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The Sitting-Rising Test Explained: What the Study Actually Says

Writer: Janet Huehls
Janet Huehls
Sep 4
4 min read
The Sitting-Rising Test Fears

If you've scrolled past a video lately of someone dropping into a cross-legged sit on the floor and then springing back up without touching a hand down — captioned something like "this test predicts how long you'll live" — you've seen the viral version of the sitting-rising test. And if trying it left you shaky, sore, or quietly panicking about your mortality, I want to stop you right there and set the record straight.


That cross-legged, no-hands version is not what the actual research measures. It's just the most dramatic way to demonstrate it on camera.


The Sitting-Rising Test Explained


The real study — most recently a 2025 paper in the European Journal of Preventive Cardiology following 4,282 adults for over a decade — used something called the Sitting-Rising Test (SRT). The instructions given to every participant were simple: sit down on the floor and stand back up "using the minimum support that you believe is needed." You can use a hand, a forearm, a knee, whatever gets you there. Crossing your legs is allowed, but never required.


sitting-rising test

source: Alves de Brito, L.B., et al. "Sitting-rising test scores predict natural and cardiovascular causes of deaths in middle-aged and older men and women." European Journal of Preventive Cardiology, 2025/2026.



In fact, I don't recommend the cross-legged position as a starting point or even as a goal to strive for. It puts extra strain on knees and hips that may already be sensitive, so if you're concerned about your joints, skip it. Start with whatever technique works best for your body right now — even if that means beginning with getting up from a chair without using your hands.


The Social Media Mix Up


Here's the part that gets flattened on social media: you get points for each support you don't have to use. Getting up and down with just your feet on the floor — no hands, no knees down — is a 10. Using a hand or a knee as you go down or come back up lowers your score from there.


But what gets missed is this isn't a pass/fail exam. A lower score is just where you are right now. Practice at that level consistently, and you gradually build the strength to need less and less support.


sitting-rising test scoring

The cross-legged, hands-free version is also the most physically demanding one — it asks for a lot of hip flexibility on top of leg strength, and puts extra load on joints that may already be sensitive. Someone with plenty of functional strength but tight hips, an old knee injury, extra weight to move, chronic pain, or just decades more birthdays than a 25-year-old influencer can "fail" that specific move while still being perfectly capable of getting up off the floor another way.


A separate peer-reviewed study out of the University of Michigan documented over a dozen distinct strategies healthy older adults naturally use to rise from the floor. There is no single correct pattern. There never was.


So if this test has been sitting in the back of your mind as a verdict on how much time you have left, I want to offer you something different: this is a skill, not a sentence. And skills are built gradually.


Gradual is Powerful


That's a phrase I come back to often — gradual is powerful. You don't need to nail a perfect 10 today, and you definitely don't need to force the hardest version of a floor transfer to prove something to an algorithm.


What actually moves the needle is consistent practice of the functional strength and mobility patterns that make getting up and down easier over time.


But there's a shortage of exercise approaches online that meet you where you actually are and give you a starting point that's right for you — without leaving you sore, more stressed, or ashamed of your body or your motivation.


Root Movements and Mindsets: The Starting Point


That's why I created the Be Well Now Method: a step-by-step way to restore your root movements and root mindsets.


These are the ones that let you get up off the floor, and that carry over into the many other functional movements that help you age well — not just live longer, but live better — while reducing stress rather than adding to it. That combination of mindfulness and movement science, practiced a little at a time, is what gives this method its power for whole-person health, healing, and naturally sustainable habits.


And the mindset piece matters just as much as the physical one. If this test made you flinch, or made you not want to try it at all, that reaction is worth paying attention to — the story you tell yourself about your body ("I'm too old," "I've let this go too far") can stall progress as fast as tight hips or a weak core can. The Be Well Now Method doesn't treat those as separate problems. The movement and the mindset grow together, on purpose, so the goal isn't just a body that can get off the floor — it's a whole person who actually believes they can.


How to Get Up and Down From the Floor Well


Now with the Sitting-Rising Test explained, if getting up from the floor is hard for you right now, you can rest assured that's information, not a doomed diagnosis. Great news is you don't have to figure out where to start on your own. On a Core Why & Real Results Online Coaching Session, we'll talk through exactly where you are, physically and mentally, and I'll map out a real plan for your body before we're done. Book your Core Why & Real Results Online Coaching Session and let's find your starting point together.




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