The 75 Medium challenge is six daily habits held for 75 days. Each day you do one 45 minute workout, hit a water target, and follow a diet 90 percent of the time. You also read for ten minutes, meditate or pray for five, and take a photo on day 1 and day 75. A missed day does not send you back to day one.
It sits between 75 Hard and 75 Soft. It keeps the daily structure of the first and drops the all or nothing restart. There is also no official version. Cleveland Clinic said so plainly in July 2026, and rule lists online disagree on alcohol, photos, and reading.
This page gives you the most common rule set and shows where versions differ. Then it covers what a rule list leaves out. That means what 90 percent looks like in numbers, your end date, and what to do after a missed day.
The 75 Medium Challenge Rules
These are the six rules most versions share. You do all six every day for 75 days.
- One 45 minute workout a day. Any activity counts. There are no rest days, so some sessions must be easy.
- Drink half your body weight in ounces of water. Take your weight in pounds and halve it. That is your daily target in ounces.
- Follow a diet of your choice 90 percent of the time. You pick the plan. Most versions also rule out alcohol.
- Read or listen for 10 minutes. Personal development content. Audiobooks and podcasts count.
- Meditate or pray for 5 minutes.
- Take a progress photo on day 1 and day 75.
Where Versions Differ
Because nobody owns the 75 Medium rules, four points change from list to list:
- Alcohol: banned in most versions, allowed inside the flexible 10 percent in others.
- Reading: 10 minutes in some lists, 10 pages of nonfiction in others.
- Photos: first and last day, once a week, or every day. Cleveland Clinic calls photos a tool, not a requirement.
- Outdoors: some versions add one outdoor workout a week.
None of these choices is wrong. The mistake is leaving them open. Pick one version before day one and write it down. A rule you decide in the moment is not a rule.
75 Hard vs 75 Medium vs 75 Soft
All three run for 75 days. 75 Hard is the original, created by Andy Frisella in 2019. The other two are softer versions that spread on social media. Here is how the 75 Medium challenge compares, rule by rule.
| Rule | 75 Hard | 75 Medium | 75 Soft |
|---|---|---|---|
| Workouts | Two 45 minute sessions a day, one outdoors | One 45 minute session a day | One 45 minute session a day, with one active recovery day a week |
| Water | 1 gallon (128 oz, 3.8 liters) | Half your body weight in pounds, as ounces | 3 liters |
| Diet | A diet of your choice, no cheat meals | A diet of your choice, 90 percent of the time | Eat well in general |
| Alcohol | None | None in most versions | Social occasions only |
| Reading | 10 pages of nonfiction, printed book | 10 minutes, audio counts | 10 pages of any book |
| Mindfulness | Not a rule | 5 minutes of meditation or prayer | Not a rule |
| Photos | Every day | Day 1 and day 75 | Not a rule |
| Missed day | Restart from day one | No restart | No restart |
The 75 Hard and 75 Soft columns follow the rule lists published by Cleveland Clinic. Use the table to choose:
- Pick 75 Hard if you already train every day and want a pass or fail test.
- Pick 75 Medium if you want daily structure that survives a normal week.
- Pick 75 Soft if a daily workout is new to you and you want a recovery day built in.
Still unsure? The 75 Hard vs 75 Soft vs 75 Medium page walks through the choice. The other two rule sets have their own pages: 75 Hard and 75 Soft.
Set Your Numbers Before Day One
Three of the six rules are vague as written. A vague rule gets renegotiated on a bad day. So turn each one into a number you can count.
What 90 Percent of Your Diet Means
“90 percent of the time” is not a rule until you can count it. Three meals a day is 21 meals a week. Ninety percent is 19 meals on plan and 2 flexible meals. Write that down, then mark each flexible meal when you use it.
The flexible part is not the weak part. One study compared two styles of eating control in more than 54,000 people on a weight reduction program. Rigid control is all or nothing. Flexible control leaves planned room. Flexible control came with lower body mass index and less binge eating. It also came with a higher chance of successful weight reduction over one year. Rigid control came with more binge eating.
