Cardio & VO2 Max
Good VO2 Max by Age
In Norway's HUNT3 study, average VO2 max fell about 3.5 mL/kg/min per decade: men 54 in their 20s to 35 past 70, women 43 to 28. US lab norms run lower.
A VO2 max reading tends to show up as a bare number, say 38, with no hint of whether 38 is something to mention at dinner. VO2 max, the most oxygen your body can use during all-out exercise, gets this much attention because fitter people are less likely to die during long studies, and because it slides with age. At Humanic Blue, the fair question is what counts as good at your age.
It depends on your age, your sex and how the number was measured. In Norway’s HUNT3 Fitness Study, which measured healthy adults’ breathing on a treadmill, average values were lower in older age groups, from about 54 mL/kg/min for men in their 20s to about 35 past 70, and from about 43 to 28 for women. The unit means milliliters of oxygen used per kilogram of body weight each minute. The difference between age groups was roughly 3.5 mL/kg/min per decade; it does not describe a measured ten-year change in each person. An average describes the group, while a percentile describes where a result ranks within it. No official body sets a VO2 max target for living longer.
Key Takeaways
- In Norway’s HUNT3 study, average measured VO2 max was about 3.5 mL/kg/min lower with each older decade of adult life. This compares age groups, not each person’s decline.
- In the cited reference studies, men averaged higher values than women at every age, and treadmill values were higher than bike values.
- US lab norms from the FRIEND registry sit well below the Norwegian averages, so the same number can rank quite differently depending on the table.
- No official “optimal” VO2 max for longevity exists. In a large Cleveland Clinic study, people fitter than others their age had lower death rates; that does not prove that increasing fitness causes longer life.
What is the average VO2 max by decade?
A widely used European yardstick comes from the HUNT3 Fitness Study, published in PLOS ONE in 2013 by researchers at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), with Henrik Loe as first author and Ulrik Wisløff as senior author. About 3,800 healthy adults aged 20 to 90 ran to exhaustion on a treadmill while a mask analyzed their breath. The authors call it “the largest European reference material of objectively measured parameters of aerobic fitness” in healthy adults (Note 1).
Their averages, in mL/kg/min:
- 20s: men about 54, women about 43
- 30s: men about 49, women about 40
- 40s: men about 47, women about 38
- 50s: men about 43, women about 34
- 60s: men about 39, women about 31
- 70 and older: men about 35, women about 28
People spread widely around those averages. The reported standard deviations—a measure of how widely results varied within each group—were about 5 to 8 mL/kg/min. Those are not upper and lower limits on individual results. Maximum heart rate fell too, by about 6 beats a minute per decade. See the full table with spreads
NTNU’s Cardiac Exercise Research Group later built its free Fitness Calculator on data from the same HUNT Fitness Study.
Where two example readers would sit
Take a 52-year-old woman with a lab-measured VO2 max of 40. That’s about 6 mL/kg/min above the Norwegian average for women in their 50s, and about the average for women in their 30s. Matching a younger group’s average does not make her body that age.
Now a 45-year-old man, also at 40. Against the Norwegian averages, he’s about 7 mL/kg/min below men in their 40s. Same number, very different story, and the story changes again with a US table, as the next section shows.
How do US lab norms compare with Norway’s?
The US lab values run lower than the Norwegian HUNT3 averages, though neither study establishes why. In the United States, a widely used measured reference is the Fitness Registry and the Importance of Exercise National Database (FRIEND). Its 2022 update in Mayo Clinic Proceedings, with Leonard Kaminsky of Ball State University as first author, drew on about 22,000 tests from 34 US laboratories in apparently healthy adults aged 20 to 89 (Note 2). The tests were collected over five decades, from 1968 to 2021. The paper reports percentiles for every decade, separately for treadmill and cycle tests.
The broad patterns match Norway’s. The FRIEND authors reported that, for both treadmill and cycle cardiopulmonary exercise tests, the 50th percentile values fell with age, were higher in men in every age group, and were higher on the treadmill than on the bike.
The levels don’t match. The US paper reports medians—the middle result, with half above and half below—while the Norwegian paper reports means, calculated by adding results and dividing by the number of people. These are different summaries as well as different samples. On a treadmill, the US middle value for men in their 50s was about 29, against Norway’s average of about 43. For women in their 50s, it was about 23, against about 34. Neither paper sets out to explain the gap, and the samples differ: HUNT3 recruited healthy volunteers in one Norwegian county, while FRIEND pooled tests from US labs over 50 years.
