Let's talk about the best rep range for muscle growth... here are the references from the video! Peace! www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7927075/ pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25853914/ pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24714538/

Glad you started doing shorts cuz your delivery of information is just so good and easy to understand

I use higher rep ranges when it’s hard to maintain proper form due to a weird path of movement, like lateral raises or side leg raises

12 years of training and still never running out of educational moments. Thanks Jeff

Used to lift mostly 5x5 for a long time, but it's so damn time-consuming. Not only are there more sets, but you need longer breaks to recover from the heavier weights. 3x8-12 is a good sweet spot to get enough volume while minimizing the risk of injuries and avoiding junk volume.

Hi jeff, biomedical scientist here. The studies you're looking at are a joke. They are using ultrasound to measure muscle gain in subjects after only 8 weeks of training. Ultrasound does not have high enough resolution compared to MRI to detect small changes in muscle mass after only 8 weeks of training. Hence why the studies are showing no difference between the two training methods. There are in addition a ton of studies showing muscle hypertrophy is best stimulated by metabolic stress (burning sensation caused by lactic acid), time under tension and mechanical tension, all of which are only possible with high intensity, yet high volume training. Therefore, the study that says doing 7 sets of 3 reps is just as effective as doing 3 sets of 10 reps is b.s. Another problem with that study is the fact that subjects doing 3 sets of 10 reps are required to only rest 90 seconds per set which clearly shows a lack of intensity in the training when you only need 90 seconds to rest. And you even said it yourself, 6-12 rep range of high intensity training seems to be most effective. While lower than 5 reps is for strength.

Gotta say I've watched Jeff for years and the man knows his stuff! 🏆

I find lower rep ranges fun every now and then. But they are incredibly exhausting, which is why I don't do many sets with those and instead try to get more volume in from isolations

For sure you can build over any rep range. But yeah personally , I definitely also feel like there is value with the typical "Hypertrophy rep range" idea (although I'd probably extend it to like 6-15) Any more than that and on certain lifts I can definitely feel systemic fatigue as a limiting factor along with the mechanical tension. Any less than that and It can beat me up on certain lifts, along with sometimes reducing mind/muscle connection, as I can feel other muscles assist more when going super heavy

Thanks man I injured my wrist a few months ago and it still hurts when I try to carry heavy weight so knowing I can do reach higher reps while still building muscle mass helps me out a lot

Perfect explanation. As long as you’re doing something in the gym you’ll see some gains, and for the most part differences are minimal assuming you’re not risking injury. It largely comes down to whatever is more fun and comfortable for you, because for most people that is what will get them to go *consistently* which is the real key.

I love how literally everything we learned from Nippard, the “srs” gang, and so many others 10 years ago are all being debunked now as myths. Makes you wonder what we’ll learn 10 years from now

For heavy compounds like bench, squat, deadlift I do 3 sets of 5 after warm up All medium weights are 3 sets of 12. Just a preference, glad to see that whatever I do as long as I get close to failure it builds muscle

Quality of rep is also very important, which is what makes studies so difficult because it's very hard to measure the "quality" of someones rep. Are they keeping tension on eccentric and concentric? Is there a pause on contraction? Are they swinging or using momentum? Best thing I tell my clients is dont over think it, if you're putting effort in and not risking injury you are going to have a positive effect. Mind muscle connection is something that can't really be taught, it has to be felt, and that takes time.

Honestly, this is one of the best, most concise videos on this subject I've ever seen. I just wanted to know the basics, not become an expert in exercise sciences or anything. This video did it for me. Thank you for creating such great, solid content. You have a new subscriber here. 👊🏼

I find 1 rep times 1 set does the job for me

I love low weight high rep, the range of motion and mind muscle connection you get are unmatched.

btw your voice is actually really calming to listen to. It's soothing!

Very informative short, thanks babe!

It's a relief to learn that you can vary your training to a certain degree to do it the way that is most enjoyable for yourself and nevertheless getting your progress. Thank you for enlightening!

A lot of the info on your channel over the last little bit is great timing for me. Had a long term injury and have been very sick, easing back in and doing things smarter is a must for me. I appreciate the work you do. It really cuts through a sea of bro science

Missing a key point here. The more weight you do the less likely you are to reach true failure. You may not be able to do another rep of your 1rm while still being far from true failure. The increments are too wide.

In Spain for long years time we said methode Bilbo in this case 🏋🏻‍♀️

I hate how well you convey your message in such a short and concise manner! I need more info XD

I'm starting out and I keep encountering strains and pains that slow me down. I don't want to permanently injure myself, but I wanna grow. Thanks for the advice! I'll get back to it. No excuses now.

