13 Step Machine Benefits Every Gym Goer Should Know

Since the days of neon leggings and Lycra bodysuits, gym goers have received plenty of step machine benefits!

But, what are the benefits of a step machine, also known as a stair climber, compared to simply walking up and down some ordinary stairs?

Well, let’s find out!

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Table of Contents

• What is a Stair Climber?
• Stair Climber Benefits
  • #1 – Engages Different Muscle Groups
  • #2 – Increases Bone Strength
  • #3 – Improved Metabolism
  • #4 – Improved Cardiovascular Health
  • #5 – Improved Mental Health
  • #6 – Sustainable & Accessible
  • #7 – Better Than Climbing Actual Stairs
  • #8 – Improves Joint Health
  • #9 – Aids Weight Loss
  • #10 – Muscle Tone
  • #11 – Great for Runners
  • #12 – Results
  • #13 – Workout Variation
• How to Get Started
• FAQs

What is a Stair Climber?

After its debut in 1983, stair climbers gained popularity as an effective workout for overall health. Whether you call it a stair climber, step mill machine, or stair stepper, it’s a great way to get your blood going.

A stair climber is a cardio machine that simulates the action of climbing stairs. It features a rotating platform with five to fifteen steps that move at adjustable speeds, allowing for both low- and high-impact workouts.

One key stair climber benefit is that it’s easier on the joints than real stairs, thanks to the machine’s softer pedals.

Because the steps move on a continuous loop, users must maintain both cadence and form to avoid injury, offering an effective and controlled workout.

So, without further ado, let’s get into some of the top stair climber machine benefits!

13 Stair Climber Benefits

#1 – Engages Different Muscle Groups

Climbing stairs requires significant muscle engagement, particularly in your lower body. The stair climber machine has workout benefits for many muscle groups, including:

• Quadriceps: These muscles are responsible for knee extension and are essential for everyday movements like walking, running, and even standing up from a seated position.
• Hamstrings: Crucial for the climbing motion, your hamstrings contract to extend the hip and drive momentum forward. To maximise hamstring gains, try climbing two or three steps at a time.
• Glutes: The gluteus maximus also extends the hip. For better glute activation and definition, straighten your leg fully after each step and squeeze your glutes at the top of the movement.
• Calves: These muscles provide the final push against gravity. To better target them, press upwards through your toes on each step.
• Core: Engage your abs by bracing your core before each step. This not only improves posture but also adds an extra challenge for your abdominal muscles.

#2 – Increases Bone Strength

The stair climber exercise machine benefits your bone strength as well as your muscle strength by forcing your body to resist gravity and rise vertically. The impact of exercise on bones works in a similar way to exercise on muscles – it makes them stronger.

Bone is living tissue and changes over time in response to any forces that act on it. Therefore, regular exercise encourages your bones to adapt over time by becoming denser.

However, you won’t see as many benefits of the stair climber machine in this area if you don’t combine your workouts with a proper diet, which is crucial to maintaining any gained bone strength. Specifically, calcium is needed for the bones to grow stronger. Calcium can be found in dairy products, leafy green vegetables, shellfish, tofu, and almonds.

It’s also important to include energy-boosting foods in your diet to keep you motivated during workouts.

#3 – Improved Metabolism

Your BMR (basal metabolic rate) refers to the amount of energy your body needs to maintain its homeostasis. It’s largely influenced by your lean muscle mass, which requires more energy to maintain.

One of the best step machine benefits is that it gives us control over our energy expenditure during exercise. Throughout the course of a workout, your muscles can burn through an impressive 3,000 kj per hour.

Any cardiovascular exercise, such as running, swimming, walking, or aerobics, acts on your metabolism in a stimulating way. These activities help burn calories and even temporarily suppress your appetite after a workout.

One of the stairmasters key benefits is that it engages your skeletal muscles, which helps boost metabolism. Over time, this can lead to increased calorie burn, improved muscle tone, and greater weight loss as lean muscle mass builds.

#4 – Improved Cardiovascular Health

Oxygen intake is the limiting factor with any form of physical activity. The more you take in, the longer you will be able to exercise. VO2 max refers to how much oxygen your body can absorb and use during exercise.

