New Research: Every Cigarette You Smoke Reduces Your Lifespan by This Much

It’s no secret that smoking cigarettes is among the leading preventable causes of death, disease, and disability worldwide—and perhaps you don’t have to be a daily smoker for it to affect your longevity. A new study published in the medical journal Addiction has purportedly narrowed in on how much each individual cigarette could shorten your days.

According to the research, which was commissioned by the UK Department for Health and Social Care and released in late December 2024, each cigarette can shorten your life by an average of 20 minutes. From there, the findings get more specific.

Using mortality data from British smokers, the researchers, who specialize in behavioral and public health research, determined that women lost 22 minutes of life per cigarette, while men lost 17 minutes per cigarette. Smoking a single pack of 20 cigarettes was linked to an average loss of over seven hours of life, the study further suggests.

Notably, cigarette smoke is responsible for roughly one in every three cancer deaths in the U.S. and can contribute to just about every cancer type, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). “Cigarette smoke contains more than 7,000 chemicals,” the health authority explains. “At least 69 of these chemicals can cause cancer. Other chemicals can interfere with the body’s ability to fight cancer.”

However, cancer is not the only life-threatening illness associated with smoking. Cigarettes have been shown to contribute to a range of deadly health conditions, including heart disease, stroke, lung disease, Type 2 diabetes, cancer, autoimmune diseases, and more. In total, cigarette smoking causes over 480,000 deaths per year in America, according to national data.

“Stopping smoking is, without a doubt, the best thing you can do for your health,” said Dr. Sarah Jackson, lead author and principal research fellow at University College London’s Alcohol and Tobacco Research Group. “The time [smokers are] losing is time that they could be spending with their loved ones in fairly good health.”

The researchers emphasized that the sooner you quit, the more easily your health can recover. “These studies have shown that people who quit at a very young age—so by their 20s or early 30s—tend to have a similar life expectancy to people who have never smoked. But as you get older, you progressively lose a little bit more that you then can’t regain by quitting. No matter how old you are when you quit, you will always have a longer life expectancy than if you had continued to smoke,” Jackson explained.

To be clear, it’s never too late to quit. According to the CDC, the risk of developing cancer decreases over time after quitting:

• 5 to 10 years after quitting, added risk of cancers of the larynx, oral cavity and pharynx drops by half
• 10 years after quitting, risk of cancers of the bladder, esophagus, and kidney decreases.
• 10 to 15 years after quitting, added risk of lung cancer drops by half.
• 20 years after quitting, risk of cancers of the larynx, oral cavity and pharynx, and pancreas drops to close to that of someone who does not smoke.

According to the American Heart Association (AHA), quitting can also slash your risk of heart disease—the leading cause of death in America—in half. This also reduces the risks of stroke, high blood pressure, diabetes, blood clots, heart arrhythmia, and other heart risk factors, experts from Johns Hopkins Medicine add.

So, if your new year’s resolution includes finally quitting, know that every cigarette you skip can help lengthen your life—and there’s no better time to quit than right now.

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