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240 million teens get no active day in a week, WHO warnsHealth
A major new global study finds one in four teenagers reports no day with an hour of activity, and no country is on track to fix it.
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Around one in four teenagers worldwide reports no day with even an hour of physical activity in a week, the World Health Organization has warned, in findings that point to a generation growing up far less active than doctors recommend. The new global estimates, published in The Lancet Global Health, suggest that about 240 million young people aged 11 to 17 do not reach the recommended level of daily activity on any day of the week.
The research brings together 389 population-based surveys from 140 countries and territories, covering more than 3.2 million adolescents. An active day is defined as at least 60 minutes of moderate-to-vigorous activity, such as brisk walking, cycling, active play or organised sport. In 2025, teenagers reported being active for an average of just 2.7 days per week, and only 14 percent said they reached the hour mark on all seven days.
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The most striking finding is how little has changed. Physical activity levels among adolescents have remained virtually unchanged over the past 15 years, since 2010, and no country is on course to meet the global target of a 15 percent relative reduction in physical inactivity by 2030. The WHO says the world has made little progress in getting young people moving, despite years of campaigns and school programmes.
A significant gender gap runs through the data. About 28 percent of girls reported having no physically active days in the previous week, compared with 22 percent of boys, and only 11 percent of girls were active every day, against 17 percent of boys. WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said girls continued to face greater disadvantages than boys, and that addressing the problem required more than simply telling teenagers to exercise.
The study also found wide differences between countries. Around 40 percent of adolescents in Namibia, Nepal and the Philippines reported no active days during the week, while more than 30 percent of young people in Bangladesh and Serbia reported daily activity. The WHO pointed to factors including transport, access to safe recreational spaces, opportunities for walking and cycling, school environments, social attitudes and the growing pull of digital devices and screen-based entertainment.
The health stakes are serious. The WHO warned that a sedentary lifestyle is a major risk factor for heart disease, type 2 diabetes and certain cancers, and that habits formed in adolescence shape health for life. Its message to governments is to make activity safer, more accessible and easier to build into everyday routines: safer schools, streets and communities where walking, cycling and playing are part of daily life, not an extra chore. Without that shift, the report warns, another generation will reach adulthood already carrying the risks of inactivity.
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