Are you new to heart rate training?
If so, you should check out our complete guide to heart rate training (opens in new tab) and then come back to this calculator 🙂
- CLICK to jump to: The Runningversity Heart Rate Zone Calculator
- What is this Heart Rate Zone Calculator for?
- Why is this Heart Rate Zone Calculator better?
- How to calculate your heart rate zones properly
- What can’t this heart rate calculator do?
- What if my heart rate zone calculator results seem wrong?
- Heart Rate Zones vs Pace Zones
What is the Runningversity Heart Rate Zone Calculator for?
This heart rate zone calculator estimates your running heart rate zones so that you can understand what effort level to use in your different runs. For example, if you are looking for a Zone 2 calculator for your easy runs, or a Zone 4 calculator to find out roughly where your tempo runs should be, this will give you the info you need as well as all the other Zones from 1 to 5. Note that this calculator provides a five zone model, as seen on most sports watches and apps.
Why is the Runningversity Heart Rate Zone Calculator better?
This running heart rate zone calculator uses your Maximum Heart Rate and your Minimum Heart Rate to calculate your Heart Rate Reserve (this is how much your heart rate can vary). It then calculates your heart rate zone boundaries as percentages of that Heart Rate Reserve, so it’s also known as a HRR Zone Calculator or Heart Rate Reserve Zone Calculator, or Karvonen Calculator (named after exercise physiologist Martti Karvonen).
Underneath the calculator, there is an explanation of what each effort / heart rate zone should feel like while running, so that you can sense-check the data in case you aren’t wearing your heart rate monitor correctly – if it’s too loose, light will seep into the gap and ruin the data – too tight and it will restrict the ability to measure the light reflected back.
How to calculate your heart rate zones properly
- Do a Maximum Heart Rate Stress Test
- Determine your Resting Heart Rate, either by looking at it first thing in the morning, or an average given by your sports watch
- Enter those values in the Heart Rate Zone Calculator on this page
- Follow up with a Heart Rate Drift Test to better determine your Zone 2 Heart Rate
To get ready to enter values in the heart rate calculator below, you’ll need to know your true maximum heart rate and your resting heart rate. The Maximum Heart Rate should have been measured in a Maximum Heart Rate Stress Test. The Minimum Heart Rate should have been measured while standing still, first thing in the morning, or use the average recent resting heart rate from your activity tracker device. If you haven’t done the Stress Test, then you could use the Max Heart Rate Calculator to give a rough estimate of your MaxHR, but it’s better to find out your own personal value from the Stress Test to get the most accurate heart rate zone calculations. Bookmark this page, schedule a stress test into your training, and then come back here to get a more useful set of results.
The Runningversity Heart Rate Zone Calculator
Calculate your Heart Rate Zones 1-5 from your Heart Rate Reserve using Runningversity’s heart rate zone calculator and remember to tell all your running friends about it:
What can’t this heart rate calculator do?
Remember that whatever values this heart rate zone calculator tells you, listening to your body is always the most important thing, so if you are struggling (effort is higher) to achieve a particular heart rate for a normal session pace, perhaps you are coming down with something, so always spend time thinking about what the physical effort related to any particular heart rate would normally be, rather than blindly following your heart rate monitor. This will help in races immensely and in interval training, with less distractions from constantly looking at your watch. You shouldn’t need a watch to tell you that you are working really, really hard! If you need more help understanding which zones to train in during the week, take a look at the personal running coaching options.
Other reasons that your heart rate might vary from normal are atmospheric conditions, terrain under-foot, dehydration and altitude, which can all have big impacts on your ability to hold a certain pace as you’d expect. Again, what’s your underlying perceived effort? That’s what you really need to replicate each time. Always be in control of your effort, rather than being a slave to your sports watch.
What if my heart rate zone calculator results seem wrong?
If you’ve found your maximum heart rate and thus your heart rate reserve, but the heart rate zone results don’t tally up to the effort levels you are feeling while running, perhaps your heart rate data is poor. If you are struggling to get anything useful, even after adjusting your watch, or using a chest strap, there’s another way to know how fast to run on your easy runs and your tempo days and your intervals – simply use Runningversity’s Training Pace Calculator instead.
