decrease body fat, improve insulin sensitivity, boost muscular fitness, and increase VO₂ max — a key measure of cardiovascular health.
Follow-up studies have shown more promising results. A 2016 study compared the effects of 7-minute, 14-minute, and no circuit training over 8 weeks. Both exercise groups showed notable improvements in muscle endurance and strength.
Another study evaluated the 7-minute workout over six weeks, with some participants doing it every day while others did nothing at all. The results? The exercise group lost some weight, decreased waist circumference, and reduced fat mass — without changing their eating habits.
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However, not everyone is sold on it. Critics have questioned whether the workout truly delivers on weight loss, and some have raised doubts about the initial 2013 study’s methodology.
Adam Bornstein, a fitness and nutrition author, noted in his blog that “the studies used to ‘prove’ the concepts don’t mirror the workout that is being lauded as the seven-minute fix for your body,” according to NBC News . For instance, one of the studies involved additional weights, and participants took three times as long to complete the exercises.
Even with those criticisms, “when it comes to exercise, anything is better than doing nothing, even if it’s just seven minutes,” Katie Lawton, exercise physiologist, told the Cleveland Clinic . “It’s not going to replace your other fitness routines, but it can be a good filler workout, like between gym days or when you’re traveling.”
That advice could prove helpful, especially since a survey of 2,000 American adults found 79% feel happier when they stick to a regular workout routine — but 48% are too busy to exercise at all.
Lawson said the consistency of the 7-minute workout also makes it ideal for beginners in need of a set routine. However, she warned against newbies pushing themselves too hard, too fast.
“If you’re a regular exerciser, this workout is OK to do every day. But if you’re just starting out, give yourself a rest in between, with some days of walking or another type of light exercise instead,” she said.
For those considering the high-intensity workout, Jordan and his team cautioned in their study that some exercises may not be suitable for individuals who are overweight or obese, have previous injuries, are elderly, or suffer from conditions like hypertension or heart disease.
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While exercise is known to improve memory, scientists have mostly studied this effect by using behavioral tests or brain imaging methods like MRIs, says Michelle Voss, PhD, one of the study’s authors, a professor, and the director of the Health, Brain, and Cognitive Lab at the University of Iowa in Iowa City.
But she says these approaches can’t precisely identify where “ripples” originate, particularly in the deep brain structures like the hippocampus, a part of the brain strongly connected to memory and learning, she says.
The current study, published in Brain Communications, recorded electrical activity directly, using surgically implanted (intracranial) electrodes. “This allowed us to observe how exercise changes the brain’s memory circuits in real time,” Dr. Voss says.
20-Minute Bursts of Exercise Increase Brain Ripples
The participants performed a 5-minute warm-up and then rode a stationary bike for 20 minutes at a pace they could maintain. Researchers recorded their brain activity before and after the biking session.
The electrodes showed an increased rate of so-called sharp-wave ripples from the hippocampus and connections with cortical regions of the brain, which are involved in learning and memory.
“Sharp-wave ripples have long been known from animal studies to play a central role in memory,” Voss says, adding that recent studies using intracranial recordings in humans also support the importance of ripples for human memory.
“Our findings are the first to show that exercise can modulate these ripple signals in the human brain,” she says.
Researchers also observed that larger increases in heart rate during exercise were associated with larger changes in ripple activity in cortical networks, Voss adds.
What’s Already Known About Exercise, Memory, and Learning
Exercise helps build connections between neurons, which deepens and strengthens brain networks, Franssen says.
Physical activity also improves metabolism, which improves insulin sensitivity, helping blood sugar regulation and giving the brain a “more stable and reliable supply of fuel,” Dr. Perlmutter says.
“This is critically important because the brain is an energy-intensive organ, consuming roughly 20 percent of the body’s energy despite representing only a small fraction of body weight,” he adds.
The Research Has Limitations
Voss says researchers were careful to “exclude signals that contained epileptic activity. However, of course, we can’t statistically control for the accumulated effects of having epilepsy on the brain.”
The exercise-brain ripple patterns observed in the current study also closely match those observed in healthy adults using noninvasive brain imaging, such as MRI, she added.
“That convergence across very different methods is one of the strongest indicators that the effects are not specific to epilepsy, but reflect a more general human brain response to exercise,” Voss said.
Researchers also didn’t directly test memory performance, Voss notes. “While hippocampal ripples are strongly linked to memory processing in decades of neuroscience research, the next step will be to measure how exercise-related changes in ripples relate to memory performance in the same individuals.”
Future studies should also compare exercise with other everyday activities, such as sitting quietly or light movement, to determine how specific these effects are to aerobic exercise at the intensity that was studied, she says.
Satisfy Your Brain’s Exercise Craving
It’s never too early or too late to start exercising for brain health, Franssen says.
People of any age, from grade-school children to people in their nineties, can benefit from increased physical activity, Perlmutter says. “My recommendation is to consider taking advantage of the connection between physical activity and brain health across the entire range of human aging.”
Any type of exercise is great, Franssen says, but especially “repetitive behaviors,” like swimming, jogging, and walking.
“Sometimes we let the hugeness of putting in a huge fitness routine get in our way,” she says. “Having a little exercise snack every so often is also very important to improving cognition.”
Increasing our level of physical fitness leads to a bigger release of brain-boosting proteins following one session of exercise, a new study led by a UCL researcher has found.