Those are associations, not proof of cause. Still, they point one way: planned room in a diet rule is not a flaw.
Your Water Target
Halve your body weight in pounds. The result is your daily water target in ounces.
- 140 pounds: 70 ounces, about 2.1 liters.
- 180 pounds: 90 ounces, about 2.7 liters.
- In metric: about 33 milliliters per kilogram. At 70 kilograms that is 2.3 liters.
75 Hard sets one gallon, 128 ounces, for everyone. The 75 Medium rule scales with your body instead.
The Daily Workout
Seven sessions of 45 minutes add up to 315 minutes a week. The World Health Organization recommends 150 to 300 minutes of moderate activity a week for adults. So seven moderate sessions already put you past the top of that range.
That is why not every session should be hard. Make at least two of the seven easy: a walk, mobility work, or stretching. They still count.
If you do not train now, do not open with 45 minutes. Cleveland Clinic suggests a daily stretch routine or 15 minutes of exercise as a starting point, then building up.
The 75 Medium Checklist
Copy this rule sheet and fill it in before day one:
Then run this line once a day, in writing:
The daily line is not decoration. A meta-analysis of 138 studies found that monitoring your progress reliably raises the rate at which goals are reached. The effect was larger when people recorded their progress physically. A paper grid on the wall does the job, and the 75 Medium tracker is a printable one.
Give each rule a fixed time as well. “Read for 10 minutes after dinner” survives a bad day. “Read at some point” does not. The method behind that is on the consistency page.
When Does 75 Medium End? Start and End Dates
Day 75 is your start date plus 74 days. The full run is 10 weeks and 5 days. These are the end dates for the most common starts:
| Start (day 1) | End (day 75) | Why this start |
|---|---|---|
| Sunday, October 18, 2026 | Thursday, December 31, 2026 | The last start that finishes inside 2026 |
| Sunday, November 1, 2026 | Thursday, January 14, 2027 | First of the month |
| Tuesday, December 1, 2026 | Saturday, February 13, 2027 | A head start on January |
| Friday, January 1, 2027 | Tuesday, March 16, 2027 | New Year's Day |
| Monday, January 4, 2027 | Friday, March 19, 2027 | First Monday of the year |
Write both dates on your rule sheet. A challenge with a start and no written end is easy to quietly stop. For any other start, the end date calculator works it out.
Already running a winter arc? A 75 Medium challenge that starts on October 18 ends on the same night, December 31. Would you rather write your own rules than follow a fixed list? The winter arc challenge is built for that.
What to Do When You Miss a Day
Log it and keep counting. 75 Medium has no rule that sends you back to day one. That is the main thing separating it from 75 Hard.
The research supports the softer rule. In a 12 week study of real habit formation, a behavior took a median of 66 days to become automatic. Missing one day did not materially affect the process. A 75 day run puts you nine days past that median, with room for a few misses along the way.
- Mark the day as missed. Do not hide it and do not restart.
- Never miss twice. One miss is noise. Two in a row is a new pattern.
- Do not double up. No punishment workout the next day.
- Set a finish line. A common one is 90 percent: 68 complete days out of 75.
If one miss turns into a week, the recovery protocol covers the first 24 hours after a lapse.
Is the 75 Medium Challenge Safe?
It is gentler than 75 Hard, but it is still a daily workout and a diet rule for 75 days. A sports medicine physician at Cleveland Clinic lists these risks:
- Overdoing exercise, above all if you have no daily workout habit yet.
- Ignoring an injury or a physical limit to protect the streak.
- Guilt or shame after a missed day.
- Too much focus on weight or body image.
- Rules that get in the way of a treatment or a medical condition.
This page is not medical advice. Talk to a doctor before you start if you have a medical condition or are pregnant. The same goes for a history of disordered eating. Skip the photo rule if it does you no good. The same physician puts it simply: a program like this should improve your quality of life, not take it over.
