How long can you stay at your physical and mental best as you grow older? A new concept called peakspan is bringing this question into the conversation about longevity, shifting attention beyond how long people live to how long they maintain near-peak health and function.
Described in a paper published in the journal Aging & Disease, peakspan refers to the length of time a person remains close to their highest level of performance in a particular area of health. The idea offers a different perspective on aging, although it is not yet an established clinical measure or a proven way to extend life.
Alex Zhavoronkov, PhD, founder of biotechnology company Insilico Medicine and a co-author of the paper, argues that people typically spend only a limited period at their peak. He believes the concept could encourage greater attention to preserving physical and cognitive abilities throughout life.
The question is not simply how many years a person can add to their life, but how long they can maintain the abilities that help them remain active, independent and engaged.
What is peakspan, and how is it different from healthspan?
Peakspan focuses on how long someone stays close to their own best performance in a specific function. Under the paper’s proposed definition, researchers consider the period during which a person remains within 10% of the highest level they have achieved in that area.
This means peakspan is not necessarily a single measurement of overall health. Cardiovascular fitness, cognitive performance and other physical functions can follow different trajectories, so a person’s peakspan may vary across different organ systems and abilities.
The concept differs from lifespan, which measures how long someone lives, and healthspan, which broadly describes the period of life spent in good health.
Healthspan itself has no universally accepted definition. Some approaches emphasize living without major disease, while others also consider physical capability, mental well-being, independence and the ability to carry out everyday activities.
Mahtab Jafari, PharmD, director of the University of California, Irvine’s Center for Healthspan Sciences, argues that healthspan should involve maintaining the health and function a person has, rather than focusing only on the absence of disease.
Jay Luthar, MD, an integrative primary care physician based in Boston, has also questioned whether introducing more terms for different aspects of healthy aging adds practical value.
Their perspectives highlight an important distinction: peakspan offers a proposed way to think about maintaining peak function, but its usefulness will depend on how clearly researchers define, measure and apply the concept.
When does peak health begin to decline?
Many physical abilities reach their highest levels relatively early in adulthood, often during the 20s or 30s, according to the paper’s authors. As people age, accumulated cellular and molecular damage can contribute to declining function and an increased risk of disease.
However, aging does not follow the same timetable for everyone. Different organ systems change at different rates, and an individual’s health trajectory depends on a range of factors.
Someone who has been physically inactive in their 20s and 30s, for example, may not have reached their personal potential for fitness during those years. With appropriate exercise and lifestyle changes, that person may improve strength, endurance and physical capacity later in life.
Evidence also suggests that some aspects of physical and cognitive health can improve during older age.
A 2026 study published in Geriatrics, which assessed thousands of older adults over periods of up to 12 years, found that almost half of the participants improved in either cognitive or physical health during the study period.
The findings suggest that aging does not automatically mean continuous decline in every area of health. However, improvement in one domain does not mean that all age-related changes can be reversed.
The practical takeaway is that people can work towards better health at different stages of life. Their starting point, existing medical conditions, lifestyle and individual circumstances all influence what improvements may be possible.
Can you extend your peakspan?
If peakspan is about staying close to your best level of function, can lifestyle changes help extend it?
The answer depends on the individual, the function being considered and what researchers can establish about the concept. While healthy habits can support physical and cognitive health, there is not yet sufficient evidence to promise that a particular intervention will extend peakspan as a defined measure.
Zhavoronkov points to familiar interventions such as glasses, hearing aids, dentures and hip replacements as examples of ways to restore or support function. These interventions do not stop biological aging, but they can help people maintain abilities that matter in everyday life.
Other practical measures include regular physical activity, a balanced diet and meaningful social connections. These habits support overall health and healthy aging, although their effects vary between individuals and they cannot guarantee a particular lifespan or period of peak performance.
Preventive healthcare is also important. Identifying and managing health conditions, seeking appropriate medical advice and addressing changes in vision, hearing, mobility or cognition can help people preserve function and independence as they grow older.
Mahtab Jafari emphasizes that the best tools currently available for healthy aging remain relatively familiar lifestyle measures, rather than unproven anti-aging treatments.
For now, the goal is not to assume that people can remain at their lifetime peak indefinitely, but to identify realistic ways to maintain health and function for as long as possible.
Does your attitude towards aging matter?
The pursuit of peak health can also raise a less obvious concern: whether the pressure to stay young and perform at one's best can become counterproductive.
Luthar cautions that an excessive focus on optimizing health and extending youth may create anxiety and distract from other meaningful aspects of life, including happiness, wisdom, relationships and personal fulfillment.
Research has also explored the relationship between attitudes towards aging and health outcomes. In the 2026 Geriatrics study, participants whose cognitive or physical health improved tended to have more positive views of aging.
Separate research has examined whether anxiety about growing older is associated with poorer aging outcomes. Such findings need careful interpretation, however, because an association alone does not prove that worrying about aging directly accelerates biological aging.
A constructive approach means focusing on achievable improvements without treating every age-related change as a personal failure. It also means recognizing that health is about more than maintaining youthful performance.
What peakspan means for the future of longevity
Peakspan adds a new term to the growing discussion about longevity, but its scientific and clinical value remains to be established. Researchers will need to clarify how it should be measured and whether it offers meaningful information beyond existing concepts such as lifespan and healthspan.
There is currently no miracle drug proven to extend peakspan, and the concept should not be mistaken for a validated medical benchmark or a promise that aging can be stopped.
Its central question, nevertheless, is relevant to anyone thinking about healthy aging: beyond adding years to life, how can people preserve the physical abilities, cognitive function and independence that help make those years fulfilling?
Regular activity, balanced nutrition, social connection and appropriate healthcare remain practical starting points. The aim is not to keep the body and mind at their absolute peak forever, but to support the best possible health and quality of life at every age.
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