While I love walking outdoors and being in nature, it doesn’t always feel so appealing in the colder months. To stop my step count from plummeting on rainy days, I’ve recently started following indoor step-count workouts on YouTube.
I’ve always thought that I should be aiming for 10,000 steps a day, and while that target comes with plenty of well-established benefits, a 2025 review published in The Lancet found that you can also achieve worthwhile results with just 7,000 steps a day. Another advantage of a lower step-count target is that it’s easier to achieve—certainly the case when the 10,000-step workouts on YouTube take around an hour and a half!
So I’ve been testing three of the most popular 7,000-step walking workouts on YouTube. Spoiler alert: I have a clear favourite.
1. BurpeeGirl: Fast Walking Workout for Weight Loss – 7300 steps
This one-hour workout from fitness trainer BurpeeGirl is designed around 30-seconds of work followed by a 10-second rest—during which you can see what the next move is.
There are eight rounds in total, and at the end of every round there’s 20 seconds of active recovery, so you can march it out or grab a sip of water.
It definitely felt pacy, but you could slow things down to a rhythm that feels right for you. Expect lots of lateral steps and knee lifts, and arm exercises such as shoulder raises, presses and rotations which really help get the heart rate up.
This was easily my favorite of the three workouts, and I can see why BurpeeGirl has a huge 1.42million subscribers—and her 7,000 step walking workout has 977,000 views to date.
There was no talking or guidance throughout, which I enjoyed, because it meant I could listen to my own playlist during the workout, although the soundtrack on the video is pretty upbeat too.
2. Walks of Life: 7000 Steps Challenge – Walk At Home Workout
For my next challenge, I headed to the Walks Of Life YouTube channel and tried the 7000 Step Challenge, which has gained more than749,000 views to date.
An animated character visually demonstrates each exercise, while a voiceover tells you what move is up next. Exercises include arm kicks, arm reaches, leg taps, skaters and double steps.
My only issue with this workout is that the timing of each exercise felt a little random. The total workout lasted over an hour, some exercises were done for 37 seconds, while others lasted 30 seconds—mostly interspersed with 23 seconds of walking and rest periods.
The final five-minutes is a fast-paced finisher with exercises performed one after another for 15-seconds—with no walking breaks. I’ll always prefer workouts led by real-life humans, but the animation and voiceover are easy to follow.
The music wasn’t to my tastes though—next time, I’ll stick to my own playlist.
3. Yes2next: 7000 Steps Walking Workout for Seniors & Beginners, Low Impact
Yes2next is a YouTube channel that is all about bringing joy back into fitness for all ages. This 7,000 step walking workout is led by personal trainer April and her 85-year-old mom, Aiko.
The low-impact workout is just under 50 minutes long, and is broken down into three sets of five exercises—each with 60 seconds of walking, then arm exercises with 40 seconds of walking.
The routine was easy-to-follow with clear guidance from April and tips on how to maintain good posture throughout. Aiko also demonstrates modifications, showing how this workout can still be done when sitting on a chair.
Physically, this workout was the easiest of the three, but I enjoyed it much more than I thought I would. I wasn’t even thinking about the music—mainly because it was such a joy to work out with April and Aiko. They have a humour and warmth that radiates throughout, which explains why they have over 600,000 subscribers and this particular video has been watched more than 400,000 times.