The human heart is a muscle about the size of a fist, and it beats more than 3 billion times during the average person's lifetime. It pumps the equivalent of more than 1 million barrels of blood through the body during an average lifetime, supplying the body’s internal systems with oxygen and other nutrients required for them to function. In one minute, a healthy heart beats about 80 times, which adds up to 115,200 beats per day and more than 42 million beats per year. It circulates about 6 quarts (5.6 liters) of blood through the entire body three times every minute.
More about the heart:
- The average adult’s heart beats 72 times per minute, and a child’s heartbeat might range from 90 to 120 times in a minute.
- Even when the body is not performing any activity, the heart muscle is exerting as much power as the leg muscles do when a person is performing fast sprints.
- The heart circulates blood through the body each day a distance equivalent to about 12,000 miles (19,000 km) — enough to cross the United States four times every day.