How Many Days Does It Take To Break a Habit?

Breaking a habit is not easy, and the ordeal may depend on the person trying to break free from it. There's no size-fits-all explanation for those asking how long it takes to break a habit.

How Many Days Does It Take to Break a Habit?

Some people have habits to break, such as overeating, staying up too late watching TV series, or constantly being late for work. Some believed it would only take 21 days. However, there's no concrete answer about how many days it takes to break a habit.

Neuroscientist Russell Poldrack, a professor at Stanford University and author of "Hard to Break: Why Our Brains Make Habits Stick," cited one study where the participants tried to create new habits like eating fruit before lunch or running before dinner, and the researchers learned that it takes between 18 to 254 days for a person to build a new habit.

A more recent study published in 2021 reported that it took a median of 59 days for participants to acquire a new habit, suggesting that the first research may have been correct. It's better not to count on a precise time frame, though, as there are a lot of factors to consider, and the study isn't very robust. Thus, it could take a few weeks to more than six months to break a habit or form a new one to break the old.

Meanwhile, Mindpath Health's Kiana Shelton, LCSW, said this is down to the brain, which doesn't distinguish between good and bad habits. According to her, unlearning bad habits could take 30 to 60 days.

Behavioral scientist Katy Milkman, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School and author of "How to Change," said there's "no magic number of days" to form a habit and the idea that there is a myth.

Purposefully forming new habits is challenging because they need a cue and a reward. According to Poldrack, the issue with new habits is that they are not prompted by external factors, making it simple to forget to perform them, particularly when they are not enjoyable.

Tips To Break A Habit

Mindpath Health shared some tips to move forward and unlearn bad habits. Here are some of the things that you can try on.

Identify habit trigger

Identify the precise trigger for the habit. Take this as a cue to start a new habit you want to develop, but not before carefully considering those cause-and-effect patterns in your life.

Start small

When trying to improve their behavior, people strive to make "huge overhauls." Jacinta M. Jiménez, PsyD, BCC, suggests that the secret to success is to start with minor changes. This implies that you might need to adjust your goal-achieving strategy, concentrating instead on what is doable and realistic regarding work and challenge.

Make it easy

Aside from making the change small, it should not require much effort. Otherwise, you would find it too challenging and return to your old ways. Jiménez suggests placing yourself at a three or four on a scale of zero to 10, where zero represents no effort and challenge, and 10 represents great effort and challenge. The expert emphasized that you are giving yourself the best opportunity to form a new habit by simplifying it.

Be mindful

Shelton has discovered that greater mindfulness is necessary for habit change to be successful. This implies that you can improve your mindfulness, or in-the-moment awareness, without being critical of yourself to kick a negative habit.

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