Billed as the ‘do-it-all’ workout that promises to build strength, endurance (and even confidence!) using just your bodyweight in less than 10 minutes, the 7-minute workout was developed and researched in 2013 by exercise physiologist Chris Jordan – the study featuring the workout was published in the American College of Sports Medicine’s Health and Fitness Journal. So, when you read the headline ‘backed by science’, there is some truth to it.

The workout itself is made up of 12 familiar bodyweight exercises, each performed in 30-second intervals, with just 5–10 seconds of rest between each exercise. The goal is to go hard on each movement, aiming for an 8/10 on the RPE (Rate of Perceived Exertion) scale, and pushing through to complete all movement intervals in under 7 minutes.

The movements include:

• Jumping jacks
• Wall sit
• Push-ups
• Abdominal crunches
• Step-ups on a chair
• Squats
• Triceps dips on a chair
• Plank
• High knees running in place
• Lunges
• Push-ups with rotation
• Side planks

I’m going to be really clear from the start: we think all movement is good movement. That is, all movement that doesn’t cause harm.

The universal conflation of movement with exercise, and exercise with training in the gym (or worse still, weight loss), might just be one of the most harmful things to ever happen to our health.

We should all be moving – moving against resistance and moving rigorously in ways that elevate our heart rate – and we should be doing it often. If you believe that your ability to get fit relies solely on having gym access or regularly practising rigid, hour-long exercise routines, you could be setting yourself up to fail.

Move, move often, and move in ways that are sustainable for your lifestyle, cool?

With that being said, the question the 7-minute workout presents (when you’re being promised that it will ‘get you fit’) is: fit for what? How fit? And for how long?

The research behind the protocol is based on the idea that participants in the study were able to get the same benefits of regular, longer exercise from frequent, shorter workouts, i.e., seven minutes. And to be honest, if you have no specific fitness, physique, or strength goals, this could well be true, especially if you’re starting from a fairly sedentary position.

Using the RPE/effort scale means you’ll be working at the same intensity, but hopefully increasing the amount of work you can do in the same time as your fitness improves. By definition, this means you’re getting fitter, so in that regard, yes, the 7-minute workout works.

If you’re starting from scratch, are short on time, or just need something small and accessible to get started, the 7-minute workout could well be your gateway drug into the wider world of exercise.

BUT (you knew it was coming), if you have ambitions of building a Spartan-like physique, running a marathon – or even a fast 5k – or deadlifting double your bodyweight, the 7-minute workout probably isn’t going to cut it. Especially if you already have some background in exercise.

This isn’t to say short workouts don’t work – we love them – it’s just to say that for more specific goals, a more deliberate approach is required. One that may involve training for longer, with more variety, more specificity, or with more resistance than your own bodyweight can provide.

With that in mind, here are some of our favourite short workouts, plans, and routines, whether you have 10, 15, 20, or 30 minutes to spare.

And remember, a short workout you actually do will always beat the longer one you skip because you didn’t have time.

With almost 18 years in the health and fitness space as a personal trainer, nutritionist, breath coach and writer, Andrew has spent nearly half of his life exploring how to help people improve their bodies and minds.    

As our fitness editor he prides himself on keeping Men’s Health at the forefront of reliable, relatable and credible fitness information, whether that’s through writing and testing thousands of workouts each year, taking deep dives into the science behind muscle building and fat loss or exploring the psychology of performance and recovery.   

Whilst constantly updating his knowledge base with seminars and courses, Andrew is a lover of the practical as much as the theory and regularly puts his training to the test tackling everything from Crossfit and strongman competitions, to ultra marathons, to multiple 24 hour workout stints and (extremely unofficial) world record attempts.   

 You can find Andrew on Instagram at @theandrew.tracey, or simply hold up a sign for ‘free pizza’ and wait for him to appear.