When stair climbing, your heart and lungs have to work hard to supply your body with the oxygen it needs in order to maintain your workout. The harder you push into this training, the more improvement you will see in your VO2 max. One study from the British Journal of Sports Medicine had young women climb stairs for a short duration for 5 days a week. After 8 weeks, VO2 max had improved by an average of 17%, highlighting how the step machine benefits your cardiovascular endurance over time.

The step machine goes far beyond simply increasing your oxygen flow: your resting heart rate lowers, your blood pressure normalises, and your cholesterol levels reduce. This all leads to another benefit of the stair climber machine – it may help you live longer!

One study that investigated men who climbed an average of 700 steps each week found that the men reduced their risk of death by 20%. You’d have to cover about two miles, taking around 30 to 40 minutes to achieve this result from walking. However, the men were able to use the stairs in mere minutes.

#5 – Improved Mental Health

The stair climber isn’t just beneficial for your physical health, consistent use can improve your mental health, mental toughness, and provide you with a mood-boosting rush of endorphins. Aerobic exercises such as swimming, running, and stair climber workouts can benefit your memory, improve your sleep, build resilience, reduce anxious feelings, and improve your self-esteem.

Scientists propose that the increase in blood flow to the brain plays a role, and that the endorphins released can improve your overall mental health over time.
In terms of mental toughness, the stair climber brings something special to the table: the psychology of defying gravity and always moving upwards can be an incredibly rewarding experience, encouraging you to push yourself to your limits each time you work out.

Exercise has many mental benefits, and the stair stepper delivers a powerful endorphin rush after your workout. Stair climbing is tough and requires consistent effort, but you’ll finish feeling exhausted and euphoric.

#6 – Sustainable & Accessible

It can be easy to become bored with your workout routines, and this can hinder your progression. When you’re looking for the right piece of gym equipment, the stair climber benefits from versatility. You can do a remarkable number of routines, each designed to target a different area of your lower body (or an all-around workout).

For example, you could follow a HIIT (high-intensity interval training) cardio circuit, designed to increase in difficulty:

• 30 seconds of jogging up the stairs at a moderate effort
• 30 seconds walking at a very easy effort
• 15 seconds running at a moderate effort
• 60 seconds of walking at a very easy effort
• 15 seconds of sprinting up the stairs at maximum effort

The stair stepper also benefits from accessibility and approachability. If you’re a first timer to the gym, it can be very overwhelming to decide where to begin, and learning how all the different machines work can be off-putting. Fortunately, with the stair climber, all you do is simply step on and start climbing!

Once you’re on, you can change the speed of the machine to adjust each of your workouts to your current fitness level. As you improve, you’ll be able to climb at a faster rate or for a longer period of time. If you don’t have access to the gym, you could try the mini stair stepper, which has benefits similar to the full-size machine.

#7 – Better Than Climbing Actual Stairs

Is the step machine better than climbing real stairs? After all, won’t you get the same results? Well, in short, the answer is no.

When you use the real thing, you have to come back down again, which can be a problem for your knees. As you descend, your connective tissue has to act as a brake to combat gravity’s pull.

However, when you use the stair climber, you don’t have to worry about any of this. You are constantly on the upward climb, meaning your connective tissues and joints are not being worn down. Plus, stair climbers fall away from you, reducing the strain required and leading to a sustainable pace noticeably higher than climbing real stairs.

Another advantage of the stairmaster over real stairs is targeted training. Unlike standard staircases, the machine offers adjustable resistance levels to support goals like fat loss, muscle gain, or strength.

Real stairs also have fixed heights, making it difficult to vary step size without discomfort. In contrast, stair climbers use levered pedals that adapt to your stride, keeping workouts challenging yet comfortable.

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#8 – Improves Joint Health

Climbing up the stairs is considered to be a low-impact exercise. This means that when you’re using the stair climber, your feet, shins, and knees suffer less stress than in other cardio workouts, such as running.

