Do you regularly feel achey, tired, and older than your years? Your biological age might be higher than it should be. Follow these lifestyle and exercise tips from biohacking pioneer Davinia Taylor and see how you could start feeling younger than ever.
Words: Amy Mica Marsden. Images: Will Powder/Nathan Damour
What is biological age?
You might think that your age is purely how many years you’ve lived — but this is actually known as your ‘chronological age’.
Biological age refers instead to the condition of your tissues and cells, as well as any ‘epigenetic changes’ (changes to your DNA), which can be a good indicator of your overall health and longevity and may help to predict your chances of certain problems such as heart disease, type 2 diabetes, and more.
Your biological age can be measured in a few ways, but one of the main methods involves checking the length of your telomeres — the protective DNA caps at the ends of your chromosomes. Shorter telomeres generally indicate a higher risk of disease.
In fact, in a 2025 study published in The Lancet Digital Health led by a team from University College London, researchers found that while organs age at different rates, their health can predict not only disease in that specific organ but diseases across the entire body — whole decades in advance.
According to the European Health Interview Survey, 50.1% of women in the UK reported having a chronic health problem from 2019-2020, and more women than men (22.3% vs 18.5%) reported being at least somewhat limited in activities because of this.
This is why it’s even more important to keep an eye on your health and keep your biological age low.
How can I lower my biological age?
Many lifestyle factors can influence your biological age — including exercise, diet, sleep, smoking, stress levels, and even your physical environment.
Thankfully a high biological age isn’t permanent. Small and consistent diet and lifestyle changes can make all the difference in reducing this number and generally improving your health and quality of life, as well as lowering your risk of diseases in the long run.
Most of these changes are things you’d already expect from a healthy lifestyle; things such as eating a healthy diet, getting enough sleep, reducing stress, and avoiding or quitting smoking.
There’s also growing evidence from a team at the University of Massachusetts Boston which suggests that physical activity and exercise can help to lengthen those all-important telomeres, and even protect against the harmful effects of stress, too.
‘Stress is the world’s biggest killer,’ says biohacking pioneer and 3x Sunday Times bestseller Davinia Taylor, who spoke to us about how she reduced her biological age a whole 27 years, from 47 to 20. ‘[Stress is] the biggest ager. Just ask anyone who’s got divorced. Ask anyone who’s moved house. You feel ancient.’
So how does it feel once you’ve reduced your biological age? ‘The difference is like night and day,’ Davinia told us. ‘I was about 35 when I was at my rock bottom, and I felt 70 then.
‘I felt tired, I couldn’t be bothered taking the kids out, I just wanted to watch daytime TV… Every single time I went upstairs I huffed and puffed… [now] it’s completely different. I run a company, I’ve got four kids, I’ve travelled the world.’
‘I couldn’t have done that back then, it would have been too overwhelming. I would have felt insecure, but I’ve got my confidence back.’
Try these ten lifestyle swaps and tips from Davinia to up your health and fitness, reduce your biological age and feel ten years younger.
10 lifestyle tips and exercises to reduce your biological age
- Weighted vest
Davinia recommends wearing a weighted vest for extra fitness help without even realising it. ‘Just go about your day with a little bit more weight on. They’re really good because it disperses the weight front and back and it’ll help stave off osteoporosis.’
- Incline walk
If you have access to a treadmill, or just some nearby hills, Davinia swears by an incline walk.
‘It doesn’t have to be super high,’ she says, ‘not like you’re going up a mountain. If you just incline it slightly between 1% and 2%… it activates the glutes and the hamstring, which is the biggest muscle group in the body, which helps you keep your metabolism ticking over.’
- Plank
‘If you can, do a plank a day,’ Davinia mentions. ‘It’s a great all-round exercise — just do it before you get in the shower or while the bath’s running. Put some music on and plank for one minute.’
And if you can’t do it for a minute, Davinia suggests just trying for as long as you can instead and build it up day by day. You might be surprised at how quickly your stamina builds.
‘It will save your abs, your pelvic floor, it strengthens every bit of your body.’
- Running
Studies have shown that running has a wife range of life-lengthening benefits. In fact, according to a study titled Running as a Key Lifestyle Medicine for Longevity, runners have a 25-40% reduced risk of premature mortality and live approximately three years longer than non-runners!
‘I’m a runner because I can just put my favourite music on and transcend. I have ADHD so I need that dopamine.’
If you want to try running but you’re put off by the increasingly chilly temperatures, try our guide to running in cold weather here!
- Lunges
Another great exercise which also helps your glutes — the biggest muscle group in your body and the one which can give you the biggest reward the fastest — is lunges.
‘When I can’t be bothered doing anything, I’ll just focus on the biggest muscle group. So that’ll be lunges, walking lunges, holding weights, doing as many as I can.
‘I’ll do curtseys holding weights, too.’
- Power Plate
‘Another thing that I really like, that we’ve put in our office because they’ve gone out of fashion in gyms, is a Power Plate,’ explains Davinia, when discussing the importance of stretching and staying limber. ‘You can get a deeper stretch [while using a Power Plate] because the brain isn’t concentrating on the length of the stretch any more.’
- Sauna
‘I’ve got a little pop-up [infrared] sauna… that got me through lockdown. I’ve done it virtually every day through lockdown and up to now, and I believe it’s kept me sane.’
Saunas are often praised for their detoxifying abilities, which is something Davinia believes in the importance of wholeheartedly. ‘If you can detox every night, you are reducing your stress load, which reduces your age. If you’re not in a stressful mode, you’re not going to age yourself.’
- Lymphatic drainage massage
Another way to detoxify and get everything moving is lymphatic drainage, another thing which Davinia swears by. ‘The lymphs are really important, particularly for women.’
‘If you’re going to do anything, at least brush under your arms. We don’t want want any stagnation on the lymphs.
‘There’s loads of tutorials online. We should all be doing it, but we don’t.’
Try this full-body lymphatic drainage massage routine to start.
- Journaling
Davinia also recognises the importance of your mind and mental health when it comes to lowering your biological age.
‘At night, write down everything that’s pissed you off — use pen and paper, not your phone.’
‘If I write three things down that have wound me up in the day, for some reason I don’t hold that resentment into the next day, or even subconsciously in my sleep. If it works, it works.’
- Breathwork
‘I like doing Wim Hof — it’s extremely good for the whole cardiovascular system.’
Davinia recommends even just doing three minutes of breathwork a day as an easy way to up your health without even having to put your trainers on. ‘Just get into a habit. When the commercials are on TV or you find yourself scrolling, just set a clock and do a round of Breath of Fire [a fast-paced breathing technique used in yoga].’
‘Every single part of your body will get a flush of oxygen that’s almost like a detox as well, and I find it calms the nervous system.’
Davinia is an ambassador for WillPowders; visit them at www.willpowders.com, or follow Davinia at @DaviniaTaylor
