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How to Get Into a Habit Faster, According to Research
It takes anywhere from 18 to 254 days to form a habit. Here’s how to land on the fast end.
Want to know why we think it takes 21 days to get into a new habit?
In 1960, a plastic surgeon named Maxwell Maltz observed that his patients took about 21 days to stop double-taking when seeing themselves in a mirror after getting a facelift or nose job. Maltz never studied habits; his interest was in how long it takes for an old mental image to dissolve and a new one to form. His book, about the power of self-image, sold 30 million copies and influenced big names in the self-help genre. People like Zig Ziglar and Tony Robbins popularized the 21-days-to-a-habit idea.
It’s nice to think that if we focus on a new behavior for three solid weeks, we’ll be able to do that thing without having to consciously decide to do it. Twenty-one days feels doable. But actual science by habit researcher Dr. Phillippa Lally shows that new habits take between 18 and 254 days to form; the average is 66.
How long it takes for a behavior to become habitual depends, for the most part, on how frequently the behavior is repeated. “Automaticity,” as researchers call it, strengthens with each repetition, quickly at first and then more slowly over time. Here are seven things that research shows can speed up that process.
1. Give your habit an anchor that happens only once a day.
In Lally’s study, participants were instructed to tie their behavior to something that occurred exactly once daily, like lunch or morning coffee. Your anchor won’t work if it fires at random, like your phone dinging, or at moments when you can’t or don’t want to do your behavior.
Anchor to an event, not a clock time. “After I pour my coffee” beats “at 7 a.m.,” because an event taps you on the shoulder while a time requires you to watch the clock. People assigned to anchor a new meditation practice to an existing routine were still practicing two months after the study ended, but those who picked a specific time of day instead mostly weren’t.
2. Aim for nearly every day, and front-load your effort.
The first two weeks are when your new habit is both most fragile and most valuable: automaticity grows fastest at the start, so your earliest repetitions buy you more than your later ones. Give the first two weeks a little elbow grease.
In Lally’s study, people who successfully formed habits performed the behavior on 88% of days; people who weren’t successful, practiced on only 60% of days. Missing three days a month versus twelve separated success from failure.
3. Make your daily behavior take less than 5 minutes.
Ask yourself honestly: what version of this behavior could I actually do on 26 or 27 days a month, including the days I’m tired, traveling, or out of time? That’s your starting version. This is the whole logic of the Better-Than-Nothing plan: consistency builds habits, and tiny behaviors make consistency possible.
4. Track your progress daily.
Even better, make tracking your progress the first habit you take on. Across 138 randomized studies involving nearly 20,000 people, those who physically recorded whether they performed the behavior, rather than just noting it mentally, were reliably more successful. Even a check on a paper calendar counts.
5. Find an accountability buddy.
In that same research, the effect was strongest when progress was shared. People who write down their goals, commit to specific actions, and report to a friend nearly double their odds of success.
6. But be careful what you tell them.
Announcing an identity goal can backfire: saying “I’m becoming a runner” delivers enough of the satisfaction of already being one that we become less likely to actually run. So tell your partner what you plan to do, not who you’re becoming. “I’m walking after lunch on Tuesday” works. “I’m becoming a woman who exercises” is best kept to yourself.
7. Shrug off a single miss, but never surrender a week.
You don’t need to do this thing perfectly; missing one day barely dents automaticity. But if you miss once, make a concerted effort not to miss again. Missing a full week is a different story: it predicts giving up.
Everyone in Lally’s study wanted their new habit, but about half didn’t succeed. What separated success from failure was how often someone actually did the thing. Every item above makes doing it easier: a smaller behavior, a once-a-day anchor, a checkmark, a friend. You’ll still need some self-control in the early weeks, but with each passing week you’ll need less and less.
So how long does it take to get into a new habit? Well, that depends on you. Not how ambitious you are, but how willing you are to do something day after day, even when you don’t feel like it.
Every Thursday, I post a research-based essay about how to live well in body, brain, and spirit. No supplement links, no 2+ hour podcast, and no promise that you’ll make it to 120. If that’s the kind of well-being you’re after, subscribe.
Research References
How long habits take to form:
Lally, P., van Jaarsveld, C. H. M., et al. (2010). How are habits formed: Modelling habit formation in the real world. European Journal of Social Psychology, 40(6), 998–1009.
Anchoring a new habit to an existing routine:
Stecher, C., Sullivan, M., & Huberty, J. (2021). Using personalized anchors to establish routine meditation practice with a mobile app: Randomized controlled trial. JMIR mHealth and uHealth, 9(12), e32794.
Tracking and sharing progress:
Harkin, B., et al. (2016). Does monitoring goal progress promote goal attainment? A meta-analysis of the experimental evidence. Psychological Bulletin, 142(2), 198–229.
Written goals and accountability:
Matthews, G. (2015). The impact of commitment, accountability, and written goals on goal achievement. Psychology | Faculty Presentations, 3. Dominican University of California.
Announcing identity goals:
Gollwitzer, P. M., Sheeran, P., et al. (2009). When intentions go public: Does social reality widen the intention-behavior gap? Psychological Science, 20(5), 612–618.
Maintaining a new behavior:
Armitage, C. J. (2005). Can the theory of planned behavior predict the maintenance of physical activity? Health Psychology, 24(3), 235–245.
