I won’t lie: building muscle with bodyweight-only movements is far from ideal.
And it’s for one simple reason: it gets harder and harder to continue creating sufficient resistance to challenge yourself as you grow stronger. And your muscles will struggle to grow if you don’t push them harder than you have in the past.
If you’re in the weightroom – you simply pick up a heavier set of dumbbells or load another plate onto the bar. If you’re using only your bodyweight – you have to be creative. What I’ll provide below is my best effort at a bodyweight only routine that gets progressively harder as you grow stronger.
Who’s It For?
This routine is for people who don’t have the time or money to goto the gym on a regular basis. Or those that simply don’t have access to a gym.
What Do I Need?
All you need is your body and some basic objects. The one thing that you will want to invest in is a pull-up bar (get one cheap on Amazon that simply fits into your doorframe here).
The Routine
– Perform an appropriate exercise variation of each of the following movements every other day
– Perform each exercise for 3 sets of 8-15 repetitions
– When you can perform more than 15 reps of a given movement, advance to the next hardest variation
1. The Squat
Muscles worked: Legs (quadriceps, hamstrings, glutes)
Variations
- Bodyweight squat
- Jump squat
- Single leg chair squat
- Single leg stoop squat (sit onto something shorter)
- Pistol squat
- Jumping pistol squat
2. The Push
Muscles worked: Chest, shoulders, triceps
Variations
- Kneeling push up
- Incline push up
- Push up
- Decline push up
- Decline clap push up
3. The Pull
Muscles worked: Back, biceps
Variations
- Assisted pull up
- Pull up
- One arm pull up
4. The Core
Muscles worked: Abdominals (rectus abdominis, transverse abdominis, internal and external obliques)
Variations
- Sit ups (with your feet underneath a sofa or something similar)
- Knee raises (hanging from a pull up bar)
- Straight leg raises (hanging from a pull up bar)
No Spam. Guaranteed.
They never really worked for me…
Do you mean bodyweight movements in general?
Actually to be honest, I do pullups and situps in the gym, but even with the pull ups I need to add weights after a while.
The pushing stuff is just too light for me, I need heavy weights to stimulate my upper body, and once an exercise gets past 20 reps I don’t really grow.
But with that being said, they are def better than nothing…
I’m in agreement, my man. It’s not optimal, but by manipulating the resistance like I suggest above you can get a progressive routine that will be very challenging for 90% of gym-goers.
David would you recommend this for someone who is cutting?
Hey Jackson, I think this routine – combined with a calorically restricted diet – would work well for cutting, yes.
Hey David, what about the frequency for this routine? how many times per week (3-4 times, such as mon-wed-fri-sun) Could be done every day ? Thanks man
It should be done every other day.
Aren’t one arm push-ups harder than decline clap push-ups?
Maybe, but it’s harder to keep good form.
What do you think about focusing on squats one day, push another day, pull another day, and another day just for the core…
For body weight workouts, can you isolate like that? Or is it better to do full body workouts?
Any ideas would be appreciated. Thanks brotha.
It’s best to stick with full-body, especially with bodyweight exercises because you are heavily limited in the intensity of each exercise (i.e. you can’t load up a few hundred pounds for squats).
I’m 6’2 270 just diagnosed with diabetes. I haven’t lifted or worked out in prob 15 years. I’m extremely over weight. Would this be good for me or do you recommend something different or change anything. Thanks
As long as you’re cleared by your doctor to perform all of the exercises, I don’t see why this routine wouldn’t work for you.
How about gymnastics exercise such as plance push ups
front liver pull up and
The iron cross
These are hard but is it good for adding muscle?
Honestly I’m not familiar with those exercises, so I can’t give an accurate answer. I assume they would be good substitutes if you want to switch up the workout every few months.