That changes the two examples. The 52-year-old woman at 40 would sit above the 90th percentile: her result would exceed more than nine out of ten US women in their 50s in that dataset. The 45-year-old man at 40 would land between the 60th and 70th percentiles, above roughly six to seven out of ten US men in their 40s in that dataset. See the US percentile table
What does disagreement between reference populations leave unresolved about a fitness percentile?
What changes how you should read your number?
How it was measured. A lab test with breath analysis measures VO2 max directly. A field test or a watch estimates it. Small validation studies have found substantial individual errors, with results depending on the device and people tested, as covered in How to Test VO2 Max. Comparing a watch number with a table built on lab tests stacks that error on top.
Treadmill or bike. FRIEND’s middle values for cycle tests were lower than for treadmill tests in every age group. If your test was on a bike, compare it with bike norms.
Body weight. VO2 max is usually expressed per kilogram of body weight, so weight moves it. In HUNT3, people in their 30s used about as much oxygen in total as people in their 20s, and the authors attributed their lower per-kilogram values to higher body mass. Losing weight can raise the number even if your heart and lungs haven’t changed.
Who’s in the sample. HUNT3 participants were healthy volunteers, and many dropped out while waiting for a test slot. The authors noted that those who took part “could thus be healthier than those who quit or declined participation,” though a comparison with other healthy HUNT participants found no large differences. More on the sample
Which measurement details belong alongside an age-based VO2 max comparison?
Is there a VO2 max target for living longer?
No official body sets one. What exists is a steady relationship between fitness and survival.
A Cleveland Clinic team, with Kyle Mandsager as first author and Wael Jaber as senior author, followed about 122,000 adults referred for treadmill stress tests for a median of about eight years. Fitness was estimated from treadmill performance rather than measured by breath analysis, and graded against people of the same age and sex. Death rates fell as fitness rose, and the “elite” group, roughly the top 2.3%, had the lowest risk observed. The authors reported “no observed upper limit of benefit.”
That’s a link, in patients sent for testing, not proof that fitness causes longer life. The study, its limits and what it can’t tell you are covered in VO2 Max and Longevity. No study has shown that raising your VO2 max by a set amount adds a set number of years. How the study worked
What’s Interesting
The HUNT3 averages hold a quietly encouraging detail. A man at 47 mL/kg/min in his 60s would sit about 8 mL/kg/min above his decade’s average and right at the Norwegian average for men in their 40s. Age sets the average. It doesn’t set where you sit relative to it.
The other surprise is how much the choice of table matters. A woman in her 50s at 40 is comfortably above average in Norway and in the top tenth in the US data. Her lungs didn’t change between the two countries. The comparison group did.
What This Means in Practice
For living longer and better, the studies distinguish comparisons with an age and sex group from changes in one person’s past results. Neither comparison calculates years of life. These are averages drawn from thousands of people, and your starting point, health and history are your own.
- How was the number obtained? Direct breath measurement and watch estimates carry different uncertainties.
- Which reference group is being used? Age, sex, treadmill or bike, and the lab’s chosen table can change the comparison.
- What does a ranking establish? It locates a result within a reference group; it does not define an individual training target or lifespan.
- Are repeated results comparable? Different methods or conditions can change a reading independently of fitness.
A sports-medicine clinician or exercise physiologist can interpret a lab result and set training zones. If you have symptoms during exercise, see a primary care clinician or cardiologist before pushing for a higher number.
Bottom Line
These charts show how a VO2 max result compares with a reference group; they do not set one medically “good” score. In HUNT3, the average was lower in older age groups, from about 54 to 35 mL/kg/min in men and from 43 to 28 in women between the 20s and 70s, about 3.5 per decade. US FRIEND data show the same patterns at lower levels, so which table you use matters. There’s no official longevity target, and watch estimates add error, but in a large Cleveland Clinic study, higher age-adjusted fitness went with lower death rates at every level. A practical next step is to find out how your number was measured and which norms your lab compares it with.
A NOTE FROM LONGEVITY365
We read research, consult expert perspectives and work to make complicated health information easier to understand. What you’re reading here reflects how we’ve interpreted and organized that information. It is educational content—not personal medical advice, diagnosis or treatment guidance.
We’re not perfect, and neither is the available research. Evidence changes, new studies emerge and what’s appropriate for one person may not be appropriate for another.
