Key takeaways
Cholesterol levels naturally change with age, rising as you get older. The risk of high cholesterol increases after age 40.
The recommended target for total cholesterol, LDL (bad cholesterol), and HDL (good cholesterol) differs depending on age and individual health risks, such as family history or the presence of other conditions like diabetes.
Early intervention in your 20s or 30s is key to heart health, enabling timely lifestyle changes or treatment to prevent heart disease and stroke later in life.
You’ve likely heard that there is “good” cholesterol and “bad” cholesterol, but knowing what ranges are healthy for each might be a little hard to discern—especially because the numbers do change with age.
Cholesterol is a waxy substance, similar to fat, that is produced by the liver. It’s found in all of the cells in your body. It comes in two forms: blood cholesterol in our body and dietary cholesterol in food. Blood cholesterol is made by your own liver and helps to make hormones and digest fatty foods. Dietary cholesterol is found in animal foods like meat, eggs, seafood, poultry, and dairy products; it contributes only a modest amount to the blood cholesterol level.
Blood cholesterol accounts for your total cholesterol level, which is measured by a group of blood tests called a lipid panel. You don’t want your total numbers to be too high—but past that, things can be confusing. However, it’s important to try to understand your ideal numbers because high cholesterol levels can lead to heart disease, heart attack, or stroke.
Read on to learn about the different types of cholesterol and the numbers to shoot for in each stage of your life. The sooner you understand what a healthy level is for you, the sooner you can start doing something about it.
How is cholesterol measured?
After you provide blood work for a lipid profile (also known as a lipoprotein panel), your total cholesterol level is determined along with three other values:
- LDL cholesterol level measures the amount of low-density lipoproteins—the “bad” cholesterol—in your blood.
- HDL cholesterol level measures the amount of high-density lipoproteins—the “good” cholesterol—in your blood.
- Triglyceride level measures the amount of triglycerides—a type of fat that the body uses for energy—in your blood.
What is a healthy cholesterol level by age?
“A healthy triglyceride level and a healthy LDL cholesterol level are both less than 100 milligrams per deciliter (mg/dL),” says Roger Blumenthal, MD, director of the Johns Hopkins Ciccarone Preventive Cardiology Center and spokesperson for the American Heart Association. “For men, a healthy HDL cholesterol level is 45 or greater. For women, it’s 50 or greater.” Dr. Blumenthal cited those numbers as a healthy standard for all adults, regardless of age, but, for most people, as they get older, it can get harder and harder to maintain those levels. Meaning, the guidelines for what’s considered optimal change because cholesterol levels naturally increase with age.
“When we’re younger, on average, the LDL cholesterol is maybe 10, 20, or 30 points lower,” Dr. Blumenthal says. As people age, their bodies lose the ability to clear cholesterol from the bloodstream as efficiently as they did when they were younger—which increases the risk of high cholesterol and associated complications.
“For most people, regardless of what you do, LDL cholesterol tends to go up as you age,” says Samuel Kim, MD, the director of preventive cardiology at New York-Presbyterian Weill Cornell Medical Center and spokesperson for the American College of Cardiology. “Post menopause we can often see a substantial jump, as well. So it’s even more important as we get older to continue leading a healthy lifestyle to maintain those lower levels.”
You will often have a lipid panel as part of a routine checkup, especially when people have one or more risk factors for high cholesterol. “When you get a cholesterol panel, you’re probably going to see four main numbers,” Dr. Kim says. “The first one is your total cholesterol, which is sort of a summary score based on the three components of your cholesterol: your LDL cholesterol, HDL cholesterol, and triglycerides. Those are the other three numbers from the panel.”
RELATED: What are the early signs of high cholesterol?
Total cholesterol
Made up of HDL cholesterol, LDL cholesterol, and triglycerides, and largely determined by your metabolism and genetics and to a lesser extent the dietary cholesterol that you ingest, total cholesterol paints an overall picture of the amount of cholesterol in your bloodstream.
Total cholesterol levels by age |
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---|---|---|
Age/sex | Classification | Total cholesterol |
Males 19 and younger | Optimal | Less than 170 mg/dL |
Borderline | 170-199 mg/dL | |
High | 200+ mg/dL | |
Males 20 and older | Optimal | 125-200 mg/dL |
Borderline | 200-239 mg/dL | |
High | 240+ mg/dL | |
Females 19 and younger | Optimal | Less than 170 mg/dL |
Borderline | 170-199 mg/dL | |
High | 200+ mg/dL | |
Females 20 and older | Optimal | 125-200 mg/dL |
Borderline | 200-239 mg/dL | |
High | 240+ mg/dL |
According to Cleveland Clinic, MedLine Plus and Nemours Kid’s Health, this is where you want your total cholesterol levels to be.
