["Acta Physiologica, Volume 242, Issue 6, June 2026. ", "\nABSTRACT\n\nAim\nAerobic metabolism supplies ~90% of the ATP for neural activity. In frogs, activity has large aerobic needs typical of an average vertebrate, but surprisingly, can shift to using only glycolysis upon emergence from hibernation. We hypothesized that hibernation triggers a global reduction in the aerobic cost of neural function.\n\n\nMethods\nWe simultaneously measured activity of the brainstem respiratory network via motor nerves and tissue O2 partial pressure (pO2) in vitro from control and hibernated bullfrogs (4 weeks cold submergence; 4°C). To identify which functions differentially consume O2, we sequentially blocked activity and various cellular processes requiring activity‐independent ion regulation and used the resulting tissue pO2 change (ΔpO2) as an index of O2 consumed. We further assessed how activity varies as a function of tissue pO2 and how O2 consumption varies across network activity levels.\n\n\nResults\nDespite similar network activity levels, we provide three lines of evidence that hibernation reduces its aerobic requirement. First, hibernators consume less O2 for baseline activity. Second, network output remains stable from baseline to anoxia, whereas moderate hypoxia disrupts controls. Finally, accelerating activity does not enhance O2 consumption as in controls, but aerobic metabolism ultimately increases during seizure‐like activity.\n\n\nConclusion\nHibernating frogs reduce aerobic needs for sustaining physiological levels of neural activity, revealing how they overcome the challenge of restarting motor circuits on the background of hypoxia during emergence from hibernation. More broadly, vertebrate neural circuits seemingly constrained by aerobic metabolism can exhibit substantial plasticity in the aerobic requirements for function.\n\n"]