The longest breath hold, using pure oxygen beforehand, is 29 minutes and 3 seconds, set by Croatian freediver Vitomir Maričić in June 2025, breaking the previous record by nearly five minutes. This incredible feat involves intensive training to maximize oxygen intake and slow metabolism, allowing divers to hold their breath far longer than the average person.
The average person can hold their breath for about 30 to 90 seconds. However, this time can increase or decrease due to factors such as smoking, underlying health conditions, and breath training.
Guinness World Records lists Kate Winslet as the record-holder for the “longest breath-hold on screen (lead actor).” The record is 7 minutes and 15 seconds, achieved during filming for Avatar: The Way of Water (2022).
Most of us can hold our breath for between 30 and 90 seconds. A few minutes without oxygen can be fatal, so we have an involuntary reflex to breathe. But freediver Vitomir Maričić recently held his breath for a new world record of 29 minutes and three seconds, lying on the bottom of a 3-metre-deep pool in Croatia.
Take, for instance, Croatian freediver Budimir Šobat. On March 27, 2021, Šobat held his breath underwater for an astounding 24 minutes and 37 seconds—a feat that was only possible thanks to minutes of huffing pure oxygen before making the attempt.
Because Chris was a saturation diver, his body had been pre-loaded with high levels of oxygen over days spent living in a pressurized environment. That oxygen lingered in his blood and tissues longer than normal.
While most people can manage about 30 seconds to two minutes without gasping for air, these elite warriors push the boundaries significantly further. Under optimal conditions, a trained Navy SEAL can hold his or her breath for two to three minutes or even longer.
Professional divers always practice and also take a deep breath before diving. By holding their breath, the divers can expel carbon dioxide out of their bodies when stay underwater. Almost all healthy adults easily hold their breath for one to two minutes.
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In the Christopher McQuarrie-directed film, Cruise went from doing stunts in the sky to doing them underwater. For the said sequence in Mission: Impossible — Rogue Nation, the actor actually had to undergo training to be able to hold his breath underwater for six minutes.
Margot Robbie Learned How To Hold Her Breath For 5 Minutes For A Key Scene In Suicide Squad - IMDb. Suicide Squad doesn't arrive for another five whole days, but it's a pretty safe bet that Margot Robbie's fan-favorite Harley Quinn has already stolen the show.
The time a person can safely stay underwater depends on many factors, including energy consumption, number of prior breaths, physical condition, and age. An average person can last between one and three minutes before falling unconscious and around ten minutes before dying.
And the actress, who has just turned 39, certainly isn't alone. Adult acne is a highly misunderstood condition that affects roughly one in 10 of us over the age of 25, with 80% of sufferers being female.
And it doesn't increase your lung capacity. There are breathing techniques, like box breathing or rhythmic breathing, that are beneficial for anxiety management, stress management and mindset tuning. But breath-holding does not offer any benefit.
Science tells us the human body can last for only a few short minutes without oxygen -- he lasted 38 minutes. On September 18, 2012, saturation diver Chris Lemons was 330 feet below the surface, fixing pipes at an oil well off Scotland's eastern coast, while breathing heliox, a helium-oxygen mix.
Here are 25 of the dumbest world records that nobody has bothered to break—yet.
Memorizing pi The record for the most digits of pi memorized belongs to Rajveer Meena of Vellore, India, who recited 70,000 decimal places of pi over 10 hours on March 21, 2015, according to Guinness World Records. (As of March 2024, Meena still holds this record.)
Jeremy Harper livestreamed himself counting to 1,000,000. It took him 89 days, during which he did not leave the house or shave. He spent an average of 16 hours a day counting.
The average person can hold their breath for about 30 seconds, though this can vary with smoking or other health conditions. Decreasing breath-holding time is an early warning sign. Consult a doctor in such a case.
This technique, known as combat or tactical breathing, is an excellent way to reduce your stress and calm down. This breathing strategy has been used by first responders, the military and athletes to focus, gain control and manage stress. In addition, it appears to help control worry and nervousness.
In controlled settings, such as certain breathwork exercises (e.g., pranayama or free diving training), holding your breath can increase lung capacity, improve CO2 tolerance, and stimulate the parasympathetic nervous system, leading to a calming effect.
A prime example is the box breathing technique, famously used by the Navy Seals, known as the 4-4-4-4 method. This simple yet effective method involves a cycle of inhaling for 4 seconds, holding the breath for 4 seconds, exhaling for 4 seconds, and then pausing for 4 seconds before the next inhalation.
Own Your 3-Foot Space In Navy SEAL training, there's a simple but profound principle: Own your 3-foot space. It means focusing on what's directly within your control—your actions, your attitude, your effort—no matter how chaotic the environment around you becomes.
When certain seal species sleep in the water instead of on land, they use a technique called “bottling”, in which they float vertically in the water with only their heads above the surface so they can continue to breathe.