what does sedentary mean

“Sedentary” means spending a lot of time sitting down and doing very little physical activity. It’s often used to describe low‑movement jobs or lifestyles, like office work or long hours on the couch.

Core meaning

• A sedentary job or activity: You sit most of the time and move very little (for example, desk work, long gaming or TV sessions).
• A sedentary person: Someone who rarely exercises and spends much of the day sitting or lying down.
• In a more technical/biology sense: Staying in one place instead of moving around (for example, some animals or populations that don’t migrate).

A simple way to remember it: if your day is mostly “chair, couch, bed, repeat,” that’s a sedentary day.

In everyday life

You’ll often see “sedentary” in phrases like:

• “Sedentary lifestyle”
• “Sedentary office job”
• “Too sedentary during the week”

People use it a lot in health discussions, because being sedentary for long periods is linked to various health risks, which is why you’ll hear advice like “sit less, move more.”

Tiny example story

Imagine Alex, who wakes up, drives to work, sits at a computer for eight hours, drives home, then spends the evening streaming shows on the couch. Alex might go the whole day with only a few hundred steps. That day, and often Alex’s lifestyle in general, would be called sedentary. TL;DR: “Sedentary” = mostly sitting, very little movement or physical activity, whether it’s a job, a lifestyle, or a person.