Use this article as a starting point for your own research and conversations with qualified professionals. Always talk with your doctor or another trusted healthcare professional before making decisions that could affect your health, particularly if you take medications, are receiving treatment, have existing health conditions, are pregnant or have other circumstances that could affect what’s appropriate for you.
Reader Questions
A few questions to carry into the comments or your next conversation. Please leave out identifying or personal medical details.
- 01Which measurement or milestone would feel useful to track without letting it take over the whole point of moving?
- 02Which real-world barrier did the article address most usefully: time, confidence, access, recovery, or knowing where to start?
- 03What question would you bring to a clinician, physical therapist, trainer, or exercise professional after reading about Good VO2 Max by Age?
Extra Insights & Sources
For readers who want the details behind each claim above.
What We Know
- VO2 max declines with age, by about 3.5 mL/kg/min per decade in HUNT3 and about 4.0 per decade on treadmills in FRIEND. Supported.
- Men average higher VO2 max than women; treadmill tests yield higher values than bike tests. Established.
- Reference values differ substantially between the Norwegian and US datasets. Supported.
- Higher age-adjusted fitness is associated with lower mortality. Supported (observational).
What We Don’t Know
- Whether any specific VO2 max value marks a longevity threshold. Unknown.
- How much of the age decline is aging itself versus declining activity. The HUNT3 authors found that falling activity might explain the decline in women but not in men, said it wasn’t known whether that reflected aging or men over-reporting their activity, and called for activity to be measured objectively rather than self-reported. Uncertain.
- Why the US and Norwegian values differ so much. Neither paper tests it. Unknown.
- Whether raising VO2 max by a given amount adds a predictable amount of life. Unknown.
HUNT3 in detail
HUNT3 was the third wave of the Nord-Trøndelag Health Study. Between October 2006 and June 2008, every resident over 20 (94,194 people) was invited, and 54% took part. People with cancer, cardiovascular disease, obstructive lung disease or blood-pressure medication were excluded. Of 12,609 eligible residents in the three testing municipalities, 5,633 volunteered, 4,621 completed a test, and 3,816 tests were judged to have reached true VO2 max (the figure in the paper’s title). The methods report 1,929 men and 1,881 women; the age-group table below covers 3,679 people with complete data.
| Age | Men: average (± SD) | Women: average (± SD) |
|---|---|---|
| 20–29 | 54.4 ± 8.4 | 43.0 ± 7.7 |
| 30–39 | 49.1 ± 7.5 | 40.0 ± 6.8 |
| 40–49 | 47.2 ± 7.7 | 38.4 ± 6.9 |
| 50–59 | 42.6 ± 7.4 | 34.4 ± 5.7 |
| 60–69 | 39.2 ± 6.7 | 31.1 ± 5.1 |
| 70+ | 35.3 ± 6.5 | 28.3 ± 5.2 |
VO2 max in mL/kg/min, measured on a treadmill (Loe et al., Table 2). SD, the standard deviation, describes the spread: about two-thirds of people fall within one SD of the average if values are roughly normally distributed. A correction published in November 2013 fixed a PDF layout error in which the 50–59 values had been listed under 20–29; the values above follow the corrected table.
The authors reported “a subsequent reduction of approximately 3.5 mL·kg−1·min−1 and 6 beats·min−1 per decade,” meaning VO2 max and maximum heart rate both fell steadily with age. In the abstract, they concluded: “This is the largest European reference material of objectively measured parameters of aerobic fitness and exercise-physiology in healthy men and women aged 20–90 years.”
On body weight: absolute VO2 max (liters per minute) didn’t differ between the 20s and 30s, but per-kilogram values were 10% lower in men and 7% lower in women in their 30s, and the authors wrote that this lower relative value “was caused by a higher body mass in our study population.”
On the sample: many potential participants withdrew because of long waits at the test sites. The authors wrote that those who took part “could thus be healthier than those who quit or declined participation,” but a comparison with a healthy sample of the whole HUNT population found the fitness participants “did not considerably differ from other healthy HUNT participants.”
Worked examples, using the table: a 52-year-old woman at 40 is (40 − 34.4) ÷ 5.7 ≈ +0.98 SD, close to the 30s average of 40.0. A 45-year-old man at 40 is (40 − 47.2) ÷ 7.7 ≈ −0.94 SD. A man in his 60s at 47 is (47 − 39.2) ÷ 6.7 ≈ +1.16 SD, about the 40s average of 47.2.
