What Are the Hallmarks of Ageing and Why Should You Care?

Written by Nicole Pezza

Fact checked by Dr. Brian P. Ramos, PhD Neurobiology

Smiling elderly woman outdoors with a younger caregiver.

Ageing isn’t random: it’s driven by predictable biological changes that researchers have spent decades mapping out. And recently, scientists reached a new milestone: they’ve officially expanded the list of the hallmarks of ageing from 9 to 14, offering the clearest framework yet for understanding why our bodies and brains slow down over time.

If you’ve ever wondered why you feel more tired than you used to, why your skin has changed seemingly overnight, or why your focus has been harder to hold on to, the answer often traces back to one or more of these hallmarks.

In this blog, we’ll break down what the 14 hallmarks are, how they actually show up in everyday life, and what you can do to support your body as it adapts to these changes, especially with the help of Ageless NMN.

Why the Hallmarks Matter

The idea behind the hallmarks is simple: there are fundamental processes that go wrong as we age. Some of these are causes, others are responses, and some are the result of accumulated damage.

The original 9 were introduced in 2013. In 2023, the framework was updated and expanded to 14, giving us a more complete picture of what’s really happening beneath the surface.

These hallmarks of ageing form the foundation of modern longevity science, and understanding them can help you make smarter, more targeted decisions about how to support your health over time.

The 14 Hallmarks of Ageing (Explained Simply)

To make sense of them, scientists group the hallmarks into three categories:

1. Primary Hallmarks (what starts the damage)

These are the earliest changes that disrupt how your cells function:

Genomic instability
→ DNA gets damaged from environmental stress, poor repair, or just time.
→ Can lead to mutations, impaired cell function, and age-related diseases.
Telomere attrition
→ Telomeres are the protective ends of your chromosomes. As they shorten, cells stop dividing.
→ Associated with fatigue, immune decline, and tissue ageing.
Epigenetic alterations
→ Your DNA doesn’t change, but how it’s “read” does. Ageing alters which genes are turned on or off.
→ Impacts everything from inflammation to energy production.
Loss of proteostasis
→ Your body becomes less efficient at folding, recycling, or clearing damaged proteins.
→ Leads to protein buildup, stress, and neurodegeneration.

2. Antagonistic Hallmarks (the body’s reaction that can go too far)

These are defensive processes that help in the short term but become harmful over time:

Mitochondrial dysfunction
→ Your energy factories slow down and leak harmful byproducts (ROS).
→ Causes fatigue, brain fog, and sluggish recovery.
Cellular senescence
→ Damaged cells stop dividing but don’t die. They release inflammatory signals.
→ Contributes to “inflammageing,” skin thinning, and joint stiffness.
Deregulated nutrient sensing
→ The pathways that help your body sense fuel (like insulin, mTOR) stop working well.
→ Linked to metabolic slowdown and increased fat storage.
Altered intercellular communication
→ Cells send the wrong signals, like chronic inflammation or hormonal confusion.
→ Impairs everything from sleep to immune response.

3. Integrative Hallmarks (the outcomes of damage + response)

These reflect what happens as systems start to fail:

Stem cell exhaustion
→ Fewer healthy cells are left to regenerate tissue.
→ Slower healing, longer recovery time, increased susceptibility to illness.
Disabled macroautophagy
→ Your internal “cell cleaning” process breaks down.
→ Leads to cellular clutter, mitochondrial stress, and disease risk.
Chronic inflammation (inflammageing)
→ Low-grade inflammation becomes a permanent background noise.
→ Accelerates skin ageing, brain degeneration, and fatigue.
Dysbiosis
→ Gut microbiome diversity drops, affecting immunity, mood, and metabolism.
→ Can result in bloating, brain fog, and inflammation.
Compromised barrier function + impaired wound healing
→ Skin, gut, and organ linings lose integrity.
→ You become more vulnerable to pathogens, allergies, and damage.

What Do These Look Like in Real Life?

Here’s how the hallmarks of ageing translate into the symptoms and experiences people often report from their 30s, 40s, and beyond:

Feeling tired even after a full night’s sleep
Taking longer to recover from workouts or stress
Noticing your skin is thinner, drier, or more easily irritated
Losing muscle faster or gaining fat more easily
Slower thinking, lapses in memory, or poor focus
Getting sick more often, or struggling to bounce back from illness
Joint stiffness or new aches you can’t quite explain
Digestive changes or new food sensitivities

These aren’t inevitable “just getting older” complaints; they’re connected to cellular-level changes that science is increasingly able to track, explain, and potentially support.

Can You Do Anything About It?

The short answer is: you can’t stop ageing, but you can support the systems that are affected by these hallmarks, especially if you start before symptoms become overwhelming.

Here are some longevity-aligned strategies that target the hallmarks:

Move regularly to stimulate mitochondrial repair and stem cell activity
Eat whole foods rich in antioxidants and polyphenols to reduce oxidative stress
Prioritise sleep to support DNA repair, autophagy, and cognitive restoration
Manage stress to reduce inflammatory signalling and protect intercellular communication
Avoid extremes like overtraining, over-restricting calories, or over-supplementing can backfire
Support key pathways involved in energy production, methylation, and detox

This is when science-backed longevity supplements can help, not to replace lifestyle, but to support systems that may be struggling behind the scenes.

Why NAD+ Matters

One hallmark that often flies under the radar is mitochondrial dysfunction. As we age, mitochondria, the parts of your cells that create energy, become less efficient. They produce less ATP, generate more oxidative stress, and take longer to recover from damage.

A key molecule that supports mitochondrial function and cellular repair is NAD+ (nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide). It plays a central role in:

DNA repair
Mitochondrial energy production
Cellular stress response
Autophagy and protein recycling

The problem? NAD+ levels decline sharply with age. That decline has been linked to reduced cognitive performance, physical fatigue, and increased vulnerability to age-related diseases. But NMN (nicotinamide mononucleotide) can help.