As a result, you can reap all the benefits of the stair climber without having to suffer through knee issues, shin splints, or other joint problems that occur from exercise. Using knee compression sleeves is an ideal way to help alleviate some of those knee pain symptoms, as well as provide additional support for your joints.

When comparing stair climber vs elliptical benefits, both support joint health, mobility, and offer low-impact workouts that build strength, lower stress, reduce blood pressure, and decrease injury risk.

Low-impact exercise is ideal for anyone, especially those who struggle with high-intensity or fast-paced training. Intensity is often measured by effort, if you can talk easily during exercise (the ‘talk test’), it’s likely low-impact, like walking or cycling. In contrast, high-impact exercises like running or stair climbing make conversation harder.

Regular stair stepper workouts help you achieve key health goals: maintaining a healthy weight, reducing the risk of heart disease and Type 2 diabetes, and strengthening bones and muscles.

#9 – Aids Weight Loss

Weight loss is one of the top reasons people exercise. For beginners, though, gym equipment can feel intimidating, and that’s where the step machine shines. It’s easy to use and ideal for weight management, even if you’re new to fitness.

Why It’s So Effective for Fat Loss:

• The stair stepper is a highly efficient calorie burner. Just 10 steps equate to 38 on flat ground (like a treadmill)
• A 68kg person can burn around 546 calories per hour
• With daily use, this can result in losing half a pound of fat per week, assuming a 7,000-calorie deficit per pound

Unlike other cardio machines, the stair stepper gets you into the fat-burning zone fast, typically within the first minute.

It’s Also a Full-Body Workout:

• Legs: Targets glutes, quads, hamstrings, and calves
• Core: Helps with balance and posture
• Arms: Engaged if not leaning on the handrails

By focusing on large muscle groups like the glutes and quads, you naturally burn more fat.

Top Tips for Maximum Results:

• Set custom intervals: Tailor your effort to match your fitness level and goals.
• Let go of the rails: Don’t lean your weight on the handrails if you want full muscle activation.
• Monitor your heart rate: Use the sensors to stay in your target heart rate zone, then take your hands off to keep the intensity up.

#10 – Muscle Tone

The stair climber provides a targeted workout for the glutes, thighs, hips, and abdominals, areas where we tend to store body fat. Regular use improves muscle tone, which is not only about appearance but also indicates a healthy low fat-to-muscle ratio.

Muscle tone refers to the ability of muscles to remain slightly contracted at rest, helping with posture, energy efficiency, and shock absorption. This makes toned muscles vital for maintaining balance, releasing energy during physical activity, and reducing injury risks.

As you use the stair climber, these benefits extend throughout your body, enhancing heart health, stamina, flexibility, and immune function. Improved muscle tone is also linked to better sleep and a more balanced skeletal-muscular system, allowing muscles to distribute physical stress more evenly.

While the stair climber works your lower body most, it’s important to complement your routine with upper-body exercises like bicep and tricep workouts to ensure overall strength and balance.

#11 – Great for Runners

If you’re a runner, adding the stair climber to your training regimen is a great move. Runners need lower-body strength and power for a successful workout. Because stair climbing forces your muscles to work against gravity, it provides both of those qualities.

Another major benefit of the step machine is that the gradient on the climber is as great as anything you’ll encounter on a real-life run. This increases your heart rate and makes you breathe faster to get more oxygen. Continuous use of the stair climber teaches your body to use that oxygen and convert it to energy quickly.

However, if you would like to challenge yourself to some harder terrain, trail running might be just the thing for you!

The step machine can also benefit your balance and coordination because the stair climber allows you to target muscle stabilisers such as the gluteus medius. This doesn’t get much stimulation during a real-life run, so you’ll feel a difference on your next run after working out.

Plus, the fact that you have to balance on one leg each time you step improves your overall balance, minimising any risk of injury on your next run.

#12 – Results

The stairmaster benefits weight loss for people who are overweight, and those who do little to no exercise will see fairly dramatic results within one or two weeks. If you’re already at a fairly healthy weight and do some exercise, you can expect to see weight loss within two to four weeks.

