The claim
“Eleven minutes of cold a week is the ideal dose.”
Hot air. A 2021 paper added up the cold-water habits that seven Danish winter swimmers reported and got 11 minutes a week. The study never assigned or compared a dose, and in the lab it cooled people with blankets that had cold water running through them.
Updated Sep 24, 2026 · 1 study reviewed
Nothing solid supports it, or the best evidence runs against it.
People say it in places like these
Huberman Lab newsletter
Aim for 11 minutes of cold a week in total and treat that as the minimum.
See an example ↗Susanna Søberg on Huberman Lab
Eleven minutes a week in total is a low threshold people can aim for.
See an example ↗Polar Monkeys
The research-supported target for most goals is about 11 minutes of cold a week.
The research found this
The figure comes from a 2021 study in Cell Reports Medicine by Susanna Søberg and colleagues in Denmark. They compared young men who swam in cold water through the winter with men who used neither cold water nor sauna. The two groups were matched on age, sex, BMI and aerobic fitness.Source 1 · Cross-sectional studyAltered brown fat thermoregulation and enhanced cold-induced thermogenesis in young, healthy, winter-swimming menSøberg S, Löfgren J, Philipsen FE, et al.. Cell Reports Medicine, 2021.Read the paper ↗PubMed ↗ The team recruited eight swimmers and dropped one because his scan showed no cold-activated brown fat, so the results cover seven.
Table 1 of the paper lists what the swimmers said they did. On average they swam 2.6 times a week and got into the water 2.6 times per visit. Each dip averaged 1.4 minutes. The spread around that figure (a standard deviation of 2.6 minutes) was bigger than the average itself, so habits varied a lot from man to man. Add it all up and the table comes to 11 minutes of cold water and 57 minutes of sauna heat a week.Source 1 · Cross-sectional studyAltered brown fat thermoregulation and enhanced cold-induced thermogenesis in young, healthy, winter-swimming menSøberg S, Löfgren J, Philipsen FE, et al.. Cell Reports Medicine, 2021.Read the paper ↗PubMed ↗
To test how each group handled cold, the researchers had the men lie under two water-cooled blankets. They lowered the water temperature step by step, according to how cold each man felt, until he was just short of shivering.Source 1 · Cross-sectional studyAltered brown fat thermoregulation and enhanced cold-induced thermogenesis in young, healthy, winter-swimming menSøberg S, Löfgren J, Philipsen FE, et al.. Cell Reports Medicine, 2021.Read the paper ↗PubMed ↗ Over 30 minutes of that cooling, the swimmers burned energy at a rate equal to 3,044 kcal a day and the controls at 2,560. At a comfortable temperature the two groups burned about the same.
The swimmers' tissue fat averaged 12.0%, against 18.2% in the controls, and their glucose tolerance was better. The authors suggest that men whose bodies handle cold in a particular way may be the ones who take up winter swimming in the first place.Source 1 · Cross-sectional studyAltered brown fat thermoregulation and enhanced cold-induced thermogenesis in young, healthy, winter-swimming menSøberg S, Löfgren J, Philipsen FE, et al.. Cell Reports Medicine, 2021.Read the paper ↗PubMed ↗
The dial reads 89°H for four reasons
How the reading adds up
22 + 18 + 25 + 24 = 89°H
EvidenceWhat kind of human evidence exists?
22/25Researchers have never tested 11 minutes, or any other weekly total, against a health outcome. The figure is a line in Table 1 of a one-time comparison between seven winter swimmers and eight men who used neither cold water nor sauna.Source 1 · Cross-sectional studyAltered brown fat thermoregulation and enhanced cold-induced thermogenesis in young, healthy, winter-swimming menSøberg S, Löfgren J, Philipsen FE, et al.. Cell Reports Medicine, 2021.Read the paper ↗PubMed ↗
ConsistencyHave other studies found the same thing?
18/25The number describes the habits of one small group. Ending a shower with 30 to 90 seconds of cold cut self-reported days off sick by the same amount in one trial, and 5 minutes in cold sea water lifted mood as much as 20 in another.Source 2 · Randomized trialThe Effect of Cold Showering on Health and Work: A Randomized Controlled TrialBuijze GA, Sierevelt IN, van der Heijden BCJM, et al.. PLOS ONE, 2016.Read the paper ↗PubMed ↗Source 3 · Randomized trialImproved Mood Following Cold‐Water Immersion: A Comparison of Differing Exposure DurationsKelly JS, Davidson N, Delaney JP. Lifestyle Medicine, 2026.Read the paper ↗
MagnitudeDoes the claim match the size of the effect?
25/25The study only compared the swimmers with men who took no cold dips or saunas, so it can't call 11 minutes ideal or rank it against any other amount.Source 1 · Cross-sectional studyAltered brown fat thermoregulation and enhanced cold-induced thermogenesis in young, healthy, winter-swimming menSøberg S, Löfgren J, Philipsen FE, et al.. Cell Reports Medicine, 2021.Read the paper ↗PubMed ↗
DoseDoes the studied dose match how people use it?
