With population ageing, the number of people living with one or more long-term conditions is increasing. Many long-term conditions are caused at least in part by modifiable risk factors such as tobacco use, unhealthy diet, alcohol consumption and physical inactivity. Attention to lifestyle is therefore critical to improve people’s health. Lifestyle medicine supports behaviour change with the aim of improving diet, physical activity levels, mental well-being, sleep and social connections while minimising the use of harmful substances and behaviours. Lifestyle medicine can provide a clinical approach for preventing, managing – and sometimes even reversing – long-term conditions. This article discusses how primary care professionals can apply a lifestyle medicine approach to encourage their patients to adopt healthier lifestyles and to shift the focus of care from treating long-term conditions to preventing them.