Exercising for the same amount of time but in a different order can produce markedly different results. A new study has found that people who did strength training before cardio lost significantly more body fat and abdominal fat than those who reversed the order.
According to the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency's "2024 Community Health Survey" released on the 7th, the adult obesity rate stood at 34.4% in 2024, meaning one in three adults is obese. The self-reported obesity rate has risen approximately 30.8% compared with 26.3% in 2014, a decade earlier. The male obesity rate reached 41.4%, 1.8 times higher than that of women at 23.0%. Among men in their 30s, the rate was 53.1%, and for men in their 40s, 50.3% — roughly one in two.
Against this backdrop, a new experiment has shown that exercise order can determine the efficiency of fat loss. A research team led by Professor Zexiong Zhou at Capital University of Physical Education and Sports in Beijing recently conducted a 12-week experiment involving 45 overweight men aged 18 to 30, with an average body mass index of 29.78.
Participants were divided into three groups. One served as a control group maintaining their usual lifestyle, while the other two performed the same 60-minute program three times a week, differing only in exercise order.
The workout menu was identical. Strength training consisted of bench press, deadlift, squat, and bicep exercises, while the cardio component was 30 minutes on a stationary bike. One group started with strength training, and the other began with cardio. All participants wore smartwatches that tracked daily activity outside of workouts.
Both groups showed improvements in cardiorespiratory endurance, muscle strength, and body composition. The difference emerged in body fat. The group that started with strength training reduced body fat by about 4% and abdominal fat by about 5%. The cardio-first group saw reductions of only 2% and 3%, respectively. Despite spending the same amount of time exercising, the gap in fat loss was nearly twofold.
Changes outside of exercise time were also substantial. The strength-first group walked approximately 3,500 more steps per day on average than the control group, while the cardio-first group's increase was around 1,600 steps. The findings suggest that gains in muscle strength naturally led to more daily movement.
Differences also appeared in strength gains. Maximum strength rose 21.78% in the strength-first group, outpacing the cardio-first group's 15.03%. Explosive strength increased 28.23% in the strength-first group versus 17.21% in the cardio-first group. Muscular endurance improved in both groups, but again, the strength-first group showed higher gains.
The researchers attributed the mechanism to energy consumption patterns. When strength training comes first, glycogen stored in muscles is depleted first. Once cardio begins in this state, the body turns to fat as an energy source due to the shortage of other fuel. Conversely, doing cardio first depletes glycogen early, which is believed to work against muscle growth. Strength training increases muscle mass itself, boosting basal metabolic rate and burning more calories even during rest.
"The effect of exercise order on body fat reduction is closely related to how the body uses energy," said Professor Jack McNamara of the University of East London. "When you do cardio after strength training, your muscles' glycogen stores are already depleted, so the body uses fat as energy."
Improvements in cardiovascular health were similar regardless of exercise order. In other words, if the goal is simply to "get healthier," order is not a major issue. But if the aim is to reduce body fat and reshape the body, the story changes. "If you want to lose body fat and increase daily activity, doing strength training first and then cardio can yield far greater results," the research team concluded.
The small choice at the gym — whether to hit the treadmill button first or grab the dumbbells — can determine what the scale reads 12 weeks later.
The study was recently published in the international journal Journal of Exercise Science & Fitness.