FRIEND in detail
The FRIEND 2022 update analyzed 22,379 tests (16,278 treadmill and 6,101 cycle ergometer) conducted between January 1, 1968, and March 31, 2021, in apparently healthy adults aged 20 to 89, from 34 US laboratories. The average decline per decade over six decades was 13.5% (4.0 mL/kg/min) for treadmill tests and 16.4% (4.3 mL/kg/min) for cycle tests. The updated treadmill standards were 1.5 to 4.6 mL/kg/min lower than the previous 2015 standards, and the authors said the update represents the US population better than the original standards did. Average body mass index in the treadmill sample was 27.8 for men and 27.2 for women.
Treadmill VO2 peak percentiles, mL/kg/min (FRIEND Table 3). VO2 peak is the highest oxygen-use value reached in a test; it does not always demonstrate a true physiological maximum. The study used a respiratory exchange ratio of at least 1.0—the ratio of carbon dioxide produced to oxygen consumed—as its effort criterion.
| Age | Men 20th | Men 50th | Men 80th | Women 20th | Women 50th | Women 80th |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 20–29 | 35.2 | 46.5 | 54.5 | 27.2 | 36.6 | 44.8 |
| 30–39 | 29.8 | 39.7 | 50.0 | 21.9 | 28.3 | 37.0 |
| 40–49 | 26.7 | 35.3 | 45.2 | 19.7 | 25.7 | 33.0 |
| 50–59 | 22.2 | 29.2 | 38.3 | 18.5 | 22.9 | 28.4 |
| 60–69 | 18.5 | 24.6 | 32.0 | 15.4 | 19.6 | 24.3 |
| 70–79 | 15.9 | 20.6 | 25.9 | 14.0 | 17.2 | 20.8 |
| 80–89 | 14.8 | 17.6 | 21.4 | 12.6 | 15.4 | 18.4 |
The worked examples against this table: for women aged 50 to 59, the 90th percentile is 32.4, so 40 sits above it. For men aged 40 to 49, the 60th and 70th percentiles are 37.9 and 40.9, so 40 falls between them. Cycle-test 50th percentiles were lower than treadmill values in every age group for both sexes (for example, 24.5 versus 29.2 for men in their 50s).
The Cleveland Clinic mortality study
Mandsager and colleagues’ retrospective cohort, published in JAMA Network Open in 2018, included 122,007 consecutive adults referred for symptom-limited treadmill testing at the Cleveland Clinic between 1991 and 2014, with a median follow-up of 8.4 years (Note 3). Fitness was peak estimated METs (metabolic equivalents, a unit of workload relative to resting energy use), graded against age- and sex-matched percentiles; “elite” meant the 97.7th percentile or higher. Risk-adjusted all-cause mortality was lowest in elite performers (elite vs low, adjusted hazard ratio 0.20, meaning about one-fifth the death rate after accounting for measured factors). That is a relative comparison between groups, not an individual chance of death or proof that training prevents four out of five deaths. The authors concluded that fitness “is inversely associated with long-term mortality with no observed upper limit of benefit.” The full breakdown is in VO2 Max and Longevity.
Sources
- Loe H, et al. Aerobic capacity reference data in 3816 healthy men and women 20–90 years: the HUNT 3 Fitness Study, PLOS ONE, 2013: PMC3654926
- Kaminsky LA, et al. Updated reference standards for cardiorespiratory fitness (FRIEND), Mayo Clinic Proceedings, 2022: PubMed 34809986
- Mandsager K, et al. Cardiorespiratory fitness and long-term mortality, JAMA Network Open, 2018: PubMed 30646252
- Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Cardiac Exercise Research Group: Fitness Calculator
Notes
Note 1: Funded by the K.G. Jebsen Foundation, the Norwegian Council on Cardiovascular Disease, the Research Council of Norway, the Foundation for Cardiovascular Research at St. Olav’s Hospital, Norwegian State Railways, Roche Norway and Valnesfjord Rehabilitation Center. The authors declared Roche Norway as a commercial funder.
Note 2: Partly supported by TKC Global, through a grant to Leonard Kaminsky at Ball State University, and by a small grant from the Division of Preventive Cardiology at Mayo Clinic, Rochester. The authors reported no competing interests.
Note 3: The paper doesn’t list a funding source. The authors reported no conflicts of interest.
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