How Long Do Everyday Chores Equal 30 Minutes of Brisk Walking?

The times below estimate how long you would need to do each activity to use roughly the same amount of energy as a 30-minute brisk walk.

Everyday activity	Approx. time to equal 30 min brisk walking
Washing dishes	72 minutes
Ironing	80 minutes
Doing laundry — folding, hanging, loading machines	63 minutes
Putting away groceries	58 minutes
Vacuuming	48 minutes
Making beds/changing sheets	48 minutes
Walking the dog	48 minutes
Grocery shopping	44 minutes
Sweeping floors	44 minutes
Cooking/food preparation — moderate effort	41 minutes
Mopping — moderate effort	41 minutes
Carrying groceries on level ground	41 minutes
Raking leaves	36 minutes
Weeding the garden — moderate effort	32 minutes
Mowing with a walk-behind power mower	29 minutes
Carrying groceries upstairs	27 minutes
Shoveling snow — moderate effort	27 minutes

The household values come from the 2024 Compendium of Physical Activities. For example, washing dishes is rated at 2.0 METs, light laundry at 2.3, vacuuming and making beds at 3.0, grocery shopping and sweeping at 3.3, and moderate mopping, cooking and carrying groceries at about 3.5 METs. Gardening and yard work can be considerably more strenuous: raking is about 4.0 METs, moderate weeding 4.5, a walk-behind power mower 5.0, and moderate snow shoveling 5.3.

How We Calculated It

A 30-minute brisk walk at 4.8 METs equals:

4.8 × 30 = 144 MET-minutes

So, for example:

Vacuuming = 3.0 METs
144 ÷ 3.0 = 48 minutes

Mowing with a power mower = 5.0 METs
144 ÷ 5.0 = about 29 minutes

Because we're comparing the activities using METs, the relative times don't change with body weight. A heavier person generally burns more calories doing both activities, while a lighter person burns fewer, but the approximate equivalence remains similar.