The study, published in Brain Research, took a group of inactive unfit participants through a 12-week training programme of cycling three times per week and made them fitter. Researchers found as their fitness increased, so did the amount of brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) released following exercise, resulting in improved brain function.
Just 15 minutes of moderate to vigorous aerobic exercise releases BDNF, a brain protein which is known to support the formation of new neurons and new synapses (connections between brain cells), and maintains the health of existing neurons. This is the first study to show that for unfit people, just 12 weeks of consistent training can boost the brain’s response to a single 15-minute workout.
The study, led by Dr Flaminia Ronca (UCL Surgery & Interventional Science, and the Institute of Sport, Exercise and Health), involved 30 participants – 23 male and seven female – taking part in the 12-week programme. To assess fitness levels throughout the programme, participants completed VO2max tests every six weeks, which measures the maximum rate of oxygen your body can consume and use during intense exercise.
BDNF levels were measured pre- and post-VO2max testing, alongside a series of cognitive and memory tests, while also measuring changes in brain activity in the prefrontal cortex – where executive functions such as decision-making, emotion regulation, attention and impulsivity are controlled.
By the final week of the trial, results showed that baseline levels of BDNF did not change, but participants did show a larger spike of BDNF following intense exercise, compared to how their brains responded to intense exercise before the 12-week programme. This was linked to improvements in VO2max (aerobic fitness).
Higher overall BDNF levels and stronger exercise-induced increases were also associated with changes in activity across key areas of the prefrontal cortex during attention and inhibition tasks, though not during memory tasks.
Overall, the results showed that increasing physical fitness can enhance the brain’s ability to produce BDNF in response to acute bouts of exercise, which can have a strong positive influence on neural activity.
Lead author Dr Flaminia Ronca said: “We’ve known for a while that exercise is good for our brain, but the mechanisms through which this occurs are still being disentangled. The most exciting finding from our study is that if we become fitter, our brains benefit even more from a single session of exercise, and this can change in only six weeks.”
Notes to editors:
For more information or to speak to the researchers involved, please contact: Tom Cramp, UCL Media Relations , T: +447586 711698, E: [email protected]
The research paper: ‘BDNF relates to prefrontal cortex activity in the context of physical exercise’, Flaminia Ronca, Cian Xu, Ellen Kong, Dennis Chan, Antonia Hamilton, Giampietro Schiavo, Ilias Tachtsidis, Paola Pinti, Benjamin Tari, Tom Gurney, Paul W. Burgess, is published in Brain Research, March 2026,
About UCL (University College London)
UCL is a diverse global community of world-class academics, students, industry links, external partners, and alumni. Our powerful collective of individuals and institutions work together to explore new possibilities.
Since 1826, we have championed independent thought by attracting and nurturing the world’s best minds. Our community of more than 50,000 students from 150 countries and over 16,000 staff pursues academic excellence, breaks boundaries and makes a positive impact on real world problems.
We are consistently ranked among the top 10 universities in the world and are one of only a handful of institutions rated as having the strongest academic reputation and the broadest research impact.
We have a progressive and integrated approach to our teaching and research – championing innovation, creativity and cross-disciplinary working. We teach our students how to think, not what to think, and see them as partners, collaborators and contributors.
For 200 years, we are proud to have opened higher education to students from a wide range of backgrounds and to change the way we create and share knowledge.
We were the first in England to welcome women to university education and that courageous attitude and disruptive spirit is still alive today. We are UCL.
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Journal
Brain Research
DOI
10.1016/j.brainres.2026.150253
Method of Research
Experimental study
Subject of Research
People
Article Title
BDNF relates to prefrontal cortex activity in the context of physical exercise
Article Publication Date
4-Mar-2026
Media Contact
Tom Cramp
University College London
[email protected]
Journal
Brain Research
DOI
10.1016/j.brainres.2026.150253
Journal
Brain Research
DOI
10.1016/j.brainres.2026.150253
Method of Research
Experimental study
Subject of Research
People
Article Title
BDNF relates to prefrontal cortex activity in the context of physical exercise
Article Publication Date
4-Mar-2026
Tags
/Health and medicine/Human health/Physical exercise
bu içeriği en az 2000 kelime olacak şekilde ve alt başlıklar ve madde içermiyecek şekilde ünlü bir science magazine için İngilizce olarak yeniden yaz. Teknik açıklamalar içersin ve viral olacak şekilde İngilizce yaz. Haber dışında başka bir şey içermesin. Haber içerisinde en az 12 paragraf ve her bir paragrafta da en az 50 kelime olsun. Cevapta sadece haber olsun. Ayrıca haberi yazdıktan sonra içerikten yararlanarak aşağıdaki başlıkların bilgisi var ise haberin altında doldur. Eğer yoksa bilgisi ilgili kısmı yazma.:
Subject of Research:
Article Title:
News Publication Date:
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References:
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Keywords
Tags: 12-week cycling training program benefitsbrain plasticity and physical fitnessbrain-derived neurotrophic factor after exerciseeffects of aerobic exercise on BDNFexercise and neuron healthexercise-induced neurogenesisfitness level impact on brain proteinsfitness training for cognitive improvementimproving brain function through fitnessmoderate to vigorous aerobic exercise effectsphysical fitness and brain healthVO2max and brain function correlation
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