TikTok is packed with questionable health trends, but there's a new one swirling around that might actually be worth trying. It involves waking up in the morning and jumping 50 times—that’s it. People swear it does everything from reduce bloat and fatigue to lower your blood pressure, and some say it even makes them feel more joyful.
The concept seems to have started with Kathryn Smith, who is a trainer who helps with surgeries. “I’m a lazy person by nature,” she said in a July TikTok video, noting that it’s taken “baby steps” for her to be more active. One way she did it? By what she calls “morning jumping.”
“When I get out of bed, my feet touch the ground, I jump 50 times,” she said. “What does your brain require first thing in the morning? Oxygen. How do you increase oxygen to your brain? Blood flow. How do you increase your blood flow? Increase your heart rate. Jump up and down.” She also noted that this can be good for lymphatic drainage and bone density. “If you have the ability to jump, you should do it every day,” she said.
Since then, plenty of other people have shared videos of themselves jumping up and down, and they seem pretty happy about it. TikTok poster @tvroomie has been doing this for weeks, and calls the act “life-changing.” She shared in a later post that jumping up and down each day “brings me joy.”
Fellow poster @chisaspam_ has been sharing updates on her journey with jumping daily, noting that she’s “actually starting to see a difference in my body.”
These are some big claims for something that seems easy to pull off. But doctors and a fitness trainer say morning jumping is a fitness hack worth trying. Here’s why.
Even though it’s suddenly popular, jumping up and down isn’t a new thing, per se. “This is essentially glorified jump roping,” Eric Ascher, DO, family medicine physician at Northwell’s Lenox Hill Hospital, tells SELF. “But we know that jumping and jumping rope are wonderful means of managing blood pressure, fatigue, and bloating.”
Jumping can raise your heart rate, along with elevate your body temperature and increase blood flow and fluid movement in the body, Steven K. Malin, PhD, a professor in the Department of Kinesiology and Health at Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, tells SELF. “The higher body temperature helps along with increased blood and fluid movement to loosen joints, tendons, and muscles for flexibility,” he says. Moving your body can also help with getting your lymphatic system moving, which can help remove waste from your body, Dr. Ascher says.
But there’s nothing special about jumping, per se. "We would consider jumping up and down aerobic activity, just like walking, jogging, and swimming," Cheng-Han Chen, MD, interventional cardiologist and medical director of the Structural Heart Program at MemorialCare Saddleback Medical Center in Laguna Hills, CA, tells SELF. "It's probably the most similar to jumping jacks, and it's a fairly high-intensity aerobic activity. Just like all aerobic activity, we think it has benefits to improve cardiovascular health.”
All of that said, the specific exercise routine of jumping 50 times hasn’t been studied to do any of these things—experts say it just makes sense. “Doing other activities like walking, stretching, and jumping jacks are likely to give a similar effect,” Malin says. “There is nothing magical about 50 jumps. There is no evidence for this ‘prescription.’ Rather, it provides a simple objective most can attempt to achieve.”
Jumping when you get out of bed is a “nice way to wake your body up,” Thea Gallagher, PsyD, clinical associate professor at NYU Langone Health and cohost of the Mind in View podcast, tells SELF. But she agrees that jumping can make you feel joyful. “We do that in exuberance and happy times,” she says. “It also probably reminds you of when you were a kid and did a lot of jumping around.” When you jump, it can start a chain reaction in your mind that sparks those happy feelings, she explains.
That activity also stimulates the release of endorphins, or feel-good chemicals in your body that can boost your mood and lower feelings of stress, Dr. Ascher says. (For what it’s worth, research suggests that jumping rope—which is really similar to jumping—can reduce anxiety and even help with focus.)
But Dr. Ascher stresses that you’d likely get this with any type of activity. “Any type of exercise is excellent for stimulating endorphin release,” he says.
Jumping up and down in the morning is “not a magic bullet,” Albert Matheny, RD, CSCS, co-founder of SoHo Strength Lab, tells SELF. But he’s also in favor of trying this if it sounds interesting to you. “Exercise and activity doesn’t have to be, ‘I have to go to the gym for 40 minutes,’” he says. “If you add these little things up in the day, it helps.”
Dr. Ascher suggests trying this in the morning as a way to get your blood pumping and to feel more alert, or as a warmup for your workout routine. But jumping doesn’t have to be limited to the morning. “If you have a break in the day, do it,” he says.
If you have joint problems or if jumping is hard for you, Matheny suggests doing little jumps or just bending at the knees or hips without leaving the ground. (If you have pain while doing this, though, Dr. Ascher says it’s important to stop and contact your healthcare professional to learn more about why this is uncomfortable for you.)
Overall, Dr. Ascher says there’s no reason not to try this—but it’s also important to have realistic expectations in mind. “Jumping up and down 50 times is not the end-all, be-all of exercise,” he says. “But it’s not a bad warmup or way to wake up.”
