Enter your age and get your zone 2 range, plus all five heart rate training zones. The math runs on the Tanaka equation, which tracks adult max heart rates better than the familiar 220 minus age shortcut, and there's a Karvonen option if you know your resting pulse. You don't need to hand over an email to see your numbers.
Add your resting heart rate to use Karvonen.
beats per minute · your zone 2 range
Estimated max heart rate: 184 bpm
Karvonen ranges are measured from your heart rate reserve, so they sit higher than the % of max method.
These ranges come from population formulas, so treat them as starting points. If you have a heart condition or take medication that changes your heart rate, such as beta blockers, get your training ranges from your doctor.
Zone 2 is the easy end of aerobic work, 60 to 70 percent of your max heart rate in the five zone model this calculator uses. It's the effort where you're clearly exercising but can still talk in full sentences. For most people that looks like a brisk incline walk, an easy jog, or a steady spin on the bike.
The reason it gets its own calculator is that "easy" is where most people miss. Left to feel alone, easy days drift into a moderate grind that piles up fatigue without adding much fitness. Endurance sport figured this out a long time ago: studies of elite training consistently find that around 80 percent of sessions happen at low intensity, with the hard work saved for a small share of the week. A number keeps the easy days honest.
That structure is also what makes zone 2 a natural fit next to lifting. Easy aerobic work builds your endurance base while leaving you fresh enough to train strength hard in the same week.
Everything starts from your max heart rate. This calculator estimates it with the Tanaka equation, built from data on more than 18,000 adults and cross-checked in a laboratory study. The same research showed that the old 220 minus age shortcut underestimates max heart rate in older adults, which is exactly the group most likely to be starting zone 2 work.
The Karvonen method anchors the zones to your heart rate reserve, the span between your resting and max heart rates. Because it adds your resting pulse back into the result, the same percentages land higher in beats per minute. Neither version is wrong. Pick one method and stay with it so every easy day is measured on the same scale.
Two honest caveats. Any age formula is a population average, and your true max can sit well above or below the estimate, so if you've seen a genuine max on a chest strap at the end of a race or a fitness test, enter it and skip the estimate entirely. And the zone boundaries themselves are conventions; the five zone scheme with zone 2 at 60 to 70 percent is the most common, but labs and watch brands slice the ranges differently, which is why your watch may disagree with this page by a few beats.
On easy cardio days. Pick something you can sustain: incline walking, easy running, cycling, rowing. Settle in under the top of your range and hold it for 30 to 60 minutes. If your heart rate drifts over the ceiling, slow down, even when the pace feels embarrassingly easy. Some upward drift is normal late in a session and in heat; the number wins that argument.
Inside a lifting week. Zone 2 sits alongside strength work better than intervals do, because it adds endurance volume without much recovery cost. Two or three sessions on non-lifting days covers most people. Balancing both sides is the whole idea behind hybrid training, and the training guides lay out the week with exercises, sets, reps, and cardio work already placed.
For your weekly total. The public health baseline is 150 to 300 minutes of moderate aerobic activity a week. Two to four zone 2 sessions of 30 to 60 minutes puts you inside that range while leaving room to lift and recover.
To hold the zone without staring at a watch. Use the talk test. If you can speak in full sentences, you're at or under the zone 2 ceiling; once talking breaks into fragments, you've drifted past it. Research has found the talk test tracks measured intensity thresholds closely. Calibrate the feel against your number a few times, then trust it on days you train without a monitor.
Zone 2 work burns calories as well. For the energy side of the picture, the TDEE calculator shows what you burn across a full day, and the walking calorie calculator breaks it out per walk and per mile.
A calculator hands you two numbers in a few seconds. The hard part is building a week where lifting, zone 2, work, and family all fit, then repeating it for months. That gap is what 1:1 coaching covers. You get custom programming, nutrition guidance, and weekly check-ins tailored to your schedule, your equipment, and your goals, with progress review, form feedback, and program adjustments every single week. Strength and endurance, built together, coached by a registered nurse who trains around full clinical shifts.