24/25The researchers never gave anyone 11 minutes of cold. In the lab the men lay under cooling blankets, and the only immersion in the protocol was one hand in 4°C water for 3 minutes.Source 1 · Cross-sectional studyAltered brown fat thermoregulation and enhanced cold-induced thermogenesis in young, healthy, winter-swimming menSøberg S, Löfgren J, Philipsen FE, et al.. Cell Reports Medicine, 2021.Read the paper ↗PubMed ↗
The claim drifts from the data here
The Huberman Lab newsletter of 1 May 2022 turned the table entry into a target. It recommended about 11 minutes of deliberate cold a week and credited a recent study without naming it.Source 4 · PodcastThe Science & Use of Cold Exposure for Health & PerformanceHuberman Lab. Huberman Lab Neural Network newsletter, 2022.Read the page ↗ In the paper, the figure describes what seven swimmers reported doing, and nothing in the study tests it.Source 1 · Cross-sectional studyAltered brown fat thermoregulation and enhanced cold-induced thermogenesis in young, healthy, winter-swimming menSøberg S, Löfgren J, Philipsen FE, et al.. Cell Reports Medicine, 2021.Read the paper ↗PubMed ↗
The swimmers also spent 57 minutes a week in the sauna, and the paper speculates that getting used to that heat might explain why they ran cooler and showed no brown fat activity at a comfortable temperature.Source 1 · Cross-sectional studyAltered brown fat thermoregulation and enhanced cold-induced thermogenesis in young, healthy, winter-swimming menSøberg S, Löfgren J, Philipsen FE, et al.. Cell Reports Medicine, 2021.Read the paper ↗PubMed ↗ The newsletter's advice to end on cold has never been tested.
Put it to use
Pick an amount of cold you'll keep up and skip the stopwatch. In trials that compared doses, 30 seconds of cold at the end of a shower cut days off sick as much as 90 seconds did, and 5 minutes in the sea lifted mood as much as 20.Source 2 · Randomized trialThe Effect of Cold Showering on Health and Work: A Randomized Controlled TrialBuijze GA, Sierevelt IN, van der Heijden BCJM, et al.. PLOS ONE, 2016.Read the paper ↗PubMed ↗Source 3 · Randomized trialImproved Mood Following Cold‐Water Immersion: A Comparison of Differing Exposure DurationsKelly JS, Davidson N, Delaney JP. Lifestyle Medicine, 2026.Read the paper ↗
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People also ask
Where does the 11 minutes of cold a week come from?
It comes from Table 1 of a 2021 Danish study. The table adds up the self-reported habits of seven young winter swimmers to 11 minutes of cold water and 57 minutes of sauna a week, and the study never tested that amount against any other.Source 1 · Cross-sectional studyAltered brown fat thermoregulation and enhanced cold-induced thermogenesis in young, healthy, winter-swimming menSøberg S, Löfgren J, Philipsen FE, et al.. Cell Reports Medicine, 2021.Read the paper ↗PubMed ↗
How many minutes of cold exposure a week do you need?
Research hasn't settled on a number. In trials that compared session lengths, short sessions did as well as long ones for sick days and for mood.Source 2 · Randomized trialThe Effect of Cold Showering on Health and Work: A Randomized Controlled TrialBuijze GA, Sierevelt IN, van der Heijden BCJM, et al.. PLOS ONE, 2016.Read the paper ↗PubMed ↗Source 3 · Randomized trialImproved Mood Following Cold‐Water Immersion: A Comparison of Differing Exposure DurationsKelly JS, Davidson N, Delaney JP. Lifestyle Medicine, 2026.Read the paper ↗
Did the Søberg study use cold plunges?
Its lab tests didn't. The researchers put the men under water-cooled blankets until they were just short of shivering, and the only immersion was one hand held in 4°C water for 3 minutes. The winter swimming happened in the men's own lives, so the paper only records what they said they did.Source 1 · Cross-sectional studyAltered brown fat thermoregulation and enhanced cold-induced thermogenesis in young, healthy, winter-swimming menSøberg S, Löfgren J, Philipsen FE, et al.. Cell Reports Medicine, 2021.Read the paper ↗PubMed ↗
Check these claims next
92°H
Hot air
“End your sauna session on cold to burn more fat.”
No human study has compared finishing a sauna session on cold with finishing it on heat for fat burning or anything else. Andrew Huberman named the rule after Susanna Søberg, and her 2021 paper never mentions it.
72°H
Stretched
“Cold plunges burn fat by switching on brown fat.”
Cold does switch on brown fat in adults. In the one controlled trial that measured fat, men who spent two hours a day in 17°C air lost 0.7 kg of it over six weeks. Plunges haven't been tested for fat loss.
74°H
Stretched
“A cold plunge raises your dopamine by 250%.”
The 250% came from blood tests after a full hour in 14°C water, and the same lab saw no significant rise when it ran that hour four years earlier. Most blood dopamine comes from nerves and the gut and barely reaches the brain.
We cited these sources
- 01Søberg S, Löfgren J, Philipsen FE, Jensen M, Hansen AE, Ahrens E, et al.. Altered brown fat thermoregulation and enhanced cold-induced thermogenesis in young, healthy, winter-swimming men. Cell Reports Medicine. 2021;2(10):100408. doi:10.1016/j.xcrm.2021.100408 PMID 34755128
- 02Buijze GA, Sierevelt IN, van der Heijden BCJM, Dijkgraaf MG, Frings-Dresen MHW. The Effect of Cold Showering on Health and Work: A Randomized Controlled Trial. PLOS ONE. 2016;11(9):e0161749. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0161749 PMID 27631616
- 03Kelly JS, Davidson N, Delaney JP. Improved Mood Following Cold‐Water Immersion: A Comparison of Differing Exposure Durations. Lifestyle Medicine. 2026;7(2):e70048. doi:10.1002/lim2.70048
- 04Huberman Lab. The Science & Use of Cold Exposure for Health & Performance. Huberman Lab Neural Network newsletter. 2022. Accessed Sep 24, 2026.