Sport and Physical Activity: State of the Nation

The report and tables are intended to sit alongside the Physical Activity For Health: Scotland’s National Framework, published September 2024, to provide an understanding of sport and physical activity levels in Scotland over the decade 2014 to 2024 leading up to publication of the new Framework.

The data is from the Scottish Health Survey (SHeS) and the Scottish Household Survey (SHS). Together, these surveys provide national estimates of adherence to the Chief Medical Officer’s (CMO) guidelines for moderate to vigorous physical activity (MVPA) levels and muscle-strengthening1, low activity levels, sport and walking participation, and sedentary behaviour for children, adults and older adults and enables analysis of trends around inequalities including sex, age, deprivation and disability.

Key findings

• Amongst children and young people, the proportion who reported levels of physical activity that met the CMO guidelines for MVPA have remained relatively stable since 2019 but have declined since peaks in 2014 and 2016.
• There are certain groups of particular concern including girls age 13-15 who have markedly lower activity levels than other age and sex groups.
• The youngest female adult age group (16-24) has increased their adherence to the CMO guidelines whilst for males there has been a decrease such that in 2024 there was no inequality gap by sex in this age group.
• In general, activity levels and trends for both adults and children in Scotland are broadly comparable with those in many other European nations.