Your heart is doing quite a lot for you, considering you probably don’t think about it that often. It beats roughly 100,000 times a day, pumping blood around your body while you get on with work, workouts, dinners, drinks and everything in between.

And while heart health can sound like something to worry about once you hit a certain age, the habits that protect your heart are worth paying attention to long before then. The encouraging news is that most of them don’t involve becoming a person who owns a juicer. For World Heart Day today (29 September), here’s what your heart actually wants from you.

9 things you probably didn’t know about your heart

1. You can have a heart attack without knowing you had one

“Silent” heart attacks can cause little or no obvious symptoms and may only be discovered later through testing. The American Heart Association reported this very week that an estimated 170,000 of 805,000 heart attacks a year in the US are silent. They can still damage the heart and increase future risk.

2. Your resting heart rate is actually worth paying attention to

For most adults, a resting heart rate of 60–100 bpm is considered normal, but fitness, stress, medication and other factors affect it. A persistently higher resting rate can be associated with greater cardiovascular risk.

3. Cold weather physically makes your heart work harder

When you’re cold, blood vessels constrict, which raises blood pressure and heart rate. The blood can also become more prone to clotting. Heart attacks are more common in winter, and research it cites found heart attacks and strokes were more than twice as likely during prolonged cold spells in older populations.

4. Sleep isn’t simply about getting eight hours

The regularity and quality of sleep matter too – things like whether you’re constantly switching your sleep schedule between weekdays and weekends. Poor sleep is associated with higher risks of high blood pressure and atrial fibrillation.

5. Your sex life can sometimes tell you something about your arteries

Erectile dysfunction can be an early sign of atherosclerosis because the arteries supplying the penis are smaller and can be affected by narrowing before larger arteries produce obvious symptoms. BHF specifically notes ED can be a warning sign of increased heart-attack risk.

6. Your morning coffee isn’t the heart villain people think it is

A 2026 AHA review says up to 400mg caffeine a day – roughly up to five cups of caffeinated coffee – does not increase cardiovascular risk for most adults, although very high doses, particularly from energy drinks, are a different story.

7. Social connection can impact your heart

Loneliness and social isolation are associated with cardiovascular risk and higher inflammatory markers. That doesn’t mean “call your mum or you’ll prevent a heart attack”, obviously, but the physiological relationship between chronic stress, isolation and cardiovascular health is genuinely interesting.

8. Cocaine is a particularly nasty cardiovascular risk – even in younger people

BHF lists cocaine and amphetamines among less common causes of heart attack. The mechanism isn’t simply “drugs are bad”: cocaine can affect coronary arteries and cardiovascular function in ways that can precipitate an acute event.

How to keep your heart healthy, according to professionals

1. Get your heart rate up

Unsurprisingly, exercise is one of the best things you can do for your cardiovascular health. The NHS recommends adults aim for at least 150 minutes of moderate-intensity activity a week, or 75 minutes of vigorous activity. That could mean brisk walking, cycling, swimming, dancing or anything else that gets you breathing a little harder.

It doesn’t have to happen in one heroic Sunday session, either. Thirty minutes, five days a week gets you there, but shorter bursts count too. A brisk walk at lunch or taking the stairs instead of the lift all add up. And if you’ve been largely sedentary, don’t suddenly decide you’re training for a marathon. Build things up gradually.

2. Stop sitting for hours on end

Doing a workout and then spending the next nine hours welded to your desk isn’t quite the cardiovascular loophole you might hope it is. Break up long stretches of sitting wherever you can. Get up to make a coffee. Walk around during a phone call. Take the long way home. It sounds almost offensively simple, but regular movement throughout the day matters.

And forget obsessing over 10,000 steps. There isn’t a magic number at which your heart suddenly hands you a heart health star of the month certificate. Just make movement part of your normal day.

3. Know your numbers

Blood pressure and cholesterol are two of those health stats that are very easy to ignore because you generally can’t feel them creeping up. For blood pressure, around 120/80mmHg is considered ideal. Consistently hitting 140/90mmHg or above at a GP or clinic, or 135/85mmHg or above at home, is considered high.