That’s good to know because I have a work related back injury and am finally able to start exercising after two years.

Really hope you keep delivering on shorts because it has been such a saviour recently

I haven't gone above 8 reps in years. I like to stick around the 5 to 8 range. Sometimes I'll go up to 12 on isolation exercises.

Do one on eggs and cholesterol

Literally the only guys advice I follow. Incorporates actual scientific based studies not bro science

It would be interesting to find muscle group specific studies.

Loving the short uploads

Yep, this makes sense because I've found it to be true through trial and error. In fact, when I started doing sets in the 10 - 15 rep range I got stronger because I wasn't getting injured (I'm in my late 40s). I wish I would have known this when I was younger because I injured myself too many times with heavy weights. I'm stronger now than I was in my late teen years when I had been lifting for 5 years.

I like this break down man. I'm in roughly the same breakdown for my workouts.

I tend to do better at the 10-12 rep range. I'm older now, so I injure easier as well as it's more taxing on my body if i go to a lower rep range. Anything with higher reps, I don't feel the first couple of reps when lifting, so it makes me feel like it's junk volume until you reach halfway and you start to feel the weights.

The broski who made fall in love with training again👊🏾

Do one on frequency and if it's necessary. Huge views you'll get

Please address rep ranges for different muscle groups and fast vs slow twitch.

as a beginner in calisthenics, im glad i could just increase the reps and still make gains. when i first started, i was able to do 3 sets of 8 reps pushups, now i can do 14 reps per set. id probably wait till i can do 30 reps per set before i progress to another harder variation of the same exercise. this is really helpful, thanks!

I love this! I normally go for 10 reps (generally 8-12) since it’s a little quicker and works for me, but if I have an injury, like you said, I like doing a little lighter to ease back in. This vid shows that you don’t have to change your weight just because you did 15 reps. If 15 felt good to you, go ahead! You’ll still get results

Intensity is always the most important part

It's a good thing this was a short video. I would have been mad if I watched a long one only to come back to 6 to 12 reps.

Can't weight to watch more of these shorts!

i don't know what you are thinking but these shorts are a godsend.d straight and concise to the point.

This is a life changer, imma reduce my weight to work around my should we impingement, thank you!!

Lower rep ranges to failure also tend to stress the ligaments and tendons more, so doing that often can lead to injury.

Bro as someone who just got injured i needed to hear this my strength on my left tricep dropped hard

i always felt that but never had the scientific confirmation, thanks

“6-12 reps is a myth”… “but it’s kind of actually the best way to workout”

Easier to go to failure on low reps because the muscle actually gets tired. With lower weights you feel the burn and it takes mental fortitude to get to muscle failure.

In a sense you are underlining Heavy Duty practiced by Mike Mentzer and others. Learning alot from you Jeff 👍

time under tension can boost muscle growth as well so its also beneficial to do more reps to failure or at least use negatives to extend the muscle’s time under tension

Could you do a video on tips and tricks to working around injuries?

I’ve been going to the gym consistently for about a month now and I’ve been doing 5x15 with most of my workouts. If I push for a little bit heavier weight then I lower the reps to 10-12. So far this is working well for me and I’m already seeing some results so I’m looking forward to what my further results will look like as time goes.

Usually the recommended is to use low reps for compound exercises to build less fatigue and use higher reps on isolated muscles to prevent injury

I see many people talking about 2 sets of 2-6 reps till failure being all we need. Would love to see your take on it.

Dude, great info! I’ve always worked with 5x5s for powerlifting because they seem to be the “gold standard,” but I never knew why. I may have to start switching it up depending on my mood and how I’m feeling each day!

It definitely is hard to only do a large amount of reps for each exercise. It makes working out take so incredibly long I have eds, and my muscles are pretty weak, combine that with my stretchy ligaments, and it means that I can only do a light weight, so a lot of reps are needed It is nice to know that I will still be building muscle, though, so thank you for this video! It definitely helped clear up some questions I had :)

Another factor would be what percentage of your one rep max you’re lifting at. Also, you’re set and rep range along with tempo will influence whether you’re developing slow twitch, fast twitch, or FOG muscle fibers.

Jeff rocked the green posers stringers

For my first set of any certain muscle group I do a warmup set that becomes a working set. This is by using a lighter weight that starts to get difficult around 15 reps, I find that around 15-20 reps is enough to get that muscle group warmed up so then I’m confident that when I go past that to near failure at around 30 reps I won’t hurt myself. So I can warmup and do a working set in the same set.

Great insight here. Thanks.

I cycle through different rep ranges around every month. I been absent to the gym for a while and just started back up. Currently hitting 8-12 rep range as I retrain my body for endurance and strength training for familiarization. For strength explosiveness, I'll hit high sets low reps heavy weight. And some isolation exercises, I hit anywhere from 10-15.

