Gait speed
Gait speed is simply how fast you walk at your usual pace, and it is a well-established predictor of survival in older adults, resting on large pooled studies. Pooling nine cohorts of 34,485 people over 65, each extra 0.1 metres per second went with about 12% lower mortality, and walking at about 1 metre per second or faster marked longer survival than age and sex alone predicted. It is a warning light, not a lever: nobody has shown that training yourself to walk faster extends life.
If you are over 65, your usual walking speed is a quick read on your physical reserve. Treat 0.8 metres per second or slower, the European sarcopenia cut-off for low physical performance, as a prompt to train strength and balance, not as a verdict.
What it measures
Gait speed is your normal walking pace, timed over a short distance and expressed in metres per second. Like the other functional tests, it captures the reserve of muscle, nerve, balance and body composition that decides how well you handle physical challenge. It has been called the "sixth vital sign".[1]
The pooled evidence
The main study pooled individual records from nine cohorts collected between 1986 and 2000: 34,485 adults aged 65 and over living in the community, averaging 73.5 years, about 60% of them women, followed for 6 to 21 years. Their average walking speed was about 0.9 metres per second, and 17,528 of them died during follow-up.[2]
Faster walking went with longer survival in every one of the nine cohorts. Each extra 0.1 metres per second was linked to about 12% lower mortality (hazard ratio 0.88), and survival kept improving across the whole range of speeds, with a measurable gain at each 0.1-metre step.
The spread is wide. At age 75, predicted 10-year survival ran from 19% for the slowest men to 87% for the fastest, and from 35% to 91% in women. A prediction built on age, sex and walking speed alone was as accurate as one built on age, sex, chronic diseases, smoking, blood pressure, body mass index and hospital stays.
Reading the numbers
- About 1.0 metre per second or faster: survival consistently longer than age and sex alone would predict.
- About 0.8 metres per second: roughly median life expectancy for your age and sex; a typical walker, not a danger line in the pooled study.[3]
- 0.8 metres per second or slower is also the European sarcopenia working group's cut-off for low physical performance, and its indicator of severe sarcopenia (age-related muscle loss), which is why the figure turns up as a clinical threshold.[4]
- Below about 0.6 metres per second: other researchers, cited in the pooled study, link this to a higher chance of poor health and function.
What it can't tell you
The data are observational: faster walkers live longer, but nobody has shown that training to walk faster is what extends life. The 12%-per-0.1-metre figure comes from adults over 65, mostly white, in cohorts collected decades ago; broader studies find a smaller slope. The pooled study measured survival only; its authors left disability for further work.
Like the other functional tests, gait speed sorts large groups far better than it predicts what happens to one person.
What to do
- Know roughly how fast you walk at your usual pace, especially after 65, and recheck it yearly alongside the one-leg stance and sitting-rising tests.
- Treat 0.8 metres per second or slower as a prompt, not a diagnosis: that is the European sarcopenia cut-off for low physical performance. Train strength, power and balance, and ask about a sarcopenia assessment.
- For training, see Training mobility and balance and Resistance training. For how walking speed fits with the other tests, see Mobility and balance.