TempoLife › Nutrition and health wiki › vo2-max
VO2 max
The maximum oxygen your body can use during hard exercise; a fitness benchmark.
Fitness
Definition
VO2 max is the maximum rate at which your body can take in and use oxygen during intense exercise, measured in millilitres of oxygen per kilogram of body weight per minute. It is one of the best single measures of aerobic fitness and tends to fall with age but rises with training, especially interval and endurance work. Labs measure it directly with a mask; watches estimate it from heart rate and pace, which is useful for tracking your own trend rather than exact comparison.
Related terms
Resting heart rate
Beats per minute at rest; a lower rate often signals better fitness.
REM sleep
The vivid-dreaming sleep stage that lengthens toward morning.
Basal metabolic rate (BMR)
The energy your body burns at complete rest just to stay alive.
Source: Standard exercise-physiology references on aerobic capacity. · checked 2026-09-04
Frequently asked questions
What is vO2 max?
VO2 max is the maximum rate at which your body can take in and use oxygen during intense exercise, measured in millilitres of oxygen per kilogram of body weight per minute. It is one of the best single measures of aerobic fitness and tends to fall with age but rises with training, especially interval and endurance work. Labs measure it directly with a mask; watches estimate it from heart rate and pace, which is useful for tracking your own trend rather than exact comparison.
From definition to your plate
TempoLife shows the calories and macros of thousands of foods and tracks your intake over time.