However, this is only as long as you combine the workout routine with a healthy diet. Or, if you’re a fitness veteran, weight loss will typically take a bit longer.

Because a step machine provides a great cardio workout while strengthening the main muscle groups in the lower body, you’re really getting two workouts done in the time it takes to do one. As a result, it will take less time for you to see and feel the benefits of your new workout routine. This is why one of the greatest advantages of stair steppers is the results you’ll see.

If you’re after better heart health, it’s recommended that you complete 150 minutes of intense exercise per week or 75 minutes of moderate exercise per week. This translates into about five 30-minute sessions on the stair climber. Within a week or two, you’ll feel your legs getting stronger and see them becoming more toned. If you’d like to track your heart rate during workouts, heart rate monitors are an effective way to do this.

You can also tailor this workout to what suits you most. If you’re after heart health, you’ll use the machine a little differently than if you’re after muscle growth.

#13 – Workout Variation

If you’re an exercise enthusiast, you’re always looking for ways to improve performance, but adaptive resistance can slow progress. This happens when your body no longer responds to a routine after performing it for a long time.

The stair climber helps avoid this by offering workout variations that keep things fresh and challenging.

For example, once you’re comfortable with a regular step, try alternating steps or walking backward to target different muscles like the hamstrings and calves. You can also mix the stair climber into circuit workouts with cardio and resistance equipment for a full-body challenge.

To intensify your cardio, incorporate HIIT, sidesteps, or high knees, and for muscle building, add squats, two-step motions, or weights. However, avoid excessive variation, stick to two or three exercises per muscle group to give your body time to adapt and perfect your form, ensuring steady progress.

How to Get Started

New to stair climbers? Don’t worry, follow these steps to get going confidently and safely.

Step 1

Begin by resting your hands gently on the support bar. If you’re feeling bold, try resting just your fingertips (The stair climber is ideally used without holding the support bar at all, but using it to get started or to keep your balance is perfectly fine).

Step 2

Now, put your right leg onto the first step, just as you would when climbing any flight of stairs. Depending on the machine, it will either automatically start when you step on, meaning that you have to climb as soon as you’re on, or wait for you to push start and choose a routine before moving away from underneath you.

Step 3

Once you’re on, try to stand upright with a very slight lean at the hips; this will help to stop your knees from locking and protect your lower back from overarching.

Step 4

Start by taking even, moderately deep steps rather than short, quick steps – this is tough on your calf muscles and reduces the number of calories you burn. Keep your entire foot on the pedal as this helps you to work out your glutes and thighs rather than putting all of the strain on your calf muscles.

Step 5

Keep going! Once you’ve got going, there’s not much more to explain. Complete your set and follow the final step to finish your workout.

Step 6

If you’re climbing at a fast pace, you’ll want to gradually slow your pace so the machine can slow down with you. Once slowed, you simply need to stop climbing for the machine to stop, and step off to complete your workout.

Now that we’ve discussed the basics, let’s get into some beginner stair climber workouts!

• One step, two step: Climb one stair at a time to work out your quads. Climb two stairs at a time to target your hamstrings and glutes. So, to get a full workout, mix the two together. Try five sets, alternating between one step and two steps.
• Squats: Stand with your feet shoulder-width apart and start the machine at a slow speed. Squat down, then spring up onto the next stair, ensuring your knees bend as you land. If you’re struggling with balance, keep your hands lightly on the support bar.
• Crossover steps: Step up with your right foot and place it on the next step where your left foot would usually land. Then step up with your left and place it where the right would land. You’ll notice that each foot literally crosses over the other. To keep your balance, keep your hands lightly on the support bar.
• Alternate leg raises: While stepping at a normal pace, bend slightly forward at the waist while kicking your leg out behind you. Ensure you contract your glutes as you kick to get the full benefit, then balance yourself as you return to the step. Repeat with the other leg.
• Sumo step: As you step, make an exaggerated step to the far edge of the step (if your left leg is climbing, go to the far left of the next step). As the name suggests, you should imitate the way a sumo walks. Maintain an upright back to reap the full benefits.
• Sidestep: Turn your body sideways so you are no longer facing the machine. Step up with your foot, then cross over and up with your other foot. Do a pre-set number of steps on that side, then turn to the opposite side of the machine and climb again to work out your other side. You may lightly hold the support bar here as it requires some coordination.

