To check a pulse, place your index and middle fingers on the inside of your wrist, just below the base of your thumb, and press gently until you feel a rhythmic beat. Count the beats for 30 seconds and multiply by two to get your heart rate in beats per minute. A normal resting heart rate for adults falls between 60 and 100 bpm.
That’s the quick version. Below is a more detailed walkthrough of each technique, including how to check a pulse on someone else, how to do it for infants, what your results mean, and where wearable devices fall short.
The Wrist (Radial) Pulse
The wrist is the most common place to check a pulse on yourself or another person. You’re feeling for the radial artery, which runs along the thumb side of the inner wrist just above the wrist joint.
Turn your palm face up. Place the pads of your index and middle fingers on the groove between the bone and the tendon on the thumb side of your wrist. Press lightly until you feel a steady tapping. If you press too hard, you can compress the artery and lose the beat entirely, so start with gentle pressure and increase gradually. Don’t use your thumb, because it has its own pulse that can interfere with your count.
Once you feel a consistent beat, look at a clock or timer. Count the number of beats in 30 seconds and multiply by two. That’s your heart rate in bpm. If the rhythm feels irregular, count for a full 60 seconds instead, since multiplying a short count can amplify errors when beats are uneven.
The Neck (Carotid) Pulse
The carotid pulse in the neck is stronger and easier to find, which makes it useful during exercise or in an emergency when a wrist pulse is hard to detect. To find it, place two fingers on the side of the neck in the soft groove between the windpipe and the large muscle that runs from behind your ear to your collarbone. You should feel a strong beat without pressing very hard.
Two safety rules matter here. First, never press on both sides of the neck at the same time. The carotid arteries supply blood to your brain, and compressing both can cause dizziness or fainting. Second, keep your fingers positioned on the mid to lower neck. Higher up, near the angle of the jaw, sits the carotid sinus, a pressure-sensitive area that can reflexively slow your heart rate if compressed.
Checking a Pulse on an Infant
Babies have short, chubby wrists and fast heart rates that make the radial pulse difficult to find. The recommended spot is the brachial pulse on the inner upper arm, between the shoulder and the elbow.
Lay the baby on their back with one arm bent so the hand is near the ear. Gently press two fingers on the inside of the upper arm, roughly halfway between the shoulder and the elbow crease. You’re feeling for the brachial artery against the bone. Because infant heart rates are much faster than adult rates (a newborn’s normal range is 100 to 160 bpm), counting for a full 30 seconds and multiplying by two gives the most reliable result.
How Long to Count
The longer you count, the more accurate your result. Counting for a full 60 seconds gives you an exact beats-per-minute number with no math required. Most nurses use a 15-second shortcut, multiplying the count by four, but any error in that short window gets multiplied right along with it. If you miscount by just one beat in 15 seconds, your final number is off by four bpm.
A 30-second count, multiplied by two, is a practical middle ground for everyday use. If you notice that some beats come sooner or later than others, or the rhythm feels unpredictable, switch to a full 60-second count to capture the variation.
What to Feel For Beyond the Number
Heart rate is only part of the picture. While you’re counting, pay attention to two other qualities: rhythm and strength.
A healthy pulse feels evenly spaced, like a metronome. If beats seem to skip, double up, or come at irregular intervals, that’s worth noting. Occasional skipped beats are common and usually harmless, but a persistently irregular rhythm can signal conditions like atrial fibrillation.
Strength matters too. A pulse that feels bounding and strong is different from one that’s weak and thready. You don’t need clinical training to notice when a pulse feels unusually faint in someone who seems unwell. That observation can be valuable information if you end up calling for help.
Normal Resting Heart Rate by Age
What counts as “normal” depends heavily on age. Younger hearts are smaller and beat faster to circulate enough blood. Here are the standard ranges:
- Newborns (0 to 1 month): 100 to 160 bpm
- Infants (2 to 11 months): 80 to 140 bpm
- Toddlers (1 to 3 years): 80 to 130 bpm
- Preschoolers (3 to 5 years): 80 to 110 bpm
- School-age children (6 to 12 years): 70 to 100 bpm
- Teens through adults: 60 to 100 bpm
- Well-trained athletes: 40 to 60 bpm
These are resting values, meaning you’ve been sitting or lying calmly for at least five minutes. Checking your pulse right after climbing stairs or drinking coffee will give you a higher number that doesn’t reflect your baseline.
Why Athletes Have Much Lower Rates
If you’re a regular runner, cyclist, or swimmer and your resting pulse sits in the 40s, that’s likely a normal training adaptation rather than a problem. Sustained endurance exercise physically remodels the heart’s pacemaker cells, making each beat more efficient. Up to 80% of endurance athletes develop resting rates below 60 bpm, and about 38% of those studied on continuous heart monitors had rates that dipped to 40 bpm or below during a 24-hour period.
A long-term study following 465 endurance athletes for over five years found no increased risk of heart problems from low resting rates, even in athletes whose heart rates dropped below 30 bpm. In the absence of symptoms like fainting, dizziness, or unusual fatigue, a very low resting pulse in a fit person is considered a sign of cardiovascular efficiency.
How Accurate Are Smartwatches?
Consumer wearables are convenient for tracking trends over time, but they have real limitations that matter in certain situations. When your heart is beating in a normal, steady rhythm, smartwatches perform reasonably well, with error rates around 6% compared to hospital-grade monitors. That means a device might read 94 when your actual rate is 100, close enough for everyday tracking.
Accuracy drops significantly when the heart rhythm is irregular. During atrial fibrillation episodes, one study of stroke patients found smartwatch error rates averaging 16.5%, and when heart rates exceeded 100 bpm during those episodes, the error rate ballooned to over 30%. The irregular rhythm notification features on these devices also had low sensitivity, correctly detecting atrial fibrillation only about 35% of the time it was present.
The takeaway: a smartwatch is fine for getting a general sense of your resting heart rate and exercise intensity. But if you’re checking your pulse because something feels off, or because a doctor asked you to monitor your heart rate, using your fingers and a clock gives you both the rate and rhythm information that a wrist sensor can miss.
When Your Pulse Signals a Problem
A resting heart rate consistently below 60 bpm in a non-athlete, or above 100 bpm while sitting calmly, is worth mentioning to a healthcare provider. On its own, a number outside the normal range isn’t necessarily an emergency. Dehydration, caffeine, stress, medications, and even body position can temporarily shift your heart rate.
The combination of an abnormal rate plus symptoms is what raises the urgency. A slow pulse paired with dizziness, confusion, fainting, or chest pain needs prompt attention. The same applies to a fast pulse above 150 bpm accompanied by lightheadedness, chest pressure, shortness of breath, or a feeling that you might pass out. At those thresholds, the heart may not be filling and pumping blood effectively, regardless of the underlying cause.
Knowing how to check a pulse gives you a simple, equipment-free way to gather real information about what your body is doing in the moment. Practice a few times when you’re feeling fine so the technique becomes second nature if you ever need it in a less calm situation.