What causes more visible veins?

To understand why these visible veins develop, you’ve got to understand how blood flows through the body. Your heart pumps blood to your entire body through your blood vessels. From there, blood circulates outward toward the extremities (legs, arms, head) through the arteries and back inward to the heart through your veins.

For instance, if you have a job where you are standing still for long periods of time, gravity is at work pulling the blood back down toward the legs, causing the veins to get stretched out and the valves to weaken over time. If you sit all day at your job, you can also start to see visible veins because there is a lack of muscle movement. The muscles in the leg help the veins push the blood back up toward the heart, so moving around during the day can help prevent visible veins.

Besides, the older you get, the more visible your veins become. As you age, your skin becomes thinner and, at the same time, your veins weaken, getting stretched out and collecting more pooled blood. In combination, these two elements contribute to larger veins that are easily visible through your skin.