Both running and aerobics work out your cardiovascular system, increasing your heart and lungs' ability to pump oxygen-rich blood through your body. These exercises also require you to use your lower body muscles -- hamstrings, quads, gluts and calves -- while your upper body muscles are more relaxed and work along with the movement. Running, on average, burns more calories than aerobics with one notable exception.
Running: Calories Burned
The faster you run, the more calories you burn. A 130-lb. person running at 5.0 miles an hour -- a 12-minute mile pace -- burns 472 calories in an hour, while a 180-lb. person running at the same speed burns 654 during the same 60-minute period. For every one-mile increase in speed -- for example, climbing from 5.0 to 6.0 miles an hour --, a 130-lb. person burns an additional 75 to 125 calories per hour; that same increase in speed causes a 180-lb. person to burn an additional 120 to 170 calories per hour.
Step Aerobics: Calories Burned
Step aerobics is the one type of aerobics that has the potential to burn more calories than running. A 60-minute step aerobics class burns 502 calories if you weigh 130 lbs.; it burns 695 calories if you weigh 180 lbs. Both those figures are slightly higher than you'd burn running at a speed of 5.0 miles an hour for a full 60 minutes. However, running at even a slightly faster speed -- for example, 5.2 miles an hour -- puts running ahead of step aerobics when it comes to burning calories.
High-Impact Aerobics
Despite its name, high-impact aerobics does not have higher impact in terms of burning more calories than running. High-impact aerobics involves movements in which both feet leave the floor simultaneously, including jumping jacks or jumping squats. Doing these exercises for 60 minutes burns 413 calories in a 130-lb. person and 572 calories in a 180-lb. person -- less than that same individual would burn running for an hour even at a moderate 12-minute mile pace.
Low-Impact Aerobics
Low-impact aerobics is the easier, gentler version of high-impact aerobics. Unlike in high-impact aerobics, where both feet may leave the ground simultaneously, at least one foot is always on the ground in low-impact aerobics. Walking and doing simple aerobics moves like grapevines are examples of low-impact aerobic exercises. Low-impact aerobics burns the fewest calories of all -- just 295 calories an hour for a 130-lb. person and 409 calories an hour for a 180-lb. person.
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