The study behind Japanese walking, explained in plain English
Every article about Japanese walking cites "a 2007 Japanese study". Very few explain what it actually involved or found. Since the whole method rests on it, here is the study in plain language, including its limits.
Who ran it and who took part
The trial was run by researchers at Shinshu University Graduate School of Medicine in Matsumoto, Japan, led by Ken-ichi Nemoto and Professor Hiroshi Nose, and published in Mayo Clinic Proceedings in July 2007. It followed 246 middle-aged and older adults, average age 63, for five months. These were ordinary people, not athletes, which is worth remembering when you wonder whether the method is "enough" exercise.
What the three groups did
Participants were split into three groups:
- No structured exercise. The control group carried on as normal.
- Continuous moderate walking. A steady, comfortable pace at around 50 per cent of their capacity, aiming for 8,000+ steps a day on four or more days a week.
- Interval walking. Repeated sets of 3 minutes fast (at 70 per cent or more of their peak aerobic capacity) followed by 3 minutes slow (around 40 per cent), on four or more days a week. Five sets, roughly 30 minutes, is the version that became "Japanese walking".
Notably, the interval group actually walked less total time than the steady group. Intensity, not volume, was the variable being tested.
What happened after five months
The steady-walking group improved barely at all. Their results were not meaningfully different from the group that did no structured exercise. The interval group, on average:
- increased peak aerobic capacity (VO2peak, a standard fitness measure) by about 10 per cent
- increased thigh strength by 13 per cent (knee extension) and 17 per cent (knee flexion)
- reduced blood pressure by about 9 mmHg systolic and 5 mmHg diastolic
Those are unusual numbers for walking. Strength gains of that size are what you would expect from resistance training, and a 9-point systolic drop is in the territory of some blood pressure medications. Which is exactly why the study keeps being cited two decades later.
The follow-up research
The 2007 trial was the start, not the whole story:
- The 2019 analysis (Masuki, Morikawa and Nose, also Mayo Clinic Proceedings) tracked 679 adults, average age 65, through five months of interval walking. Aerobic capacity rose 14 per cent on average, and a composite score of lifestyle-disease markers (blood pressure, blood glucose, lipids) improved 17 per cent. Its most useful finding for anyone doing the method: the amount of fast walking per week was the key driver of results, with roughly 60 minutes of brisk time per week as the effective dose. This is why how often you walk is best thought of in brisk minutes, not sessions.
- Danish research in people with type 2 diabetes (Karstoft and colleagues, Diabetes Care, 2013) found interval walking improved blood sugar control where steady walking of matched energy expenditure did not.
- Later work has looked at older adults' mood, sleep and long-term adherence, generally finding the method is sustainable precisely because it is only walking.
What the research does not show
Honesty matters more than hype here, so three corrections to things you may have read:
- "10 times better than 10,000 steps" is not a study finding. No trial compared those two things in those terms. What the research shows is that intensity beats steady volume for fitness, strength and blood pressure in this population. That is impressive enough without inventing multipliers.
- It is not a weight-loss study. The trials measured fitness, strength and cardiometabolic markers, not primarily body weight. If fat loss is your goal, the method helps but food still does most of the work.
- The participants were mostly middle-aged and older Japanese adults. The results very likely generalise, and follow-ups support that, but a 25-year-old gym-goer should expect smaller relative gains, because their baseline is higher.
The one practical takeaway
If you take a single thing from the research, take this: the fast phases have to be genuinely fast for you, around a 6 or 7 out of 10 effort. The steady walkers in the trial put in more time and got almost nothing measurable. The difference was never the walking. It was the briskness. If you want to see what five months might look like for you, we have laid out a realistic results timeline.
About the app
Japanese Walking: Step Counter is a free iPhone and Apple Watch app made by Red Kite 9, a one-person studio in the UK. It guides the exact protocol from this research: the full guided 3x3 walk is free, including the complete Apple Watch app with real-time heart rate, haptic phase cues and voice guidance.