Cholesterol is a little more complicated because your overall cardiovascular risk matters too, but as a rough guide, healthy adults are generally advised to have total cholesterol below 5mmol/L and LDL cholesterol below 3mmol/L.

You don’t need to memorise any of that. The point is to actually know what your own readings are – and what they mean – particularly if heart disease runs in your family. In England, adults aged 40 to 74 without certain pre-existing conditions are offered an NHS Health Check every five years, which includes blood pressure and cholesterol. You can also get your blood pressure checked at many pharmacies.

4. Eat for your heart, not against it

There is no single magical “heart-healthy” food. Thankfully, because we’d all be very bored by Wednesday. What matters more is the overall pattern. A Mediterranean-style diet – think plenty of vegetables and fruit, wholegrains, pulses, nuts, seeds and olive oil, alongside fish and other sources of protein – is associated with better cardiovascular health.

Fibre is your friend, too. Wholegrains, beans, lentils, fruit and vegetables can all help you get more of it, while swapping some saturated fats for unsaturated fats can help manage cholesterol. You don’t need to ban butter or the occasional burger. It’s what you eat most of the time that counts.

5. Don’t smoke

This one isn’t particularly glamorous or revolutionary, but it’s one of the biggest things you can do for your cardiovascular health. Smoking damages your arteries, makes your blood more likely to clot and increases your risk of coronary heart disease and stroke by two to four times compared with not smoking.

The good news is that your body starts recovering after you stop. If you’ve tried before and found it difficult, that’s not a character flaw. Nicotine is addictive, and there is support available to help you quit (including some widely acclaimed books).

6. Keep an eye on the booze

A glass of wine with dinner isn’t going to single-handedly ruin your cardiovascular health. But alcohol isn’t a heart-health supplement either, despite what certain headlines from the past might have suggested.

The current UK guidance is no more than 14 units a week, whether you drink every day or only occasionally, with the advice to spread those units over three or more days if you regularly drink that much. This is equivalent to:

• 6 pints of average-strength beer (4% ABV)
• 6 medium (175ml) glasses of wine (13% ABV)
• 14 single (25ml) measures of spirits (40% ABV)

Regularly drinking more than that can raise blood pressure and increase your risk of cardiovascular disease. In other words: enjoy the Negroni. Maybe don’t make it a six-Negroni Tuesday.

7. Give your heart a proper night’s sleep

Sleep gets filed under “nice to have” surprisingly often, when it’s actually one of the foundations of good health. Poor or insufficient sleep is associated with a higher risk of high blood pressure and cardiovascular disease. Most adults need around seven to nine hours a night, although individual needs vary.

No need to panic if you only managed to get your Zs for six hours after a late dinner, or are having trouble falling asleep. Think about your sleep across the week and make decent rest something you protect where you can. Your heart doesn’t care that you have emails to respond to and, truthfully, neither should you.

8. Don’t underestimate stress

Stress isn’t as simple as “stress causes heart disease”, so let’s not go there. But chronic stress can affect plenty of the things that do matter: sleep, exercise, diet, smoking and drinking. It can also temporarily raise your heart rate and blood pressure.

Managing stress doesn’t mean achieving some permanently blissed-out state (naturally!). It’s about having ways to come back down after your nervous system has spent the day acting like you’re being chased by a bear. Go for a walk; see your friends; put your phone down; exercise; sit somewhere quiet – whatever works for you, do it and do it consistently.

9. Know when something isn’t right

This is worth knowing regardless of your age. A heart attack can cause pain or discomfort in the chest, which may feel like pressure, squeezing or heaviness. It can spread to the arms, neck, jaw, back or stomach and may come with sweating, nausea, dizziness or shortness of breath.

If you think you or someone else is having a heart attack, call 999 immediately. And because you should be prepared when the worst happens, learn CPR. If someone collapses and isn’t breathing normally, starting CPR and using an automated external defibrillator (AED) as soon as possible can make a critical difference.

You can eat the salad and the chips, you can run on Tuesday and spend Saturday on the sofa. You can have a late night, miss a workout and get back to normal the next day. It’s about the bigger picture.