After Day 75
On the last day, count the kept days for each rule. You are looking for three things:
- The rule that held above 90 percent.
- The rule you kept but hated.
- The rule you missed so often it was never real.
Keep the first, shrink the second, and cut the third. Then decide what runs next from the numbers, not from how the last week felt. The framework behind that review is the Lock In Protocol.
The Lock In Protocol
A flexible rule only works when you count it. Turn every rule into a number before day one: minutes, ounces, meals on plan. Mark each one kept or missed every day. When a day goes wrong, log it and keep the count running. The system is the tracking, not the streak.
Key Takeaways
- The 75 Medium challenge is six daily habits for 75 days: one 45 minute workout, a water target, a diet followed 90 percent of the time, ten minutes of reading, five minutes of meditation or prayer, and a photo on day 1 and day 75.
- There is no official version. Rule lists differ on alcohol, photos, and reading, so pick one version and write it down before you start.
- Make 90 percent a number. With three meals a day, that is 19 of 21 meals on plan each week.
- Day 75 is your start date plus 74 days. Start on January 1, 2027 and you finish on March 16, 2027.
- A missed day does not reset the count. Log it and never miss twice. In a 12 week habit study, one missed day did not materially affect the process.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the 75 Medium challenge?
The 75 Medium challenge is a 75 day habit challenge that sits between 75 Hard and 75 Soft. The common version has six daily rules: one 45 minute workout, half your body weight in ounces of water, a diet followed 90 percent of the time, ten minutes of reading or listening, five minutes of meditation or prayer, and a progress photo on day 1 and day 75. There is no official version, so rule lists vary.
What are the 75 Medium challenge rules?
The most common 75 Medium rules are: do one 45 minute workout every day, drink half your body weight in pounds as ounces of water, follow a diet of your choice 90 percent of the time, read or listen to ten minutes of personal development, meditate or pray for five minutes, and take a photo on day 1 and day 75. Many versions also rule out alcohol.
Do you have to restart 75 Medium if you miss a day?
No. Unlike 75 Hard, 75 Medium has no rule that sends you back to day one. Log the missed day, keep counting, and do not miss twice in a row. A common finish line is 90 percent, which is 68 complete days out of 75.
What is the difference between 75 Hard and 75 Medium?
75 Hard asks for two 45 minute workouts a day with one outdoors, a gallon of water, a strict diet with no alcohol, ten pages of nonfiction, and a daily photo, and any miss restarts the challenge. 75 Medium cuts that to one workout, a water target based on your weight, a diet followed 90 percent of the time, and no restart.
Can you drink alcohol on 75 Medium?
It depends on the version you pick. Many rule lists say no alcohol for all 75 days. Others count a drink as one of the flexible meals inside the 10 percent. Decide before day one and write it into your rules, so the answer is never made in the moment.
How long is the 75 Medium challenge?
75 days, which is 10 weeks and 5 days. Your last day is your start date plus 74 days. If you start on Friday, January 1, 2027, day 75 is Tuesday, March 16, 2027.
References
- The 75 Medium Challenge reviewed by a sports medicine physician: common rules, benefits, and risks (Cleveland Clinic, July 2026)
- The 75 Hard Challenge: rules, origin, and risks, reviewed by a sports performance psychologist (Cleveland Clinic, September 2025)
- The 75 Soft Challenge: rules and why there is no restart (Cleveland Clinic, November 2023)
- Lally, van Jaarsveld, Potts and Wardle. How are habits formed: Modelling habit formation in the real world. European Journal of Social Psychology, 2010.
- Does monitoring goal progress promote goal attainment? Meta-analysis of 138 studies (PubMed)
- Flexible and rigid control of eating, validated in more than 54,000 participants of a weight reduction program (PubMed)
- World Health Organization 2020 guidelines on physical activity and sedentary behaviour (PubMed)
