Primal Takeaways

  1. Researchers wanted to run into how doing more or fewer sets per workout afflicted strength, endurance, and muscle growth.
  2. On the whole, the more sets people practice in workouts, the more forcefulness, endurance, and muscle they proceeds.
  3. If yous desire to maximize force and muscle gain or break through a plateau, then you want to do more sets, not less.

How many sets should yous exercise to build musculus?

On the ane hand, minimalists say you should do equally few sets as possible to keep making progress.

Some even say that you lot should have one set to failure in your workouts, and anything across that is overtraining.

Long-term progress, they claim, is all about adding weight (intensity) not volume (sets).

"Piece of work smarter, not harder," is their ideology.

On the other mitt, the maximalist camp says you should do every bit many sets as yous can without getting injured.

"No pain, no gain, brah," is their motto.

Who'south right?

That's what researchers from the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul in Brazil wanted to discover out in a written report published in 2022.

Let's look at what they did.

    Table of Contents

  • What Did the Researchers Do?
  • What Were the Study Results?
  • How Your Workout Volume Affects Muscle Growth
  • How Your Conditioning Volume Affects Strength Gains
  • How Your Workout Volume Affects Muscle Endurance
  • What Does This Mean for You?
  • ane. There'southward a indicate of diminishing returns when you do more sets.
  • ii. More sets can be counterproductive.
  • three. Gradual increases in volume are better than sudden jumps.

What Did the Researchers Do?

The researchers had 48 men without any prior weightlifting experience follow a strength preparation program for 6 months.

The men were randomly split into iv groups:

  1. One grouping did one fix per exercise.
  2. One group did 3 sets per practise.
  3. One group did v sets per exercise.
  4. 1 group merely did body weight exercises.

The reason the researchers included the body weight exercise group is they needed a control group to compare the others to. They figured that the body weight exercise group could serve every bit a skilful representation of what people tin attain with a moderate corporeality of resistance preparation.

Anyway, anybody trained 3 times per week with at least 2 to 3 days of residual between workouts, did the aforementioned exercises, trained in the viii-to-12-rep range, and rested ane.5 to 2 minutes between sets.

The only departure between groups was how many sets were performed on each do.

The strength training program included compound exercises like the bench printing, military press, and leg printing, and some isolation exercises like the leg extension, leg curl, bicep roll, crunches, and tricep extensions.

Everyone likewise took every set to failure and the weight was increased on every exercise when they reached the pinnacle of their rep range, just like you practise in the Bigger Leaner Stronger and Thinner Leaner Stronger programs.

The researchers took a variety of tests to measure anybody'southward progress. They measured:

  • How much weight people could elevator for five reps (to mensurate muscle strength)
  • How much weight people could lift for 20 reps (to mensurate muscle endurance)
  • How high people could bound (to measure out ability)
  • How much musculus and fat people were conveying (to measure trunk limerick)
  • How thick people's muscles were in different places (to measure muscle growth)

The research team was extremely careful to record how they took all of the measurements, and remeasured every subject twice to ensure they had authentic results.

Unfortunately, the researchers didn't record what or how much these guys were eating. Calorie and macronutrient intake can make a big difference in body composition and, as you'll come across, this probably did hurt everyone's gains.

What did the researchers observe?

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What Were the Study Results?

how many sets build muscle

The group that did v sets per exercise gained more forcefulness, endurance, and muscle than the groups that did i or 3 sets per exercise or body weight exercises.

The main finding was that the more than sets people did, the better their results on the whole.

Let'due south go over the highlights offset and then dig into the details. The chief takeaways were:

  • People who did 5 sets gained more musculus than anybody else.
  • People who did five sets gained more forcefulness on near every exercise than anybody else.
  • People who did iii sets gained more muscle than people who did i set or trunk weight training only.
  • People who did 3 sets gained more strength than people who did one set up or body weight training only.
  • People who did torso weight preparation actually lost force on the bench press and leg press (lol, bummer).
  • Every group lost about the same amount of fatty (which makes sense—none of them were following a structured diet).
  • Every group gained the aforementioned amount of ability (which also makes sense, since none of them were training for that specifically).

Now let's dig into the details.

How Your Workout Volume Affects Muscle Growth

Technically, there wasn't a statistically significant difference in muscle gain between any of the groups.

That said, in that location was a articulate tendency for more than muscle proceeds in the groups that did more than sets.

Hither'southward what the results looked similar:

  • v sets: 7.iii pounds of musculus gain
  • 3 sets: 6.five pounds of muscle gain
  • 1 set: 1 pound of muscle gain
  • Body weight do: half-dozen.4 pounds of muscle proceeds

The group that did 5 sets also increased their bicep and tricep size more than than whatever other group in the written report.

One matter to keep in mind is that none of these groups gained as much muscle as they probably should have. If you're doing everything right, you can usually expect to proceeds at least ten pounds or and then of muscle in your get-go 6 months of training, and anybody in this study brutal short of that goal.

So, why the lacklustre results?

Information technology's likely these people weren't following an constructive muscle-building diet .

Almost everyone (except the body weight group) lost around 10 pounds of trunk fat, and so they were probably in a calorie arrears most of the time. That also means that none of them gained as much musculus as they should accept if they were bulking properly.

Loftier-volume training takes more than calories to recover from, then it's likely that the 5-set up group would take as well benefited the almost from a diet that provided more than calories.

In other words, although the differences don't look meaning, they probably would accept been bigger if these people were eating right.

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How Your Workout Volume Affects Strength Gains

how many sets build muscle study

There's a common idea floating effectually that to go stiff, you only need to focus on adding weight to the bar every workout.