LDL cholesterol
So why is LDL cholesterol so bad? Well, as Dr. Blumenthal notes, “Lousy LDL cholesterol is the type of cholesterol that gets deposited in the arteries throughout the body.”
If you have too much low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol in your blood, it can join other substances to form plaque, which can build up in your arteries in a condition called atherosclerosis. When this happens in the heart, it’s called coronary artery disease, a type of cardiovascular disease in which the arteries become hardened and narrowed, blocking blood flow to the heart. If a coronary artery becomes completely blocked, it can cause a heart attack.
“LDL cholesterol is the bad cholesterol because it’s the one that seems to be the most strongly associated with heart disease,” Dr. Kim says.
LDL cholesterol ranges by age, people with no risk factors |
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---|---|---|
Age/sex | Classification | LDL cholesterol |
Males 19 and younger | Optimal | Less than 100 mg/dL |
Borderline | 110-129 mg/dL | |
High | 130+ mg/dL | |
Males 20 and older | Optimal | Less than 100 mg/dL |
Borderline | 130-159 mg/dL | |
High | 160+ mg/dL | |
Females 19 and younger | Optimal | Less than 100 mg/dL |
Borderline | 110-129 mg/dL | |
High | 130+ mg/dL | |
Females 20 and older | Optimal | Less than 100 mg/dL |
Borderline | 130-159 mg/dL | |
High | 160+ mg/dL |
According to Cleveland Clinic, MedLine Plus and Nemours Kid’s Health, this is where you want your LDL cholesterol levels to be.
LDL cholesterol goals can be lower for people with certain risk factors, such as a history of heart attack or stroke, or if someone is already taking cholesterol-lowering medication. In those cases, providers like to see lower numbers.
“When someone is a high-risk person, if they’ve had a heart attack or stroke or bypass surgery, rather than be satisfied with an LDL level of 100, we want to get the LDL number below 70 milligrams per decimeter,” Dr. Blumenthal says.
LDL cholesterol ranges by age, people with risk factors |
||
---|---|---|
Age/sex | Classification | LDL cholesterol |
Males 19 and younger | Optimal | Less than 100mg/dL |
Borderline | 100-129 mg/dL | |
High | 130+ mg/dL | |
Males 20 and older | Optimal | Less than 70 mg/dL |
Borderline | 70-99 mg/dL | |
High | 100+ mg/dL | |
Females 19 and younger | Optimal | Less than 100 mg/dL |
Borderline | 100-129 mg/dL | |
High | 130+ mg/dL | |
Females 20 and older | Optimal | Less than 70 mg/dL |
Borderline | 70-99 mg/dL | |
High | 100+ mg/dL |
According to Cleveland Clinic and University of Rochester Medical Center, this is where you want your LDL cholesterol levels to be if risk factors are present.
Triglycerides
Although triglycerides aren’t cholesterol, triglyceride levels are generally included in a cholesterol panel. Triglycerides are a kind of fat, called lipids, that circulate in your bloodstream. They’re the most common type of fat in the body, which stores unused calories as triglycerides in your fat cells. Triglycerides are also found in fatty foods, such as oils and butter, and the body turns extra sugars from food into triglycerides. “Triglycerides are especially affected by one’s intake of sweets and carbohydrates,” Dr. Blumenthal says.
Triglyceride levels by age |
||
---|---|---|
Age/sex | Classification | LDL cholesterol |
Children 0-9 | Optimal | Less than 75 mg/dL |
Borderline | 75-99 mg/dL | |
High | 100+ mg/dL | |
Children 10-19 | Optimal | Less than 90 mg/dL |
Borderline | 90-129 mg/dL | |
High | 130+ mg/dL | |
Males 20 and older | Optimal | Less than 150 mg/dL |
Borderline | 150-199 mg/dL | |
High | 200+ mg/dL | |
Females 20 and older | Optimal | Less than 150 mg/dL |
Borderline | 150-199 mg/dL | |
High | 200+ mg/dL |
According to MedLine Plus and CHOC, this is where you want your triglyceride levels to be.
