Even During the Extended Chuseok Holiday, People Keep Walking... "Nine in 10 Will Stick to Their Exercise Routine"

[Financial News] As walking and running have become leading forms of sports for all that can be easily incorporated into daily life, more people are seeking to maintain their usual exercise habits even during the extended Chuseok holiday. With the proportion of people who regularly participated in sports for all exceeding 60% last year, a survey found that nearly nine in 10 walking-app users planned to manage their step counts during the Chuseok holiday.
 According to the 2026 Chuseok Holiday Health Management Survey conducted from the 1st to the 10th by Nudge Healthcare among 711 users of its health-management app CashWalk, 86.8% of respondents said they planned to manage their step counts during the Chuseok holiday.
 The most common response, at 44.2%, was "I will aim for about the same number of steps as usual." This was followed by "I will still try to get a certain number of steps, even if I walk less than usual" at 23.2% and "I plan to walk more than usual" at 19.4%. Only 13.1% said they would "not pay particular attention to their step count."
 The findings reflect the broader trend of walking becoming an everyday means of managing one's health.
 According to the 2025 Community Health Survey released this year by the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA), the median rate of people meeting the walking criterion across cities, counties and districts nationwide was 49.2%. Although the figure was down 0.5 percentage points from 49.7% the previous year, it was 10.5 percentage points higher than the 38.7% recorded in 2016. The walking rate refers to the proportion of people who walked for at least 10 minutes at a time and at least 30 minutes in total per day on five or more days during the previous week.
 Walking also accounts for a large share of sports for all. According to the 2025 National Sports for All Survey released in January by the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism (MCST), 62.9% of people regularly participated in sports for all at least once a week for 30 minutes or more per session, up 2.2 percentage points from the previous year. Among the activities most commonly pursued by regular participants, walking accounted for the largest share at 40.5%. Running also rose to 7.7% from 4.8% the previous year.
 Exercise habits developed during ordinary times also appear to continue through the holiday.
 In the CashWalk survey, 91.4% of users who usually walked at least 7,000 steps a day said they would continue to manage their step counts during the Chuseok holiday. That was 19.3 percentage points higher than the 72.1% reported among users who walked fewer than 5,000 steps a day.
 Physical activities planned for the holiday likewise centered on exercises that are easy to do in daily life. "Walking" was the most common response at 61.0%, followed by walking during travel or outings at 27.8%, visiting ancestral graves and clearing weeds from them at 18.0%, running or jogging at 14.6%, and home workouts at 10.4%.
 Respondents also planned to resume exercising soon after the holiday. A total of 58.1% said they would restart "immediately after the holiday ends." Including those who chose "within two to three days after the holiday ends," 72.0% planned to resume exercising within three days of the holiday's conclusion.
 CashWalk is a health-management app operated by Nudge Healthcare that rewards users based on their step counts. Nudge Healthcare also operates the mental-care app Trost and the diet habit-management service Geniet.
 Park Jung-shin, CEO of Nudge Healthcare, said, "We confirmed that users intend to manage their step counts and continue their usual health-management habits even during the holiday." Park added, "We will provide a range of services so that people can keep walking consistently and maintain healthy lifestyle habits amid changes to their daily routines."


[email protected] Jung Sang-hee Reporter