Want to run faster?
Once you’ve sorted out your heart rate training zones using the calculator below, you should check out our course on how to improve running form (opens in new tab) so that all your runs become more fun. If your form is holding you back, check it out!
Heart Rate Zones vs Pace Zones
Note that this is a heart rate zones calculator. I have seen people confuse this with pace zones that are sometimes shown in fitness apps. Pace zones look at the spread of different speeds / paces during your run, so can vary wildly according to conditions on the day – what seems an easy pace in the cold might be a very hard pace in the heat.
Zone 2 Calculator
In the absence of availability of a blood lactate response test, this heart rate zone calculator is a great option for determining all your training zones, including a start point for your Zone 2 boundaries. However, if you are more experienced and able to run for 75+ minutes comfortably, you should consider additionally doing a Heart Rate Drift Test. You can use the results of the calculator on this page as the start point for the Drift test and then tweak them to better determine your optimal fat-as-fuel adaptation zone. This HR zone calculator does a great job of determining ranges for your Z2, Z3, Z4 and Z5 HR zones, but we find that the boundary of the Z2 zone can be explored further. Many runners can run at a slightly higher HR than predicted and still be at the right effort for aerobic base runs. The Heart Rate Drift Test will help you tweak that low-effort Z2 range.
What are the benefits of heart rate zone training?
The most important aspects of training for endurance running (1500m+) are the aerobic energy system and the lactate anaerobic energy system. To optimally train both of these, you need to know where your aerobic threshold and your lactate threshold are. In a five zone model, the aerobic threshold is in Zone 2 and the lactate threshold is in Zone 4. So simply knowing your heart rate zones helps you target the right effort levels for your different run types. If you are always running in Zone 3, you aren’t optimally training either energy system, so using this heart rate calculator can help you adjust your efforts to become a better runner. If you want to read more about training via heart rate, read this guide.
Other sports
This is a running heart rate zones calculator, because the advice given in the details for each HR zone is targeted at runners. However, it would also be applicable as a cycling heart rate zone calculator, or for other endurance athletes to understand their zones. You would need to devise a maximum heart rate stress test for each sport because, for example cycling recruits less muscle fibres because the body is supported, so maximum heart rate for cycling is normally a little lower than for running. The energy systems we train are the same across endurance sports, but the heart rates for any given perceived effort might be a little different.
Hi Charles, thanks for this.
I carried out a Cooper test which gave me a max HR of 175. My Fitbit shows that my resting HR is 50. That gives me a Calculated Heart Rate Reserve of 125.
However, when I run at a speed of 9-9.5km/h my average HR for an hour’s run is between 121-125.
So to carry out the drift test my understanding of it is that I should run at a pace from the outset that gets me close to a HR of 138, is that correct? This seems quite high to me, also considering what the calculator is saying for zone 1.
Thanks.
Yes, I’d start with 138 in an HR drift test based off that data. How confident are you of the HR data accuracy?
If you raced a 5K tomorrow (or have recently), how long will it take you?
Thanks for the reply. I’m fairly confident, though I’ve only tested it once. But that one time I was pretty wiped after that 12 minute all out run. If using the age formula my max is 181, so I’m more confident in the test result.
I ran a 10k last week and my max heart rate was 165 (average was 147). I haven’t run a 5k in about three months but when I did I ran it in 22 mins and my max heart rate was 165 (average was 146). I’d like to think if I ran it again it would be sub 22 mins.
A 22 minute 5K race time would suggest your easy run efforts would be around 5:30mins/km (just under 11km/hour) or slower (see my training pace calculator). If you are running at 9km/h in all your easy runs, it sounds like you might be able to run faster on more of your easy runs, and if you did run faster, you’d expect your HR to be higher. There may also be an issue with your HR data. In a 5K race, you’d expect the HR to shoot up quickly at the start and then rise just a little throughout, so the average would be fairly close to the maximum. If you can get access to a chest strap to borrow, I would try that for comparison.
