Everyone knows regular exercise is essential for good health. Pair it with a balanced diet and consistent movement, and you can lower your risk of chronic disease, boost energy levels, sharpen brain function, and feel better in your body overall. But once you decide to start, especially as a beginner, things can get confusing fast. How often should you actually be working out? What counts as a rest day? And how do you tell the difference between a real injury and the kind of soreness that just makes stairs feel personal?
“Understanding when to push the body and when to rest is essential in preventing injuries that can interfere with long-term fitness goals,” stresses Nicole Cartier, CPT and Physical Therapist Assistant for FYZICAL Therapy & Balance Centers.
One of the most important skills to develop early on is learning how to stay in tune with your body, particularly when it comes to knowing when to push and when to pull back. Rest days and active recovery both play a role, but they serve different purposes. To break down how and when to use each, we turned to the pros. Take care of your body, and it will take care of you. The key is learning to listen before it starts shouting.
“Both [rest and active recovery days] are important. The difference is the amount of stress the body can tolerate at that point in time,” notes Dr. David Herzberg, PT, DPT, APTA spokesperson, Owner & PT of Launch Physical Therapy and Sports Performance Center at American Physical Therapy.
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What Is a Rest Day?
Research shows the top reasons to take a rest day include feelings of fatigue, unexplained reduction in physical performance, and musculoskeletal aches and pains, so it’s important to listen to your body and know when it’s time to stop.
Think of a rest day as taking a complete vacation day from your workout routine—no quick classes or sessions allowed. It’s time to fully shift your focus to recovery.
According to Julie Dermer, CPT and Master Soul Cycle Instructor, “You want your body to get the message that this day is about full physical and nervous system recovery…When you fully rest, muscles finally get a chance to repair the tiny micro-tears created during workouts. This is when real rebuilding happens.”
What Is Active Recovery?
Active recovery, on the other hand, supports the recovery process through low-intensity movement. This day should consist of a bit more mobility than a rest day—without doing anything that takes much energy or causes fatigue. Some suggestions include light yoga or pilates, walking, stretching, or swimming.
The purpose of an active recovery day is to alleviate stiffness, boost blood flow, and help your body feel all-around better.
Evan Betts, Fitness Coach and Trainer at The Pack, says it’s “not a full reset,” but rather keeps you active in a sense, “while breaking up your norm.”
Related: We Rated and Reviewed the Best Recovery Tools to Get Better, Faster, and Stronger
When You Need to Take a Rest Day
Your body will tell you when you need a rest day, but it’s important to plan it before your body starts asking.
According to Cartier, “To determine whether an active recovery day or a full rest day is needed, it is important to assess how the body feels.”
These are telltale signs it’s crucial to rest: little motivation or energy, total fatigue that can’t be resolved with a good night’s rest, irritability, brain fog, or sore muscles that aren’t going away. If your heart rate is elevated, you experience tendon or joint pain, or you don’t feel like you’re at the top of your workout game for several sessions, it’s time for a break.
Although you’re not exercising on a complete rest day, you still have a checklist to complete. It’s essential to hydrate, eat nutritious meals, engage in relaxing activities, and plan to actuallyreset your body, as in getting quality shuteye.
“You should not engage in any strenuous activity in or outside of a gym,” Betts stresses. “Go to the spa, get a massage, or enjoy a nice, quiet day at home.”
Here’s a brief summary of when your body needs a rest day:
- Soreness prevails even after warming up
- You experience major pain, fatigue, or sickness
- Stress levels are high
- Quality of sleep is poor
- You’re burned out
When Active Recovery Will Help
If your muscles feel mildly sore and you’re tired but not totally exhausted—and you feel better by warming up—it’s a great day for some active recovery. It’s important to emphasize control, not burn.
“When you engage in active recovery, you increase blood flow which speeds up recovery, you reduce soreness (motion is lotion) and you get to release those much sought after endorphins without breaking down your body further,” Betts says. “Whatever you do for active recovery should make you feel better, not worse.”
Increased circulation helps bring nutrients in and remove toxins, which is why engaging in light movement can alleviate soreness—so long as your training remains easy.
Dr. Herzberg usually tells athletes or highly active clients on active recovery days, “If gentle movement makes you feel better instead of worse, active recovery is doing its job.”
Here’s a summary of when to turn to active recovery:
- You’re feeling sore, but not in pain
- Stiffness remains after warming up
- Moving improves mental clarity and energy levels
- You don’t feel tired after exercising with mild intensity
Related: The 2 Hacks an Exercise Scientist Swears by for Better Sleep and Recovery
Common Recovery Mistakes to Avoid
1. Turning Active Recovery Into Just Another Workout
One major mistake is turning an active recovery day into just another session that overloads your body. It’s not recovery if you’re keeping track of intensity or sweating a ton. Keep the intensity low.
“Active recovery should feel almost too easy. You should finish feeling calmer and looser,” Dermer says.
2. Waiting Until You’re Totally Fatigued to Rest
Most fitness enthusiasts don’t carve out rest time when they could really use it—they simply rest when they have to.
“By then, fatigue has already piled up. The fix is to plan for rest before burnout shows up. Think of rest as maintenance, and an important part of your overall wellness,” Dermer explains.
When you don’t carve out ample time to rest, you place yourself at risk of overtraining, which can wreak havoc on your body and progress. One study noted that overtraining—regardless of diet—can cause a decline in lean muscle, higher stress levels, and even an increase in belly fat.
3. Under-Fueling on Recovery Days
Fueling your body is essential throughout your fitness routine—but most especially on recovery days. In fact, consuming lighter meals or not getting sufficient protein or calories on rest days can slow the recovery process. One study found that low energy intake can negatively impact explosive power, while another indicated that under-fueling can result in less muscle repair after working out.
“Your body still needs fuel to rebuild,” Dermer stresses.
4. Thinking of Rest Days as “Being Lazy”
It’s common to consider rest days as “being lazy”—but this mindset couldn’t be further from the truth.
“[This mentality] keeps people stuck in a cycle of overdoing and under-recovering. Reframe rest as part of training,” Dermer says. “Rest is how you stay consistent with all your goals of strength, longevity, and energy. Rest and recovery is a gist that truly takes care of you!”
Takeaways
One major tip Dr. Herzberg shares with his young athletes? “Less is more.” Spending all your time working out and doing the same thing isn’t the best way to boost performance. This can heighten your risk of injury and jeopardize how your body recovers from external stressors.
“Constantly training, not incorporating active recovery days, and not resting, could cause mental distress, thus in effect increasing body fatigue and anxiety, which impacts how one performs and exposes the athletes to injury as well,” Dr. Herzberg shares. “It is not very often that I get an athlete who does not follow this protocol, and instead of preventing an injury, we end up treating it, which means they miss several games/competitions or even an entire season.”
Training smarter, not harder, is the name of the game if you want to remain healthy and progress toward your fitness goals. By knowing the early warning signs and staying in sync with your body, you can more effectively implement rest days and keep your workout sustainable for the long-term.
Related: Overtrained? This Simple Pantry Staple Could Speed Recovery
