Gut health has become a more mainstream topic in the health and wellness space in recent years. While sauerkraut and kombucha are worth adding to your grocery list, improving your digestion might be easier than you think.
Yes, you guessed it: Exercise is key. Aside from making you feel stronger, energized, happier, and lowering your risk of disease—regular exercise also benefits your gastrointestinal health.
We spoke with certified nutritionist and obé instructor Kat B. to learn more about the role of exercise in digestion. You’ll learn the best types of exercise for gut health, how often you need to do it, and so much more.
An Intro to Your Digestion: What You Need to Know About the Gut
Let’s throw things back to high school biology, because if you’re anything like us—those days were a long time ago.
Digestion is the process by which your body breaks down food into smaller molecules, absorbs essential nutrients, and eliminates waste. When we reference “digestion,” we’re talking about the gut. This is a broad term that includes everything involved in digestive processes, from your stomach to your intestines.
The digestive tract is part of your gut and digestive system. It consists of a series of muscles that contract to move food from your mouth to the other end, whereby nutrients are absorbed and the rest is excreted.
When you hear people talk about “gut health,” they’re essentially referring to the overall health of this process.
Why a Healthy Gut Matters
Did you know that we’re all just walking bacteria? That’s right, each person has more bacterial cells in their body than human cells. This population of bacteria is known as your microbiome. As with any ecosystem on the planet, there are good parts and bad parts.
Good (healthy) bacteria are your gut’s VIPs. They aid digestion, boost your immune system, and produce essential nutrients like vitamins B and K.
But if bad bacteria outnumber the good (also referred to as gut dysbiosis), it’s a recipe for digestive drama—think constipation, diarrhea, weakened immunity, inflammation, and conditions like irritable bowel syndrome (IBS).
One key sign of a healthy gut is regular bowel movements. Pooping is your body’s way of flushing out waste and toxins. Keeping a steady rhythm means your gut is working efficiently, helping maintain the balance of those good bacteria and keeping everything running smoothly.
How Often Should I Poop?
There is variation between people, but generally speaking, you want to poop somewhere between three times a day and three times a week.
You may have already noticed that exercise makes you poop: is this normal? Yes! We’ll get on to the exact reasons why below, but just know that it’s a good sign. Your gut appreciates the movement, even if the pooping urge isn’t always at the most opportune times!
How Exercise Aids Digestion
“Believe it or not… the digestive tract is a muscle!” says Kat. We don’t often consider the gut a muscle. But as Kat explains, your digestive tract is actually a series of muscles, and so it benefits from exercise in a similar way to the rest of your body. Here’s how exercise aids digestion:
Exercise Strengthens Your Gut Muscles Which Can Make You More Regular
When you exercise regularly, your gut muscles become stronger and more efficient, which improves intestinal contractions. “When you contract your abdominal muscles, it can cause the muscles in your digestive tract to contract, helping you eliminate waste more easily. This is known as peristalsis,” explains Kat.
“When we’re physically inactive, the muscles in our gut become less active, too. Over time, they lose their natural coordination and strength.” This can result in constipation or an irregular toilet habit.
Exercise Increases Blood Flow Which Supports Nutrient Absorption
When you get moving, so does your digestive system. “Exercise ramps up blood flow to your organs and stimulates the muscles in your gastrointestinal tract,” says Kat. “Maintaining ample blood flow in the digestive tract enhances digestion and nutrient absorption.”
In fact, whenever you eat, blood flow naturally increases to your intestines to help digest the food and absorb the nutrients. So think about it this way: Increasing blood flow through exercise ensures that your digestive system is always primed and ready to process and utilize nutrients efficiently, leading to better overall gut health.
Exercise Reduces Stress Which Improves Gut Health
Stress can be a major culprit behind digestive issues, largely due to the gut-brain axis—the direct communication pathway between your brain and your gut. When you’re stressed, it can disrupt this connection, leading to digestive discomfort and irregularities.
The good news? Exercise is a natural stress-buster! By releasing endorphins, your workouts help reduce anxiety and tension, positively influencing the gut-brain axis. This leads to a happier, healthier gut, with less stress translating into smoother digestion and fewer bathroom woes.
