You’ve heard of breathing exercises to improve your mood and brain exercises to boost your memory powers. But eye exercises to strengthen your vision? Is that a thing?

Well ... it’s complicated, says Eun S. Lee, O.D. He’s an optometric physician with Regional Vision Consultants at America’s Best Contacts & Eyeglasses in Raritan, New Jersey.

Yes, self-help eye exercises can help reduce various symptoms patients have by using their eyes every day, Dr. Lee says. Your newsfeed may have recently included articles about palming (a yoga technique meant to relax eye muscles), a figure-eight eye-tracking exercise, or near-far focus challenges, to name a few.

But can these exercises really impact your vision? Dr. Lee says the evidence isn’t strong.

“Patients ask if they can exercise their eye muscles just like they exercise their body’s muscles at the gym,” says Dr. Lee. “But there’s no such thing as the equivalent of pushups or dumbbells for your eyes so that you don’t have to wear glasses or have vision correction for your farsightedness or nearsightedness.”

Instead, some of these eye maneuvers may help sharpen your vision skills, such as improving eye coordination and lessening eye fatigue and eyestrain.

To better understand what eye exercises can and can’t do for your eyesight, Dr. Lee offers this guidance:

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Why won’t eye exercises improve my vision?

People who are nearsighted or farsighted don’t have “weak” eyes, Dr. Lee explains. Rather, their eyes are out of focus. There’s a difference.

Nearsightedness and farsightedness are refractive vision problems. They’re caused by the inability to focus image on the retina (that’s the inner layer on the back part of the eye). This happens because the eye is either too short or too long.

In people who are nearsighted, the light focuses in front of the retina instead of directly on it. In people who are farsighted, the light focuses behind the retina. Both cases make it hard to see clearly.

“You can’t naturally bring the point of focus to the retina with eye exercises,” Dr. Lee says. “You need corrective lenses, like eyeglasses or contacts, or refractive surgery for that.”

Is there any reason to try eye exercises?

Even if they won’t improve your vision, some eye exercises can serve a purpose for certain eye conditions.

For example, people with convergence insufficiency may benefit. With this condition, the eyes don’t work well together when looking at objects up close. (It often shows up in childhood, but the condition can also develop after a brain injury, such as a concussion.) People with convergence insufficiency often have double vision or tired or sore eyes, according to the National Eye Institute.

Vision therapists — who are often optometrists with additional training — teach people with this condition exercises that involve focusing on objects at various distances.

Pencil pushups are one such exercise, says Dr. Lee. Here, you’d be instructed to hold a pencil in front of you and then slowly bring it to your nose, all while keeping your focus on the pencil’s eraser.

Furthermore, vision therapy can be safe and effective in treating conditions such as amblyopia (lazy eye) and strabismus (crossed eyes).

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I don’t have an eye condition. Are there any “everyday” reasons to do eye exercises?

Yes. There are a few eye exercises that can help you avoid the symptoms of digital eyestrain that often come with long stretches of screen time, says Dr. Lee.

Nearly 6 in 10 American adults say they have symptoms of digital eyestrain (also known as computer vision syndrome), according to The Vision Council. It causes symptoms such as eye fatigue, headache, blurry vision, dry eye, and neck pain.

Part of the reason that screen time is so taxing on your eyes is that the letters on the devices aren’t always sharply defined — unlike, say, the words in a book, according to the American Optometric Association (AOA).

The glare from the screen can also cause your eyes to work harder than they otherwise would, resulting in eyestrain. If you spend more than two continuous hours in front of a screen every day, then you may have a higher risk of digital eyestrain than people who don’t.

That’s where eye exercises come in.

What eye exercises can prevent digital eyestrain?

Think of these exercises as being “like yoga for the eyes,” Dr. Lee says. Here are a few to try:

Palming

What it does: Palming relaxes the eye muscles to ease eyestrain and eye fatigue.

How to do it: Start by rubbing your hands together to warm them up slightly. Next, cup the palms of each of your hands over your eyes. Do this for about 5 minutes, or as long as is comfortable.

“Make sure your hand isn’t pressing on the eye and you aren’t exerting any pressure on it,” Dr. Lee says. Putting too much pressure on your eyes could, over time, damage your optic nerves.

Conscious Blinking

What it does: Blinking replenishes the natural tears that help keep the eye lubricated. That can help ward off dry eye. When we look at a screen, we naturally blink less frequently.

How to do it: Close your eyes for two to three seconds. Then open them. Repeat a few more times.

“This kind of blinking is more of a conscious blinking,” Dr. Lee says.

Figure Eights

What it does: Focusing on an object in the distance helps ease eyestrain from looking at a nearby screen.

How to do it: Pick a spot about 10 feet away from you on the floor or the wall. With your eyes, trace an imaginary figure eight with your eyes. Then switch the direction.

“You can do an upstanding figure eight, as a number, or flip it from side to side,” Dr. Lee says.

20-20-20 Rule

What it does: Like the figure eights, focusing on something in the distance gives your eyes a break from all that up-close work you do at a computer or screen.

How to do it: Every 20 minutes, take a 20-second break and look at something 20 feet away.

“This is the No. 1 rule I recommend to my patients,” Dr. Lee says. Looking at something in the distance will give your eyes a much-needed rest.

Another way to improve your eye health? Get moving! Press play to learn how staying physically active can help your eyes: