Calculate your aerobic capacity or V02 max. Enter your age and resting heart rate to estimate your fitness level and determine how to improve.

## V02 Max Formula

To calculate V02 max, multiply your max heart rate, in beats per minute, by 15.3 then divide by your resting heart rate.

AC = 15.3 * Max Heart Rate (BPM) / Resting Heart Rate (BPM)

This calculator provides an estimated measure of your V02 max. Your V02 max is the volume of oxygen your body uses in a given amount of time.

Typically the better your cardiovascular health is the larger your V02 max will be. This is why it’s often considered a good indicator of your aerobic capacity. Below is a table that outlines the comparative fitness levels of male and female adults based on their V02 Max.

## Cardiovascular Fitness Level

One may ask, how do I lower my resting heart rate?

The best and only proven way to do that without short-term drugs is through endurance training and aerobic activity. That is the reason that lower resting heart rates and higher V02 levels are considered indicators of good aerobic fitness levels. Below is a good link to estimate V02 max based on running performance instead of resting heart rate.

## V02 Max Calculator

What does V02 max stand for?

In short V02 max is the volume of oxygen that your muscles and body can take in. The more oxygen available to muscles the better they can perform, and this is why V02 max is associated with high fitness levels.

Those people that are getting oxygen to their muscles more efficiently and in greater quantities will outperform those with less oxygen every single time regardless of effort.

## How to calculate aerobic capacity

The level of someone’s aerobic capacity is directly related to someone’s fitness level. The terms are actually synonymous but most people are more familiar with fitness level. If you’ve read this far you’ve already seen the tables above outlining the relationship between aerobic capacity and fitness, but how is aerobic capacity actually calculated?

It’s a very simple equation in fact, and although it is simple it’s very accurate. The following formula is used for calculating aerobic capacity.

AC = 15.3 * Max Heart Rate (BPM) / Resting Heart Rate (BPM)

To determine your resting heart rate, all you need to do is measure the number of heartbeats in 10 seconds, and then multiply by 6. It’s important to note that your resting heart rate varies from day to day and hour to hour, so you should take multiple measurements and then take an average.

Determining your max heart rate is a little more difficult. There are anywhere between 10-20 valid equations for calculating one’s max heart rate. It depends on age, gender, weight, and a multitude of other factors depending on what equation you are looking at. For more information, you can head over to our heart rate zone calculator which goes over the formulas for calculating max heart rate.