How to measure your running cadence
Count how many times your right foot lands in 30 seconds and multiply by four. That is your running cadence in steps per minute, and you need nothing but a clock to get it.
The rest of this guide covers the other ways to get the number, what it means once you have it, and what to do with it.
Count by hand
Pick a flat stretch and run at your usual easy pace for a minute or two first, so the count reflects how you actually run and not how you set off.
Then start a 30-second timer and count every time one foot hits the ground. Right foot or left foot, it does not matter which, as long as you stick to one. Multiply the count by four: two to cover the other foot, two to make a full minute. Forty-two strikes in 30 seconds is 84 per foot per minute, or 168 steps per minute.
If 30 seconds feels long to count while running, count for 15 seconds and multiply by eight. The shorter window is easier to hold in your head, but a single miscounted strike costs you eight steps per minute, so do it two or three times and take the middle value.
Counting both feet for a full minute works too and needs no arithmetic, but most people lose count somewhere past 120.
Use a running watch or footpod
Most sport watches report cadence as a matter of course, either live on the watch face or in the activity summary afterwards. Some measure it from wrist movement, some from a pod clipped to a shoe. Look for "cadence" or "steps per minute" in the data fields. Some devices show it per foot, around 85, rather than for both feet, around 170, so check which convention yours uses before comparing it with anything else.
The advantage over counting is that you get a number for every part of the run, not just the 30 seconds you happened to measure, so you can see how your cadence changes as you tire or speed up.
Use a metronome app
Any metronome app will do. Set it to a tempo somewhere around 160, start running, and try to land a foot on every click. If you are reaching for the click, lower the tempo. If you are waiting for it, raise it. Adjust in steps of two or four until landing on the beat feels like what you would have done anyway. The tempo you settle on is your cadence.
This takes a little longer than counting, but it measures the cadence that feels natural rather than the one you happened to run for half a minute, and that is the one worth building a playlist around.
Measure with BPM Companion
If you already have BPM Companion on your phone, press and hold the tempo disc, then walk or run for about ten seconds. The phone's step sensor measures your pace, and the app sets the cadence to what it found.
There are three other ways to set it: tap the disc in the rhythm of your steps, drag the outer ring, or use the plus and minus buttons for fine adjustment. Tapping is a quick way to carry over a number you counted by hand, or to set the tempo on the spot: tap as your foot lands and the dial follows.
What the numbers mean
Recreational runners commonly land between 150 and 170 steps per minute. Faster runners tend to be at 180 and above. The same runner also has more than one cadence: it rises with speed, so your easy-run number and your hard-run number will differ.
You may have heard that 180 is the number to aim for. It traces back to Jack Daniels' observations of elite runners at the 1984 Olympics, and it describes a tendency among fast runners at race pace. It is not a prescription for everyone at every speed, and 160 at a comfortable jog is not a fault to be corrected.
For the purpose of matching music, measure twice: once at your usual easy pace and once at the faster pace you run when you mean it. You will want a different playlist for each, because a song that fits 165 steps per minute is out of step at 178.
What to do with the number
A song whose BPM equals your cadence holds your stride: one beat, one footfall. So does a song at half that tempo, with one beat for every two footfalls, and a song at double it. How the two numbers relate, and why a 90 BPM song works for a runner at 180 steps per minute, is covered in running cadence and song BPM. The cadence pages list the BPM ranges that fit each common cadence.
If you would rather not sort your library by hand, apps that match music to your pace compares the options, and why beat-matched transitions matter explains what happens between one song and the next once the tempo is right.
BPM Companion turns the number you just measured into an ordered playlist from the songs already on your phone, with the tempo of every song detected on the device and no internet connection at all.