Introduction: Adherence with the American Heart Association (AHA) guidelines for physical activity (AHA-PA) may reduce the risk of heart failure (HF). However, the association of AHA-PA in relation to sex and race-specific lifetime risk (LR) estimates of HF and years lived free of HF is not established. Therefore, we sought to examine the association of AHA-PA and burden of HF. Methods: We included individual-level pooled data from 5 population-based cohorts and stratified middle-aged participants (index age 40-59 years) free of cardiovascular disease (CVD) and HF at baseline by sex and race. We categorized AHA-PA as ideal (≥150 minutes/week), intermediate (1 to 149 minutes/week), or poor (0 minutes/week) and performed (1) modified Kaplan-Meier analysis to estimate LR of HF, (2) Irwin restricted mean to estimates years lived free of and with HF, and (3) competing Cox models (adjusted for age, smoking, education, body mass index [BMI], hypertension, and diabetes) to estimate joint cumulative risks for HF or death. Results: Of the 41,685 participants, 19% were black and 82% were women. Over median follow-up of 13.8 years, LR for incident HF was higher in individuals with poor compared with those who achieved ideal AHA-PA among women and black men, but not white men. Poor AHA-PA was associated with significantly fewer healthy years lived free of HF among black men (-4.9 years) compared with ideal AHA-PA, but was not significantly different among black women or white adults. Adjusted competing hazard ratios for incident HF among middle-aged black men with poor AHA-PA was 1.39 (95% confidence interval 1.02, 1.90) compared with individuals achieving ideal AHA-PA with similar findings among black (1.40 [1.07, 1.82]) or white women (1.79 [1.48, 2.17]) ( Table ). Discussion: Adherence with ideal AHA-PA is associated with lower risk of HF and greater proportion of life lived free of HF, particularly among black men. Public health policies promoting PA may mitigate the risk of HF in women and the racial disparities in HF in men.