If you’ve spent any amount of time in the fitness world, you’ve probably heard the same advice repeated over and over: cardio comes after lifting. So when a coach suggests doing Low-Intensity Steady-State cardio (LISS) before your workout, it can feel a little confusing.

Isn’t that backwards? Won’t it hurt performance? Is there actually a benefit?

According to Fitbliss Fitness Chief Science Officer Natalie Suazo, the answer is a little more nuanced.

“Generally, based on what research shows, cardio should come after lifting sessions,” Natalie explains. “The number one reason is to preserve performance.”

But that doesn’t mean a short bout of low-intensity cardio before lifting is automatically harmful — or even wrong.

Let’s break down what the research actually says, when workout order matters, and why the best approach may depend more on context than rigid rules.

Why Lifting Usually Comes Before Cardio

When your goal is strength, muscle growth, or improving body composition, resistance training is typically prioritized first for a few key reasons.

1. You Preserve Strength and Performance

Your lifting session requires energy, focus, coordination, and power output. Even low-intensity cardio uses fuel and creates some fatigue, which can slightly reduce performance during training.

This is especially important for:

• Progressive overload
• Strength development
• Hypertrophy (muscle growth)
• High-volume training phases
• Contest (bodybuilding) prep

In other words, you want your best energy reserved for the thing that matters most.

“If we’re performing better in the gym, lifting heavier, and getting more quality reps in, we’re going to have greater outcomes,” Natalie says.

The “Interference Effect” Explained

One concept that often comes up in conversations about cardio and lifting is something called the interference effect. This refers to the idea that too much cardio — or poorly timed cardio — may interfere with certain strength and muscle-building adaptations. That sounds dramatic, but context matters.

The interference effect is much more likely to become an issue when:

• Cardio volume is very high
• Intensity is too aggressive
• Recovery is inadequate
• Training frequency is high
• Someone is deep into contest prep or an intense fat loss phase

A short, easy LISS session is a very different scenario.

“We know that there will be minimal interference from low-intensity, short-duration cardio,” Natalie explains. “The impact on recovery is pretty negligible.”

So while the traditional recommendation still leans toward cardio after lifting, a 10–15 minute walk or incline treadmill session before training is unlikely to sabotage your gains.

What Counts as LISS Cardio?

Low-Intensity Steady-State cardio is exactly what it sounds like, low effort at a steady pace with a sustainable intensity.

Examples include walking (outdoor or on the treadmill), easy cycling, stairmill at a moderate pace, or light elliptical work. Whatever it is, you should still be able to hold a conversation while doing it. This type of cardio is commonly used during fat loss phases and contest prep because it’s effective without creating excessive recovery demands.

In fact, Natalie refers to LISS as “the gold standard during contest prep” because it creates less fatigue than more intense forms of cardio.

So Why Would a Coach Program LISS Before Lifting?

Even though lifting first is considered best practice, there are a few legitimate reasons a coach might intentionally place LISS before resistance training.

As a General Warm-Up

A short LISS session can help:

• Increase blood flow
• Raise core temperature
• Improve mobility
• Help you mentally “wake up”
• Transition out of a sedentary state

This may be especially useful if:

• You train very early in the morning
• You’re coming straight from a desk job
• You live in a colder climate
• You feel stiff before training

That said, Natalie also notes that newer research is making experts rethink how much warm-up volume is actually necessary for moderate-load lifting sessions.

“The more we learn about warming up before lifting, the more skeptical I’m becoming about spending a lot of time warming up,” she says.

So while a brief warm-up may help you feel more prepared, there’s usually no need to turn it into a 30-minute cardio session.

What About Fat Loss?

One of the biggest misconceptions in fitness is that workout order dramatically changes fat loss results, but this isn’t necessarily the case. Research comparing cardio-before-lifting versus cardio-after-lifting has generally found that both approaches can be effective for improving body composition.

“The key driver of fat loss is an overall energy deficit — not workout order,” Natalie explains.

If your lifting performance suffers because you’re exhausting yourself with cardio first, that could indirectly impact long-term body composition outcomes. But if you’re doing 10–15 minutes of easy incline walking and still training hard, the difference is likely minimal.

So… Should You Do LISS Before or After Lifting?

For most people, the answer is simple:

If your priority is strength, muscle retention, or hypertrophy, lifting first is still the best-supported recommendation.

But if:

• Your LISS is truly low intensity
• The duration is short
• Your performance isn’t suffering
• You enjoy the routine
• It helps with consistency

…then doing it before lifting is unlikely to make a meaningful negative difference.

“If you’re enjoying it and you feel great about it, then I think it can be placed based on what feels best or supports your habit or routine consistency,” Natalie says.

The key is understanding that there’s no magical fat-burning advantage either way. The bigger picture — recovery, training quality, consistency, nutrition, and energy balance — matters far more than whether your incline walk happens before or after your workout.