The Wim Hof breathing method: 30 breaths, a hold, a recovery hold, with a free guided timer

What is the Wim Hof breathing method?

The Wim Hof breathing round has three parts. First, 30 fast, full breaths in and out, without pausing between them. Second, after the last exhale, a breath-hold: you simply hold your breath, without inhaling, until you feel the first real urge to breathe. Third, one deep inhale, held for about 15 seconds, before you let go and start the next round. A full session is usually 3 rounds.

It was developed by the Dutch athlete Wim Hof. The full method he teaches also includes gradual cold exposure, such as cold showers, and a form of meditation and concentration training; these three parts are usually taught and practised together, not the breathing alone.

Wim Hof is widely known as "the Iceman" for his feats of cold endurance, and researchers usually describe the method as resting on three pillars: breathing, cold exposure and commitment, the mental training part. In research papers the breathing on its own is often called cyclic hyperventilation followed by breath retention, which is exactly what the round on this page is: a cycle of deliberate over-breathing, then a hold on empty lungs.

How to do the Wim Hof breathing round, step by step

Do this sitting or lying down, on an empty stomach, somewhere you cannot fall and are not near water.

• Take 30 fast, full breaths: a full inhale through the nose or mouth, then a relaxed, passive exhale, one right after the other, without pausing.
• After the 30th exhale, hold your breath. Do not inhale. Hold for as long as feels comfortable, until you feel the first real urge to breathe.
• When that urge comes, take one deep breath in and hold it for about 15 seconds.
• Let go of that breath and, if doing more than one round, start the next 30 breaths straight away.
• Repeat for 3 rounds in total.

The breath-hold has no fixed length: some rounds it will feel short, others longer. This is normal and is not something to push against.

The guide above sets the pace for you: each of the 30 breaths takes about 1.4 seconds, so the fast-breathing part of a round lasts roughly 42 seconds. At the end it lists how long you held in each round, which is a simple way to see how your practice changes over the weeks.

Wim Hof breathing for beginners: your first week

The first session often surprises people: the tingling, the light head and the long, easy hold can all feel strong. None of it is a test you have to pass. A calm first week matters more than long holds, and the plan below keeps the risk low while you learn how your body reacts.

The plan is practical advice, not a tested protocol. In the published trials people practised daily for anything from 15 days to 5 weeks, usually for 5 to 20 minutes a day, so a short daily habit is closer to what was studied than one long session a week.

• Days 1 and 2: one or two rounds only, lying on your back on a bed or a mat. Breathe at a relaxed pace, not as hard as you can.
• Days 3 to 5: three rounds with the guide above. Let the hold end as soon as the urge to breathe is clear; there is no prize for holding longer.
• Days 6 and 7: three rounds again, then sit quietly for a minute and notice how you feel before you get up slowly.
• Every day: practise before a meal rather than after, never in or near water, never before driving, and stop at once if you feel faint, confused or unwell.
• If you have epilepsy, a heart condition, high or low blood pressure, or are pregnant, ask a doctor before day 1.

What happens in your body during Wim Hof breathing

Each part of the round does something different, and knowing what to expect makes the sensations less alarming. Fast, deep breathing blows off carbon dioxide faster than the body makes it. With less carbon dioxide the blood becomes more alkaline, which is called respiratory alkalosis. In a 2021 Swiss pilot study of 15 amateur runners, the carbon dioxide in their breath fell to about 19 mmHg after the last fast-breathing phase, a level that points to clear alkalosis.

The low carbon dioxide is also why the hold feels so easy. The urge to breathe comes mostly from rising carbon dioxide, not from falling oxygen, so after over-breathing the urge arrives late while oxygen keeps dropping. In the same runners, blood oxygen saturation measured on the finger fell to about 60% at the end of the holds. Normal is around 95 to 100%. This is why people can black out during a hold without warning, and why the safety rules below are not optional.

In the 2014 Radboud study the trained group's practice produced intermittent respiratory alkalosis and low blood oxygen, followed by a steep rise in adrenaline. That adrenaline surge is the main link the researchers found between the breathing and the calmer immune response.

Tingling, a light head and a feeling of warmth are common and pass within a few breaths of normal breathing. Fainting, confusion, chest pain or jerking movements are not normal: stop and breathe normally.

Does the Wim Hof method actually work? What the research found

The best-known study is a 2014 trial at Radboud University Medical Centre in the Netherlands. 12 people who had trained for 10 days in the Wim Hof method, which combines this breathing, cold exposure and meditation, were compared with 12 untrained people. All 24 were then given an injection of a bacterial substance that normally triggers flu-like symptoms. The trained group showed higher blood adrenaline, lower levels of pro-inflammatory signalling molecules in the blood, and milder symptoms than the untrained group.

This is a real, peer-reviewed finding, but it is a small study, and because the training combined breathing with cold exposure and meditation, it cannot show that the breathing alone caused the effect; the cold exposure or the combination could be doing some or all of the work.

