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72 Examples of Moderate Activity

John Spacey, March 17, 2022

Moderate activity is physical activity that is perceived as exertion in the range of light to somewhat hard. These can include sports, recreation, housework and work related activities. Regular moderate activities can be integrated into your lifestyle such as an individual who walks or cycles to work. A broad range of activities can be considered moderate but it often depends on how you perform the activity. For example, riding a bicycle at a moderate speed on a flat road versus vigorously cycling up hills. The following are illustrative examples of moderate activities.

Animal Care (e.g. farm work)	Badminton
Baseball	Bicycling Slowly / Moderately
Bodyboarding	Boxing a Punching Bag
Calisthenics (Light)	Canoeing (Leisurely)
Caring for Young Children (e.g. carrying a baby)	Carpentry
Catch Ball	Children's Play (active free play)
Cultural Performances (e.g. folk dance)	Curling
Dancing	Dodgeball
Easy Jogging	Elliptical Machine
Exercise Routine (light)	Fencing / LARP
Fishing (while canoeing or walking)	Four-Square
Frisbee	Gardening
Gymnastics (light)	Hiking (Light)
Home Maintenance (e.g. cleaning gutters)	Home Repair (e.g. sanding floors)
Hopscotch	Horseback Riding
Inline Skating (leisurely)	Kick Ball (e.g. passing soccer ball)
Lawn Care / Yardwork	Musical Performances
Physical Housework (e.g. mopping)	Physical Occupations (e.g. cleaning services)
Physical Video Games (e.g. dancing as part of a game)	Physical Work (e.g. carrying groceries)
Playing With Animals	Playing on Playground Equipment
Pushing a Stroller	Rollerskating (leisurely)
Rowing / Rowing Machine (light effort)	Sailing
Shooting Hoops (basketball)	Shovelling Light Snow
Skateboarding	Skating (leisurely)
Skiing / Snowboarding (moderately)	Softball
Stair Climbing (leisurely)	Surfing
Swimming Slowly	Table Tennis (competitive)
Tag	Tennis (light)
Touch Football	Training Animals
Trampolining (moderately)	Treading Water
Treadmill	Using Crutches
Using Manual Wheelchair	Volleyball
Walking Briskly	Walking a Dog (briskly)
Washing Windows	Water Aerobics
Waterskiing	Weight Training (non-intensive)
Wood Chopping (leisurely pace)	Woodworking

Notes

Moderate activity can be objectively measured using your heart rate during the activity. An activity is considered moderate if it raises your heart rate to between 64% and 76% of your maximum heart rate.¹ This can be roughly estimated by subtracting your age from 220 bpm.² For example, the maximum heart rate of a 60 year old would be 220-60 = 160 bpm with moderate activity falling between 102 bpm and 122 bpm.

Moderate activity depends on your physical fitness. For example, it wouldn't be the same for a marathon runner and someone who has never exercised at all.

Many of the activities above could be vigorous, depending how you do them.

Moderate activity typically burns 3-6 times as much energy as sitting still.³

In order to be considered moderate activity, effort must be sustained for a period of time. For example, walking to the kitchen 100 times over 12 hours wouldn't be moderate activity even if you walked as many steps as in a brisk 20 minute walk.

Many team sports such as a soccer game are considered vigorous activity. Practices such as passing a soccer ball or shooting hoops may be moderate.