As long as yous're getting a blank minimum of sets, say 1, ii, or 3 per conditioning, and focusing on progressive overload, yous aren't going to benefit past adding whatsoever more sets.

This study shows otherwise.

When it comes to strength gains, the people who did the near sets got the strongest on nearly of the exercises, besides.

Here's how each grouping's 5-rep max changed on each exercise throughout the study:

Bench Press 5-Rep Max

Body weight: -6%

1 gear up: +12%

3 sets: +17%

five sets: +11%

Leg Press v-Rep Max

Body weight:  -2%

1 set: +xvi%

three sets: +15%

v sets: +18%

Overhead Press 5-Rep Max

Body weight: +13%

one set: +22%

3 sets: +24%

5 sets: +35%

Lat Pulldown v-Rep Max

Trunk weight: +3%

1 set: +19%

3 sets: +12%

5 sets: +17%

Average 5-Rep Max

Body weight: +4%

i Set: +17%

3 Set: +17%

5 Sets: +20%

Every bit you tin can run into, the differences aren't huge, though at that place'southward more to the story. Anybody in the 5-set group started out significantly stronger than the people in the 1- and iii-set groups, meaning they were probably closer to their genetic limit for strength gains.

Normally, your rate of strength proceeds slows down the stronger you lot go, nevertheless in this report the strongest people still made faster progress when they did more sets.

Of course, you still have to go stronger to get bigger.

You tin can't just do more than sets with light weights and look to make much progress. That said, doing more sets and consistently adding weight to your lifts gives you the best of both worlds.

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How Your Workout Volume Affects Muscle Endurance

When it came to how much weight people could push button for 20 reps, the 5-prepare group came out on top once over again.

In this case, the researchers simply measured bench printing and leg press endurance (probably considering doing 20-reps on every exercise would have been exhausting).

Here'southward how each group's 20-rep max changed on each practise throughout the study:

Bench Press xx-Rep Max

Body weight: +five%

ane gear up: +5%

3 sets: +17%

5 sets: +24%

Leg Printing 20-Rep Max

Body weight: +five%

ane fix: +12%

three sets: +seven%

5 sets: +36%

Boilerplate 20-Rep Max

Body weight: +5%

1 Set: +9%

3 Set up: +12%

v Sets: +thirty%

As you can see, the grouping that did 5 sets improved their muscular endurance by 18% more than the group that only did 3 sets, and the group that did iii sets generally got better results than the group that did 1 set.

In the last analysis, the five-set grouping gained more muscle, endurance, and strength on almost every metric than the iii-set group. There were a few measurements that were similar, just when yous wait at everything together the people who did 5 sets clearly fabricated ameliorate gains across the board.

As the researchers ended, there was a "dose-response" relationship between how many sets people did and their results.

In other words, the more than sets people did, the more force, muscle, and endurance they gained.

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What Does This Mean for You?

how many sets to build muscle

The lesser line, and what the researchers concluded, is more than or less what yous'd expect:

The more sets you lot practice, the better your gains.

Does this mean you should do 5 sets for every practise, all the fourth dimension, under all circumstances, though?

Does this mean more than sets is always meliorate than less?

Not necessarily.

Here are a few things to keep in mind:

ane. There's a indicate of diminishing returns when y'all exercise more sets.

Doing more sets usually does result in more gains, just the increase in muscle growth, force, and endurance isn't proportional to the number of additional sets you practise.

That is, past a sure threshold, yous're getting smaller and smaller returns for more and more attempt.

If you've already achieved the bulk of your natural strength and muscle gains, and you're chasing that terminal 5 to 10% comeback, and then yous're going to need to increment your workout book substantially to get the task done.

But if yous're just starting out or trying to break through a plateau?

Probably non worth it.

In that case, yous're better off focusing on intensity (weight) while doing plenty volume (sets), which is in the range of 9 to 12 heavy sets per week for almost people.

2. More sets tin can be counterproductive.

Not but is doing more sets less and less beneficial, in some cases it tin can get-go to become detrimental.

In another recent study from researchers at the University of Sydney, beginner lifters who used 5 sets for their compound exercises gained more strength and musculus than lifters who used ten sets.

The ten-set group also spent significantly more time in the gym.

These people were complete beginners, and jumping into a program that involved 10 sets for every practice pushed them into a state of overtraining.

three. Gradual increases in volume are amend than sudden jumps.

You should increase book, but merely as much equally you need to keep making progress.

This is the real takeaway from this study.

On the whole, information technology's clear that the more sets y'all practise, the more force and muscle gains you're going to brand, on several weather condition:

  1. Yous can proceed adding weight to your exercises over time, besides.
  2. Yous tin effectively recover from your workouts.
  3. Y'all're calculation book because yous plateaued, not considering you want to see how much abuse your body can take.

You also don't need to do five sets for all of your exercises to see benefits.

Instead, what y'all tin can do when you plateau is add together i or 2 sets to whatever exercises take plateaued or that yous want to improve most.

For instance, if y'all're following the Bigger Leaner Stronger forcefulness training programme, you could add together two sets to your incline bench printing and overhead printing so that you're doing five total sets for each every time y'all train.

Or, if you lot want to build bigger quads, yous could add i set to your squat workouts.

The bottom line is that doing more sets is better for gaining strength, musculus, and endurance up to a betoken, and your best bet for long-term gains is to gradually build your conditioning volume over time.

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What's your take on how many sets you should do? Accept anything else to share? Let me know in the comments below!

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