The short answer
Pick a length you could sit on your worst day, and sit it most days. For many people that's somewhere between 10 and 20 minutes. Extend it when the length starts to feel easy, not when you feel you ought to.
What the research says
Studies don't agree on a best length, and most were designed to test programs rather than session lengths. A few findings are still worth knowing.
- The classic programs ask for a lot. Mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR) and mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT) assign about 45 minutes of home practice a day, six days a week, for eight weeks. A 2017 meta-analysis of 43 studies found that participants reported doing about 64% of that, roughly 30 minutes a day, and found a small but significant link between how much people practiced and how much they benefited [1].
- More isn't clearly better. A 2020 meta-regression across 203 randomized trials of mindfulness programs found no robust dose-response relationship for depression, anxiety or stress, although more face-to-face contact, a more intensive program and more actual use of the program were each linked to greater mindfulness [2].
- Short sessions can work. In an experiment with 71 adults who had little mindfulness experience, four 5-minute practices over two weeks helped as much as four 20-minute practices, and did better on stress and trait mindfulness [3]. In another, 42 adults new to meditation were split between 13 minutes a day of guided meditation and 13 minutes of podcast listening; after eight weeks (not after four), the meditation group did better on attention, memory, mood and anxiety [4].
- Consistency stands out. An analysis of about 280,000 sessions in a meditation app found that practicing consistently, four to seven days a week, predicted improvement and sticking with the practice better than session length did [5]. It's observational data, so it shows a pattern, not a cause.
Most of these studies used guided practice, and none of them can tell you your number. Together they suggest that a length you'll actually repeat is worth more than an ambitious one you'll skip.
A practical way to choose
- Start from your floor. What could you sit on a tired, crowded day? That's your length. Five minutes is a real practice.
- Keep it for two weeks. Same length, same time of day, until it's ordinary.
- Add five minutes when it's easy. Easy means you're not watching the clock, not that you've decided to push through.
- Hold the new length for another two weeks, then decide again.
If you sit with a group or follow a tradition, its standard periods are a good reference. San Francisco Zen Center's online zendo, for example, sits a 40-minute period in the evening and a 60-minute period in the morning, with a short interval in the middle of the longer one [6]. Zen Center San Diego describes its sitting periods as typically 30 minutes [7].
Signs your length is wrong
- Too long: you spend the second half watching the clock or bargaining with yourself, or you skip sessions because they feel like a chore.
- Too short: most days, you're only just settling when the bell rings.
Sitting longer
If you want more time than you can comfortably sit in one go, two shorter sessions in a day are a good alternative to one long one. On long sits, posture matters more: a chair is fine, and so is changing position slowly and attentively when pain is all you can attend to.
Let a timer hold the time
Whatever length you choose, give it to a timer. Every glance at the clock pulls you out of the session. In Echo you choose the length with a turn of the wheel, and a bell tells you when it's over.