That mic quality is amazing. Anyone know what mic he's using?

Indeed right, but it needs to take into account the fatigue

Your yt shorts are golden, Jeff. Please keep em coming 🔥

This subject matter is crucial based on my particular situation. I’m 44, had 25 unsuccessful knee surgeries from age 27-42. I finally found a dr who was willing to do knee replacements, and it was absolutely the right choice. Now most of the arthritis pain is gone. Yet because of so many unsuccessful knee surgeries in the past, all my muscles have completely atrophied over the years, upper and lower, almost to the point where I am legitimately disabled. Trying to build back basic muscle only seems possible sticking to very very low weights and very very high reps, never less than 30-40. Anytime I try to raise the weight significantly and target the 8-12 rep range for failure, it never feels right, there’s alot of discomfort all throughout my body. I can do the 8-12 pretty easily, but I never feel the correct muscles being activated, only systematic failure and the bad kind of pain (not the good muscle burn I get from doing high reps low weight) It’s a tremendous fuckin challenge having to do every body part very low weight, very high reps, due to systemic failure. Yet through tedious trial and error, it’s the only way my muscles grow back without tearing the shit out of my joints. Right now since my cardiovascular is low too, I workout once every 4 days, give it every ounce of energy I got on my workout day. It takes about 3 full days to recover, which is frustrating because I’m so anxious to build back my cardio now that the knee replacements have corrected my lifelong anatomy problems……..So 2 questions, any insight on how I can get more cardio in without frying my nervous system trying to train to often? And 2nd, which is better for building quads after knee replacements, squats or leg press? Consensus might say leg press is easier, but it’s very difficult finding a functional leg press machine that doesn’t aggravate my knees. Squats actually feel a little more natural, but I don’t really feel any quad burning, since they’re so weak & atrophied. I’m sure there’s a leg press out there that could help but I’ve yet to find the right one. I hate the diagonal leg press, and hate the horizontal one where you’re on a sled and start out with your knees retartedly bent towards your chest. I need the horizontal one where you push out, and the weights move forward, not me moving backwards

As of late, I have been doing a "Starting Strength" program with just the barbell - All sets of 5. I have been thinking about increasing reps to 6, 7, or 8 instead of increasing weight in the linear progression format I have been. I am getting stronger, but of course would like to get bigger as well.

That lat machine looks so good

Cant wait for the new program to drop i’ve been looking for a decent pure bodybuilding program for a while

I do various set and rep situations depending on the week. Its generally a 4-5 week cycle. 1st week is 1 rep maxes for main movements, 2nd week is 3x10 at 75% max to build a base, 3rd is 8-12rep at 85%-65%, 4th is 3x8 @85%, 5th is 3x12@65%. Ive found i can usually increase my main movements by 5%-10% by the next max week at this rate. Of course thats just my program, and it obviously includes axillary movements to strengthen the fine muscles and group work as well.

Im learning so much thank you

The best way to implement this imo is doing your compound lifts with heavy weight since compounds lead to more growth than isolation and compounds are already more fatiguing than isolation movements you double down on it and plus who doesn’t like to have a big SBD. THEN do your isolation movements with light weight high reps and good form controlling the eccentric and all that fun stuff

My favorite workout is Smolov: 6x6, 7x5, 8x4, 10x3. Sure, it's lots of sets, but no other program has ever built so much strength in me. In 4 months I am now repping my previous 1 rep max in a 6x6 set.

I'm very new to lifting and I keep seeing people saying go to failure and others saying leave 2 or 3 reps in reserve. Idk who to believe

Can you elaborate on the working around an injury part? How should I program my sets?

