Life's Essential 8

Life's Essential 8 is the American Heart Association's way of scoring heart health. It looks at eight things: diet, physical activity, nicotine exposure, sleep, body mass index, blood fats, blood sugar and blood pressure. Each gets 0 to 100 points, and the average of the eight is the overall score, also 0 to 100. It updates the AHA's earlier Life's Simple 7, adds sleep health, and is meant for people across the whole life course. This page describes the score as the AHA defines it; it does not record how well the score predicts outcomes.

Care topic
In this atlas

Overview

Technical summary

AHA presidential advisory (Circulation, 2022; PubMed 35766027); only the PubMed abstract was read (the PMC copy is not in the open-access subset). The abstract says diet, nicotine exposure, blood lipids and blood glucose were updated, sleep health is new, and the age spectrum was expanded to the entire life course. The composite score is the unweighted average of the components. The advisory also discusses social determinants of health and psychological health as foundational contexts and methods for implementing assessment; none of that detail is recorded here.

Scope

A scoring construct for cardiovascular health with eight components (diet, physical activity, nicotine exposure, sleep health, body mass index, blood lipids, blood glucose and blood pressure), scored 0 to 100 each, and a composite score that is the unweighted average of the components. The AHA expanded its age spectrum to the entire life course.

Life stages: Whole life course (AHA advisory abstract)
Care setting: Not reported

Claims and evidence

Context Whole life course, American Heart Association's cardiovascular health score

Recipient: Mixed recipients
Population: Individuals and populations across the whole life course (the advisory abstract says the age spectrum was expanded to include the entire life course).
Care setting: Not stated in the source: the abstract mentions policy, public health, clinical, institutional and community settings for implementation.
Geography: Not stated in the source.
Life stage: Whole life course
Gestational age: Not reported
Postnatal age: Not reported
Follow-up: Not stated in the source.

Eligibility: inclusion criteria not stated; exclusion criteria not stated

Included: None stated
Excluded: None stated

Description Guidance Certainty not assessed

The American Heart Association's presidential advisory introduces Life's Essential 8 as an enhanced approach to assessing cardiovascular health. Its components are diet (updated), physical activity, nicotine exposure (updated), sleep health (new), body mass index, blood lipids (updated), blood glucose (updated) and blood pressure. Each metric has a new scoring algorithm ranging from 0 to 100 points, and the unweighted average of the components gives a composite cardiovascular health score that also varies from 0 to 100 points. The age spectrum was expanded to include the entire life course.
Applies to Mixed recipients
- Individuals and populations across the whole life course (the advisory abstract says the age spectrum was expanded to include the entire life course).
- Not stated in the source: the abstract mentions policy, public health, clinical, institutional and community settings for implementation.
- Not stated in the source.
- Whole life course
- Gestational age Not reported
- Postnatal age Not reported
Follow-up Not stated in the source.
Certainty method
Not assessed

Limitations
This is the American Heart Association's definition of its own score. The abstract gives no data on how well the score predicts outcomes. Only the PubMed abstract was read; the PMC copy is not in the open-access subset.

Last checked
2026-10-15

Next evidence check due
Not scheduled
Sources and citations (1)
1. Supports Life's Essential 8: Updating and Enhancing the American Heart Association's Construct of Cardiovascular Health: A Presidential Advisory From the American Heart Association
  
  Publication · Circulation · Edition PubMed record (abstract and bibliographic data) from NCBI E-utilities. The full text and the version of record were not fetched. · Published 2022-08-02 · DOI: 10.1161/CIR.0000000000001078 · PMID: 35766027 · PMCID: PMC10503546
  
  Locator
  Abstract, paragraph 1, sentences 5 to 9
  
  How it applies
  Components, scoring and age spectrum.
  
  Retrieved
  2026-10-15T13:48:15Z
  
  Source effective date
  Not reported
  
  Source state
  Current
  
  Snapshot hash
  8bdb4a57234216d39ecfe9513273a4e389dcafc78b879acf61a96ecf5988874c
  
  Reuse basis
  PubMed record fetched through NCBI E-utilities. Only the hash of the bytes is kept, because publisher copyright may apply to the abstract (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/disclaimer/). Short factual quotations under 25 words, with the citation.

Record details

Record id: cardio:lifes-essential-8
Content hash: ddfa89c9b6c173fd4755f464d9836a0f02fd74010c18807548da3a8a25125b43