A separate, simplified fast-breathing-with-hold pattern in the same family, without the cold exposure, was tested on its own in a 2023 Stanford randomised trial of 108 adults. Over 5 weeks of daily 5-minute practice it improved mood and reduced anxiety compared with baseline, though by a smaller margin than the physiological sigh technique in the same trial. A single brain-imaging case study of one Wim Hof-trained individual during cold exposure also exists, but one person cannot be generalised to anyone else.

The story started with Wim Hof himself. In a 2012 case study the same Dutch team measured him during an 80-minute full-body ice immersion and during the same bacterial-substance test. His immune response in the blood was strongly dampened, and his cortisol was higher than in any of the 112 people previously tested in that lab. A single person proves nothing about others, which is why the team went on to train volunteers.

A 2024 systematic review gathered 9 papers covering 8 trials published up to July 2022. Its conclusion was that the method may reduce inflammation, through the rise in adrenaline, while the results for exercise performance and breathing during exercise were mixed. Most trials since then have been small, which the table in the next section reflects.

Wim Hof breathing benefits: what is proven and what is not

Many benefits are claimed for the Wim Hof method, from more energy to a stronger immune system. The table sets out what controlled studies actually measured. A row marked "no effect" does not mean the practice is useless, only that this particular study did not find the change it looked for.

In short: the immune findings are the strongest and have been reproduced by the same team, mood findings are positive but no stronger than gentler breathing, and the claims about sport, blood pressure and heart rate variability have so far not held up in trials.

Why are fast breathing and cold exposure often done together?

The 2014 Radboud trial trained its 12 participants in breathing, cold exposure and meditation as one combined method, which is how Wim Hof teaches it and how most people practise it. That combined training is what showed the immune and adrenaline effects; that trial alone could not show which part, or which combination, produced the result.

The same team answered that question in 2022. First, 40 healthy men learned the breathing exercises in a short or a longer course, from Wim Hof himself or from an independent trainer: adrenaline rose in every group, whatever the length of training or the trainer. Then 48 healthy men were split into four groups: cold exposure training, the breathing exercise, both, or no training, and all were given the bacterial substance. Cold training alone did not change the inflammatory response, the breathing exercise alone dampened it, and cold training made the effect of the breathing stronger. The combination worked best.

Two limits are worth keeping in mind: everyone in that study was a healthy young man, and the outcome was a laboratory model of inflammation, not a real illness. The study shows the method can be taught in a standard way by anyone, which is what makes larger clinical trials possible.

Why does the breath-hold time change between rounds?

It is common for the hold after exhaling to lengthen across the 3 rounds of one session, though this varies from day to day and person to person and is not a fixed target to chase. The exact length is not something to compare against anyone else's; it depends on things like how well-rested you are and how much practice you have, not on willpower.

A long hold is not a sign that more oxygen is stored. It mostly reflects how low the carbon dioxide has fallen after the fast breathing, which delays the urge to breathe while oxygen drops. That is why a record hold is not a goal in itself, and why chasing one is the most common way people get into trouble.

Wim Hof breathing for anxiety and stress

Wim Hof breathing raises adrenaline: it is a deliberate, short stress, not a relaxation exercise. Still, several trials found people felt less anxious and stressed after weeks of practice. In a 2024 randomised trial in the United States, 84 midlife women with high stress and depressive symptoms practised daily for 3 weeks with 15-minute audio instructions. One group did Wim Hof-style breathing plus cold showers, the other slow breathing plus warm showers.

Both groups improved by the same amount: depressive symptoms fell by 24%, anxiety by 27% and perceived stress by 20%, and the gains held at 3 months. The Wim Hof group showed less rumination after stressful days, a finding the authors say needs repeating. All six women who dropped out were in the Wim Hof group, which suggests it is harder to stick with.

A 2025 semi-randomised trial of 404 adults compared 29 days of the Wim Hof method with mindfulness meditation. Right after each daily session the Wim Hof groups reported more energy, mental clarity and ability to handle stress, and the effect on stress grew over the weeks while the effect of meditation shrank. Changes in lasting traits were small.

Not every trial agrees. A 2023 randomised study of 42 adults found 15 days of daily practice had no effect on perceived stress, mood, blood pressure or heart rate variability. If you live with an anxiety or panic disorder, the strong body sensations can feel like the start of an attack; talk to a doctor first, and consider calmer techniques such as the physiological sigh or coherent breathing, each with its own page and pacer.

Wim Hof breathing in the morning or before sleep?

No study has tested Wim Hof breathing at bedtime. What is known is that the practice raises adrenaline, and in the 2025 trial people reported more energy right after each session. Both point to the morning or the early afternoon as the natural time for it, which is also how most people use it: to wake up, not to wind down.