I just do 3 sets of 3-5 reps on most exercises then another 2-3 sets in the 5-8 rep range and 1-2 sets in the 8-15 rep range. Significant gains in strength and pretty fast muscle growth too. Get both endurance and heavy load strength. This is per exercise but I typically only have around 5 different exercises a session on PPLR. Every 2-3 weeks I’ll work up to a 1 rep max with most exercises. If I hit a new PR then I’ll try and hit it again and try and get an extra rep. If that fails I’ll just hit a new rep PR on a slightly lower weight then the week after that hit a new weight PR again. When I’m hitting PR’s every 2nd week and once I achieve it I lower the weight slightly and try and get 3-5 reps for a couple of sets then lower the weight again and do 2-3 sets of 8-12 reps. So every week I’m working on total strength but on PR weeks I tend to stick around 3-5 reps for at least half my sets while my other weeks it’s typically 5-8. I always do at least 1-2 sets, usually 3 very slow and controlled in the 8-12 or 10-15 rep range. Sometimes instead of working with 2-3 sets of high rep ranges I’ll just do one massive drop set starting at my max or slightly below until I can’t even physically do the movement without any weights anymore. This is the way to build both muscle and strength and has worked extremely well for me compared to any other way I’ve ever worked out before. Going for 1 rep maxes every session and trying it on the same exercise 2-3 days a week locked me in a very long plateau and I wasn’t even building strength. I was attempting a new PR, failing, lowering the weight and go to failure, lower the weight, failure and repeat etc. Now going for weight PR’s on an exercise every 2 weeks I’m successful most of the time. I also keep 1-2 RIR for squats and bench. This works best for me. I go to failure on every other movement including pull-ups and OHP. For OHP after going for a max I usually just lower the weight and for 3 sets do a challenging but easy enough weight to do 5 sets with 1RIR. Final sets I lower it again and go 5-12 rep range to failure. Strength and muscle is built in every rep range. Just focus on lifting heavy weights close to failure and don’t go to failure every single set. I love going to failure but for bench especially I find 3-5 reps and leaving 1-2RIR results in the best gains. Best results from my experience is: 3 sets of 3-5 with 1RIR (as fast as possible) 2 sets of 5-8 with 0-1 RIR slow on way down, pause, explode on way up) 2 sets of 8-15 with 0-2 RIR (slow on way down, optional pause and either explode or controlled on way up). Avoid actually failing on bench and squat, allow yourself to fail if you’re going for a new rep PR at most once a month with a spotter so you can actually make the most out of the last rep with a slight assistance.

Also if you do too many or not enough reps, it can be hard to gauge where failure is

Agree, what about when I used to cycle 10 miles a day! Do tons of reps and get really muscular , lots of failure when the wind is blowing , but’s it’s a thousand reps it more

Mix them, use certain ranges for certain moves. Go heavy progression with squats, mid with lunges and high for extensions etc.

For over a year I've been training to failure with a very slow rep cadence as well as attempting to remove as much momentum from my lifts as possible. I lift lighter weights for many of my lifts but I've built more muscle than I have from other types of training. I discovered this training methodology after becoming injured.

I do 1 set, moderately heavy weight, 6-10 reps to failure, w/ progressively heavier weight each set cycle. For me that's all I need. I work @ a pretty labor intensive (high volume) job already, so I rest 3 days between workouts. Getting the biggest growth of my life @ 40 right now.

Still gonna do 6-12, might mix it with lower rep range now cos of this video

That same study that found that 7x3 was just as effective at building muscle as 3x10 also showed that group A was significantly more sore and felt worse than the 3x10 group

I think it just depends per person, but also your own preference. For me, I like to switch between 4x10 and 5x5 reps every six weeks.

12-20 is my sweet spot on most movements, below 10 on most exercises I don't feel shit and often dont get sore at all or not in the target muscle

My personal favorite is 3 sets of 5 on compound lifts and 3 sets of 7-8 on more isolated movements

Jeff plz make more shorts

Do you have any videos on rep tempo and eccentric training?

When I train light I can’t feel that muscle stimulation or connection as well then when I’m pumping iron with a heavier wait with good form

7x3 will take SO much longer to finish the exercise from adding up the rest between each set

Hard to reach the same intensity with high reps too, 20 reps when failure is 22 is tough to perform and even gauge.

Thanks jeff

👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽 One of the best ways to gain muscle mass is to do periodization and avaliations. Periodize the number of repetitions and vary exercises so that your body becomes increasingly harmonious.

I use all three. Start with (After warm up) 8-12, then move on to a heavy 4-7, then finish off with a high rep range just to finish things off.

I think the best way possible is to vary the reps ranges in the same workout For example a good push session for me its like 3x 6-8 Bench 3x 10-12 incline bench 2x 10-12 military press 3x 10-15 Lateral rises 3x 10-15 triceps excercise i think lateral and tricep can stay in that range forever. BUT you can rotate the first 3 compounds movements load from day to day. so you came second day and: 3x 6-8 incline bench 3x 10-12 Bench 2x 10-12 military press 3x 10-15 Lateral rises 3x 10-15 triceps excercise

We need a new fullbody high frequency workout, is it coming soon

I'd be curious to see if there is a difference in myofibril composition amongst the different rep ranges. I know there are some muscle measuring techniques that can differentiate water content from actual fibril and/or protein composition (DXA scans maybe?)

Ite true! All you need is a weighted stretch or whatever the current fitness trend is, I dunno, early it was training once every epoc like mentzer but the optimal seems to have changed again

Wasn't gaining any size until I dropped to 3-5 rep range.