HDL cholesterol
Made up of a lipid and protein, high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol carries excess cholesterol from other parts of your body back to your liver, which removes the cholesterol from your blood.
“HDL cholesterol is the good cholesterol,” says Dr. Kim. “It helps to counter some of the bad effects from the LDL cholesterol.”
Dr. Blumenthal explains that you want HDL cholesterol as high as possible because of its role. “HDL cholesterol is involved with removing some of the plaque—the fatty cholesterol and what we call hardened fibrous tissue—from the arteries and taking it back to the liver,” says Dr. Blumenthal.
HDL cholesterol ranges by age |
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---|---|---|
Age/sex | Classification | HDL cholesterol |
Males 19 and younger | Optimal | 45+ mg/dL |
Males 20 and older | Optimal | 40+ mg/dL |
Females 19 and younger | Optimal | 45+ mg/dL |
Females 20 and older | Optimal | 50+ mg/dL |
According to Cleveland Clinic, MedLine Plus and Nemours Kid’s Health, this is where you want your HDL cholesterol levels to be
Factors that affect cholesterol levels
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), in the U.S. in 2020, about 86 million people aged 20 and older had total cholesterol levels above 200 mg/dL, the upper limit of what doctors consider healthy. This puts them in the borderline category. Nearly 25 million people had levels above 240 mg/dL, or what is medically considered to be high cholesterol. Factors that can put you at higher risk of high cholesterol include the following.
- Unhealthy diet: A leading cause of high cholesterol is diets high in saturated and trans fats, sugar, and processed foods, which can significantly elevate cholesterol levels.
- Lack of physical activity: Sedentary lifestyles increase weight gain and cholesterol levels, increasing the risk of heart disease.
- Family medical history: Genetic predisposition can increase your risk of high cholesterol risk, so discuss your family history with a healthcare professional for appropriate monitoring.
- Underlying health conditions: Conditions like Type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, and obesity raise LDL cholesterol levels, increasing heart disease risk. Familial hypercholesterolemia is a serious genetic condition affecting cholesterol.
- Smoking: Cigarette smoke harms blood vessels and lowers HDL cholesterol, contributing to plaque buildup.
How to lower your cholesterol
For most people who aren’t genetically predisposed toward high cholesterol, the simplest, best way to lower your cholesterol and improve other cardiovascular risk factors is through positive lifestyle changes. “It always starts with lifestyle,” Dr. Kim says. “That’s the emphasis.” You can make the following changes:
- Eat a healthy diet. A Mediterranean diet rich in fruits, vegetables, and healthy fats can lower cholesterol. Foods to avoid include red meat, fried foods, processed foods, coconut oil, palm oil, butter, cream, whole milk, and egg yolks.
- Exercise regularly. Weight loss and consistent physical activity can help manage cholesterol levels. Aim for at least 40 minutes of brisk activity four days a week.
- Take cholesterol medication. If lifestyle changes are insufficient, healthcare providers may prescribe cholesterol-lowering medications, especially in high-risk individuals.
According to Dr. Kim, most people who need cholesterol-lowering medications start with statin therapy, which is a once-daily medication that lowers cholesterol by causing the liver to produce less cholesterol. Commonly prescribed statins include Lipitor (atorvastatin), Crestor (rosuvastatin), and Zocor (simvastatin).
Other medications that are less commonly prescribed to help lower cholesterol include Zetia (ezetimibe), which is a cholesterol-absorption inhibitor, PCSK9 inhibitors, bile acid sequestrants, fibrates, niacin, and omega-3 fatty acid supplements.
How to save on cholesterol medications |
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Lipitor (atorvastatin) | Coupons |
Crestor (rosuvastatin) | Coupons |
Zocor (simvastatin) | Coupons |
Zetia (ezetimibe) | Coupons |
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- Cholesterol levels, Cleveland Clinic (2024)
- Cholesterol levels: What you need to know, MedlinePlus (2020)
- Cholesterol, Nemours KidsHealth (2022)
- Triglycerides, Medline Plus (2020)
- Facts about cholesterol, LDL, HDL and triglycerides in children and adolescents, Children’s Hospital of Orange County
- What your cholesterol levels mean, American Heart Association (2020)
- High blood triglycerides, National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (2023)
- High cholesterol facts, CDC (2023)
- Blood cholesterol causes and risk factors, National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute (2022)
- Risk factors for high cholesterol, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2023)