Some people say they feel calm and sleepy after the rounds. If that is you, an evening session lying in bed is possible, with one firm rule: never fall asleep during or straight after a hold. If you want help falling asleep, slow techniques with long exhales, such as 4-7-8 breathing or coherent breathing, are designed for that and have their own pages.

How long is a Wim Hof session, and how often should you do it?

With the guide above, one round takes the 42 seconds of fast breathing, your own hold, and the 15-second recovery hold. With holds of one to two minutes, 3 rounds take roughly 6 to 9 minutes. Popular guided sessions of 10 or 11 minutes are the same thing with longer holds or a fourth round.

The trials used different doses: 5 minutes a day for 5 weeks in the Stanford trial, 15 minutes a day for 3 weeks in the trial with stressed women, about 20 minutes a day for 4 weeks in teenage runners, and daily practice for 15 or 29 days in others. No study has compared doses, so there is no proven ideal. Once a day is the pattern used most often in research.

Three rounds is a sensible ceiling for beginners. More rounds mean more time with low carbon dioxide and low oxygen, and no trial has shown that more is better.

Is the Wim Hof breathing method safe?

This technique carries the clearest specific safety risk of anything on these pages. Fast, deep breathing lowers blood carbon dioxide, which narrows blood vessels in the brain and can cause light-headedness, tingling fingers or lips, and, if breath-holding is then combined with standing up or being in water, a risk of fainting. Shallow-water blackout is a documented risk among breath-hold divers who hyperventilate beforehand, which is exactly the pattern here.

For this reason: practise sitting or lying down, never in or near water, never while driving or operating machinery, and stand up slowly after a hold rather than jumping straight up.

Anyone pregnant, or with epilepsy, a heart condition, or high or low blood pressure, should get a doctor's approval before doing this practice.

Wim Hof breathing dangers: water, epilepsy and other risks

The water risk is not theoretical. A 1976 report gathered 58 cases of people who lost consciousness while swimming or diving underwater after hyperventilating. All were known as good swimmers or divers, most were young men, about 80% of the cases happened in pools with lifeguards, and 23 people died. Breath-holding experiments in the same report suggested that the time between losing consciousness and death may be no longer than 2.5 minutes. Over-breathing lets you stay under longer, but it removes the warning signal: oxygen runs out before the urge to breathe arrives.

That is why this practice must never be done in a bath, a pool, the sea, a cold plunge or an ice hole, even though cold water is part of the wider method. Cold exposure and the breathing are practised separately, at different times, with the breathing always on dry land.

Hyperventilation is also a standard way to provoke seizures. Doctors use it during EEG testing because typical absence seizures in children can be brought on by it, and a 2024 report described two adults with focal epilepsy whose usual seizures were consistently triggered by hyperventilation. People with epilepsy should not do this practice without their doctor's agreement.

In a small 8-week trial in 24 patients with an inflammatory spine disease the method caused no safety problems, but patients there were supervised and screened. For anyone with heart disease, high or low blood pressure or a pregnancy, the drop in oxygen and the adrenaline surge are reasons to get medical advice first.

• Stop at once if you feel faint, confused, see your vision narrow, or notice chest pain or jerking movements.
• Never practise in or near water, in the shower or bath, or anywhere a fall could hurt you.
• Never practise while driving, cycling or operating machinery, or just before.
• Do not combine the holds with exercise, such as push-ups during the hold.
• Do not compete with yourself or others on hold length.

Common Wim Hof breathing mistakes

Most problems come from pushing too hard. These are the mistakes that come up again and again, and how to avoid them.

• Forcing the exhale. The inhale is full, the exhale is a relaxed letting go. Pushing the air out makes the round harder without adding anything.
• Holding until you struggle. The hold ends at the first real urge to breathe, not when you are fighting it.
• Standing or sitting on an edge. If you black out, you need to be already lying or safely seated.
• Practising on a full stomach. Deep, fast breaths with a full stomach are uncomfortable; most people practise before breakfast.
• Treating hold times as a score. They change with sleep, time of day and practice, and say nothing about your health.
• Mixing it with cold water. Do the breathing on dry land and the cold exposure at another time.

Wim Hof breathing vs the physiological sigh and box breathing

All three of the fast-breathing-with-hold pattern, the physiological sigh, and box breathing were compared directly in the same 2023 Stanford trial, and all three improved mood over 5 weeks, though by different margins. If your goal is energy and alertness rather than calm, the fast-breathing pattern here fits that goal better than the slower, calming techniques on the physiological sigh and box breathing pages.

The Buteyko method is almost the opposite of Wim Hof breathing: instead of breathing more than usual, it trains you to breathe less, and its hold follows a gentle exhale rather than a stretch of over-breathing. In a 2024 trial, slow breathing gave the same gains in mood and stress as Wim Hof breathing with fewer dropouts, so if you only want calm, the slower techniques get you there with less risk.