Exercise Increases the Amount of Healthy Bacteria
As outlined in a 2017 study, “Exercise can enhance the number of beneficial microbial species, enrich the microflora diversity, and improve the development of commensal (healthy) bacteria.”
Without getting too technical, here’s what you need to know: Exercise makes a more favorable environment for the growth of health-promoting bacteria, whether that’s by reducing inflammation or helping you absorb nutrients from your food more efficiently. In short, exercise helps—a lot.
The Best Exercise for Digestive Health
If you want to improve your digestive health using exercise, here’s what you should aim for, according to this 2023 study:
- Moderate-to-high intensity activity
- 30 minutes to 90 minutes
- 3 times or more per week
If you’re just starting your exercise routine, follow this pattern for at least 8 weeks to notice a difference in your digestion (by the way, that’s the golden rule for noticing most changes from exercise).
Now you know the intensity and duration, what type of exercise is best?
“Any movement is better than none,” says Kat. So whether that’s going for a lunchtime stroll or getting your booty kicked in a Strongest Self obé class—the goal is to fall in love with fitness and make it a part of your daily life.
If you’re really on a path for optimization, research indicates that these types of exercise may have advantages:
1. Strength Training
Why: A 2021 study found that strength training increases healthy bacteria and produces more short-chain fatty acids (metabolites that play an important role in gut health, disease prevention, and the gut-brain connection, learn more here.)
obé Examples: The BodyComp, Simply Strong, Gym Strong, Hard AF, or MuscleGuard workout programs. Or, try a strength class from the on-demand library.
2. Aerobic Endurance Training
Why: A 2021 study found that endurance-type workouts are particularly effective at improving healthy bacteria in the gut and stimulating those intestinal contractions to help get things moving.
Examples: Rowing, walking, running, dancing (Dance Essentials), or biking for 30 minutes or more.
3. Yoga
Why: Remember that the mind-gut connection is very real! So any activity that helps you connect to your body and alleviate stress will aid your digestion. In fact, a 2020 study even used yoga as a treatment for IBS, reporting that it reduced symptoms, improved regularity of bowel movements, and improved mental health.
Examples: Yoga—duh! Explore all of obé’s on-demand yoga classes here, and read more about the 9 different types of yoga classes on obé here.
4. Core Strengthening Exercises
Why: Engaging your core muscles helps stimulate your intestines, boosting the efficiency of digestion and waste movement. And don’t forget: the gastrointestinal tract is a muscle!
Examples: Bird dogs, side planks, crunches, and pretty much everything you’ll find in the CORE Workout Challenge or by checking the ‘core’ filter in obé’s on-demand library.
3 Additional Strategies to Support Your Digestive Health
If your gut needs some extra support, we got you. Even though obé instructor Kat is a picture of health, she still struggles with a problematic gut. “I have a long history of gut issues, so I’ve tried just about everything. Alongside exercise, these three strategies have helped me the most.”
1. Eating a Wholefood Diet: We don’t mean you have to do your grocery shopping at Whole Foods; we’re actually advising a wholefood diet. Essentially, this means eating minimally processed foods. Think steak and potatoes versus fried chicken and french fries. It’s eating foods as they naturally come, with their maximal nutritional value intact.
Kat’s advice: “When I stick to lean proteins, whole grains, and fruits and veggies as my main sources of fuel, my body and gut are happiest. These foods provide high nutritional value and plenty of fiber to keep my bowel movements like clockwork!”
2. Take a Daily Probiotic: Probiotic supplements are sources of live healthy bacteria. When you take them, they travel to your gut to increase the density of those health-promoting bacterial strains.
Kat’s advice: “I have tried many different ones, but Seed’s daily probiotic seems to work best for me, personally!”
3. Incorporate More Fermented Foods: Fermented foods are naturally rich in probiotics. Think sauerkraut, kombucha, miso, probiotic yogurt, kimchi, or kefir. You don’t have to get them from the farmer’s market either—it’s really easy to make your own fermented foods, check TikTok for a demo.
Kat’s advice: “I love naturally fermented pickles. They are SO yummy and contain tons of good gut bacteria!”
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