Hot, sweaty exercise is the key to living longer, according to a new study.

Data from more than 200,000 Australians has proven moderate exercise such as long walks isn’t enough if we want to protect ourselves from death and decline.

The study, published in the JAMA Internal Medicine journal, supports the latest trend in exercise of high intensity interval training.

• Dieting vs exercising: which one is better for you?
• Hamburgers are ‘destroying the planet’
• Australians have ‘had a gutful of booze’

Rather than doing long periods of exercise it shows you are better off working out in short, sharp bursts of very hard exercise.

Study author Klaus Gebel said his research had shown people who regularly did vigorous exercise were up to 13 per cent less likely to die prematurely than those who did moderate exercise.

Even making less than a third of your exercise vigorous was linked to a nine per cent decreased risk of early death.

“If you think of people who maybe so far have only been doing some walking, it could make a significant difference if on top of that they maybe have something like 20-30 minutes per week, not necessarily a lot, of doing something vigorous that makes them sweat and significantly increases their breathing rate,” he said.

Dr Gebel said vigorous exercise didn’t need to fit into one particular style of workout.

“It doesn’t necessarily even have to be going to the gym, it could be vigorous gardening,” he said.

And the research team cautions that just because you aren’t in the mood for hard-core exercise doesn’t mean you should abandon physical activity altogether.

It found what’s known as a “dose-response relationship”, that is, the more you do, the better, but even the smallest amount of any exercise will improve your chance of warding off an early death.

Dr Gebel said other studies indicated working up a sweat could have all sorts of beneficial effects on our body, not only improving our fitness but decreasing inflammation, blood fats and blood pressure, while improving our ability to function in our daily lives.