FAQs

How long should you work out on a stair climber for?

If you’re new to the stair climber, start with a 10-15 minute session to get you used to it. Remember, you can always come back to it again during a circuit!

For the more experienced user, aim to stay on for 30 minutes, incorporating some alternate exercises for a great fat-burning session. All users should start with a 5-minute warm-up at a low intensity to get their bodies prepared for the full workout.

Before you begin, it’s also best to warm your legs up by performing stretches, so take a look at our articles on the best calf stretches and hamstring stretches to get started.

How often should you use the stair climber?

The vast majority of health associations, such as the NHS and British Heart Foundation, recommend 150 minutes of moderate-intensity aerobic exercise per week to maintain a strong, healthy body. This equates to five 30-minute sessions on the stair climber per week.

However, if you are able to do cardiovascular exercise every day, then you definitely should. Due to the low-impact nature of stair climbers, you won’t be putting strain on your body; only be making it stronger.

Keep in mind that 150 minutes of exercise a week is the minimum amount you should be aiming for, so always try and do more if you can.

Is a stair climber better than a treadmill?

This all comes down to what your fitness goals are. If you’re looking to improve your heart and lung health or give yourself a killer leg and core workout, you’ll want to use the stair climber. However, if you’re looking to burn as many calories as you can before feeling exhausted, the treadmill is a better option.

If you’re a runner but are not sure which machine to choose, keep in mind that one of the benefits of the stair climber is that it is a lower-impact alternative to the treadmill, which makes it useful for reducing the risk of injury.

Nevertheless, just like the stairmaster, running on a treadmill has plenty of benefits.

Is the stair climber better than running?

Both of these physical activities are fantastic options for a cardiovascular workout, but whether one is better depends on a few different factors. Stair climbing is low-impact, so less pressure is placed on the legs, ankles, and knees, while also offering more aerobic and muscle-building benefits than running does. On the other hand, running burns a higher number of calories, so if weight loss is your goal, this may be the way to go.

However, as with most types of exercise, it depends more on how intense the activity is, not necessarily the activity itself. For example, a long, uphill run will be more beneficial to your body than a slow stair climber workout and vice versa.

Is the stair climber good for losing weight?

Stair climbers are one of the best fat-burning exercises as they focus on strengthening the lower body, toning the glutes, thighs and calves, and losing inches on the waist.

It makes a fantastic full-body workout because it focuses on some of the largest muscles in your body, as well as providing benefits for your lungs and cardiovascular system.

Stair stepper machines are best used when incorporated into larger workouts. When being used alongside other gym equipment or such as treadmills and weights, it is likely to burn more calories, tone different areas of your body by providing a full workout.

Before You Go

While stair climbers aren’t the newest, flashiest pieces of equipment, we hope this article has shown that these machines are not to be overlooked. Whether you want to manage your weight or simply improve your heart and joint health, the stair climber machine can benefit any fitness level.

If you have a passion for all things health and fitness related, a rewarding career in the industry might just be the thing for you. OriGym’s CIMSPA-accredited Level 3 Diploma in Personal Training is the perfect first step to launch your career. Even better, it can be completed in whatever way suits you best – either online, in the classroom, or a mixture of both!

Alternatively, download our FREE prospectus to see the range of courses we have on offer here at OriGym to find the ideal one for you.

References

Scribbans, Trisha D et al., ‘The Effect of Training Intensity on Vo2max in Young Healthy: A-Meta Regression and Meta-Analysis’ in International Journal of Exercise (April 2016, Vol.9, Issue 2), 230-247. PMID: 27182424.
Fletcher, Gerard F et al., ‘Exercise Standards for Testing and Training: A Statement for Healthcare Professionals From the American Heart Association’ in Circulation (October 2001, Vol. 104, No. 14) 1694-1740, doi: 10.1161/hc3901.095960.