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Flights climbed

How many flights of stairs you walked or ran up today, counted by your iPhone or Apple Watch.

Your iPhone and Apple Watch count a flight each time you climb about one story on foot. Floors you ride up in an elevator or on an escalator don't count, and some devices can't count floors at all. Pajdo reads the day's total from Apple Health.

Stairs pack a lot of effort into a short climb. The Compendium of Physical Activities, the reference researchers use for how hard activities are, rates climbing stairs at a slow pace as moderate and at a general or fast pace as vigorous. A few flights spread through the day add up.

What tends to push it up

  • Taking the stairs instead of the elevator

Worth a try

Find a hill or some stairs

The NHS lists walking up stairs as a vigorous activity and says most moderate activities become vigorous when you put in more effort. It also counts hill walking and climbing stairs among activities that work your muscles.

So the same route can do more for you if it goes up. Apple Health also keeps count of flights climbed, if you like seeing proof.

Try it: add one hill or a few flights of stairs to a walk you already do. Take the climbs at a pace where you're breathing harder but still in control, and stroll the flat bits.

Sources

  1. flightsClimbed, Apple Developer Documentation
  2. floorsAscended, Apple Developer Documentation
  3. Walking (2024 Adult Compendium of Physical Activities), Compendium of Physical Activities
  4. World Health Organization 2020 guidelines on physical activity and sedentary behaviour, World Health Organization (Br J Sports Med, 2020)
  5. Physical activity guidelines for adults aged 19 to 64, NHS
  6. How to improve your strength and flexibility, NHS

Checked against these sources on September 15, 2026.

This is general wellness information, not medical advice. If a number worries you, or stays away from your usual for a while, talk to a doctor.

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