Thanks. In the 5k run I think I might have done a minimal warm up which may explain why there’s a bit of a variance. I’m using a Polar H10 by the way.
I gave the drift test a go today. Only slight issue was that the treadmills don’t allow you to run one session longer than 60 mins, so I did a warm up for 15 mins and quickly reset and got going again at the same pace, but I could see that my heart rate dropped quite a bit in just a few seconds and took some time to rise back up.
In my warm up I got up to a pace of 10.5km/h and kept it at that pace for the last five mins. My average HR in the first 30 mins was 126, and in the last 30 mins it was 132. Giving me a drift % of 4.5%.
I struggled to get up to a HR of 138, so would you recommend retrying in a few weeks at a slightly faster pace? And I’m assuming the slight stop after the warm up shouldn’t affect the drift % too much? Apologies if this is more suited to your post on the drift test.
“Struggled to get up to 138” << not sure what you mean there? Surely just running a bit faster should make it go up to 138 easily?
I can’t seem to reply to the latest comment for some reason, the reply button is not appearing for me. When I say I struggled, I meant that I was running at a fast enough pace compared to what I’m used to. Felt like 11.5km/h or so would have got me to around that number. Maybe I need to retest and actually run at that speed.
Do you think the slight pause after the warm up would have much of an impact?
No, barely any impact. Please run a 5K Time Trial and then use my training pace calculator as a sense check. If it says your easy pace is predicted to be a lot slower than your heart rate at Z2 in a drift test, then you know your HR data is rubbish. Given it’s a Fitbit, rather than a Garmin, Suunto, Couros, that might be the issue.
Hello, great blog.
But how did you calculate these %?
Because i don’t get the math haha.
for instance:
My max HR is: 185
resting HR is: 38
My heart rate reserve therefore is: 147
But then come the calculations:
Running ZONE 2 / Z2 60-70% of HRR = 127 to 141. How do you get to these numbers?
Hi Ken, simply take 60% of your HRR and add it to your resting HR 🙂
There is a big difference (at least for me) between rest HR and rest HR standing still – 46 vs 69. The zones are totally different when calculated with the respective values. I would like to be sure, if the resting HR means really standing still, or laying down (first thing in the morning). For example Polar Flow setup defines rest HR as “at complete rest but not asleep”. Honestly, if I use the 46, my running would me really way too slow (z2 under 119??), but I want to respect the science so please how is it? Or should I use something between? (very helpful articles btw). Thanks in advance!
I normally go with standing HR first thing in the morning, but my gap between Garmin resting HR and the standing HR isn’t as big as yours. Don’t latch on to the exact numbers quite so much though. It’s a guide, so you can target easy runs (Z1 and Z2) as well as Tempo at Threshold (somewhere in Z4). You can then tweak your zones depending on feel, plus using the Pace Calculator and Drift Test (links also in the content of this page).
Practical info. The 220-age never worked for me. this feels more realistic.
Glad you found it useful 🙂
Thanks for this!
Q/ How would the numbers vary for cycling, vs running? If at al?
Hi. Glad you found it useful. edit: I’ve amended the final paragraph of the article to mention this topic.
I don’t find this to be true, actually — that your HR zones are the same across different endurance sports. University track/cross-country coach and avid road cyclist here, age 49. I’m a lifelong runner, and my max HR running is 185. I’ve only been cycling seriously for six years, and over that time my max HR for that sport has gradually increased from 165 to 173 as I’ve improved/become more efficient at it — and this despite the underlying downward pull on max HR of aging. As you improve at an endurance sport, your max HR increases for that sport. The same goes for your lactate threshold in each sport — all the more so if you specifically train it over a season. And over many seasons of consistent training, you can move your LT from lower zone 4 to near the top of that zone.
Could be. Mine has always been the same for MTB (cycling as hard as possible up a hill) and Running, but I’ve been doing both concurrently for decades. I’ll read up and consider some changes to the text. 🙂