Let's start by explaining the options you'll experience out there in two different categories.

  1. Hollywood Bro-Splits
  2. Beginner Strength Routines

Hollywood Bro-Splits

A bro-split, in simplest terms, is any routine that divides a week into days focused on small muscle groups, such as a day for arms, a day for chest, a day for back, etc. Each muscle group is worked no more than one day per week.

I will not take part in the debate on whether or not bro-splits are legitimate, but I will say that they are not optimized for beginners. Working each muscle group once a week is less than ideal frequency. Dr. Mike Israetel explains.

Beginner Strength Routines

Examples include, but are not limited to, Starting Strength and Strong Lifts. Both of these routines are good for beginners, but both of them lack bodybuilding elements most beginners desire. These are powerlifting style beginner routines that focus primarily on movements rather than aesthetics. In other words, you will be able to lift heavy objects, but you may still have small arms or a disproportionate body. Mark Rippetoe is a legend (as well as a contributor to ExRx) and his books are highly recommended by the fitness community. That being said, I think his programs are better suited for someone who is more interested in strength than aesthetics. He is a strength and powerlifting coach, not a bodybuilder.

The Beginner Routine: A Full Body Split

Please locate Full Body Workouts at the top of the page. In the left cell you will see four different routines. Any of these four routines are acceptable to choose. In the right cell you will see some basic directions. Please read these so you understand how to apply the routine. Note that x's stand for rest days, while w's stand for workout days. Now click on one of the routines in the left cell. Please scroll down to the bottom and read the guidelines first. Notice how each muscle group is a link. If you click on the link, you will be taken to a directory of exercises that work the specified muscle. Choose one exercise for each muscle group listed.

Why A Full Body Split For Beginners?

As a beginner your work capacity is lower, so you have to do more with less. A full body routine allows you to hit as many muscles as possible with a higher frequency by dividing the lower total volume over more exercises. While an advanced lifter may do three or four exercises for one muscle group, this increases his total work load beyond what is reasonable for a beginner. Beginners also recover quickly due to their lower work volumes and intensities, and this is good because it allows you to increase frequency. Increased frequency means faster gains and also more opportunities to train the basic movement patterns and work on your technique.

How Does This Differ From Strength Routines?

The main difference is the exercise selection and targeted muscle groups. Most strength based routines only focus on the biggest movements, like bench press, deadlift, and squat. While these movements will absolutely make you stronger, their aesthetic distribution is limited. ExRx includes more bicep, tricep, abdominal, and shoulder work that is likely to leave you with a more balanced physique at the end of your first six months to a year as a beginner.

So Why Not Do A Hollywood Bro Split If We Want Aesthetics?

As mentioned before, bro splits reduce frequency to once a week, and are not optimum for growth. The per-muscle-group volume is also high for beginners and is more likely to risk injury in someone who is probably not performing techniques properly yet.

The Intermediate Routine: Push-Pull-Legs (PPL)

Please return to the Workout Menu and locate the 3 Day Split Programs. Read the directions in the right cell, then click on Push / Pull / Legs in the left cell. Scroll down and read the guidelines first. The PPL split is a great intermediate split that can be used effectively for the rest of your weightlifting career. The only real downside is that it places lower push (i.e. squat) and lower pull (i.e. deadlift) on the same day, which does create a bit of a contest for which one you want to focus on at any given time. The alternative to this is the Upper Push, Upper Pull, Lower Push, Lower Pull four day split. The reason I do not recommend this for intermediate athletes is two-fold. First, it reduces frequency of each lift. Second, it is more complicated to apply and probably best left to advanced lifters. This is obviously NOT ideal for strength based lifters or powerlifters, because the squat and deadlift are two of the three lifts they compete with and should never be compromised in favor of aesthetics.

When Do I Become An Intermediate Lifter?

It's subjective, but after your first 6 months to 1 year, you should switch to a PPL routine. It offers a wider variety of exercises over the full body routine, and improved aesthetics as a result. The higher volume split over multiple days will also help you to avoid plateauing early, which will happen if you remain on a full body split long term. Generally, you are no longer an intermediate lifter when your linear gains (meaning your ability to add weight to the bar with each workout) fall off significantly or stop completely.

Question And Answer: FAQ

What about my diet?

I suggest starting with a simple macro-nutrient based diet like If It Fits Your Macros (IIFYM) or a standard TDEE Calculator. Keep in mind I am not endorsing either of these websites, or philosophies. In fact, Dr. Mike Israetel recommends 1g/lbs of protein, which is lower than most online calculators will suggest. You can do more research on your own, the key here is just to get on the right track by picking a formula and going with it. Adjust as you go, don't delay.

When you first start working out, unless your goal is to lose weight because you are already fat, you should probably be bulking, which means eating more calories than you burn. If you are already fat and trying to lose weight, you can gain muscle and cut fat at the same time, though this phenomenon is usually isolated to the beginner stage and will not likely be possible as an intermediate or advanced lifter (though some i.e. leangains believe otherwise). Dr. Mike Israetel covers this topic in a short video.

How do I know which exercises to select from the ExRx directory?

Read the guidelines and suggestions on ExRx. Stick to larger, compound, basic movements like squat, deadlift, bent row, and bench press when possible. If the muscle is repeated on the same day, you can then do more isolation style exercises.

How do I make progress with each lift? When do I add weight?

The goal is generally to stay within the 7-15 repetition range, though it is ok to dip lower (which will increase strength slightly more than size) and to go a little higher (which will improve endurance slightly more than increase size). The simplest approach is to either add weight or do more reps each workout session. In other words, if you are squatting Monday and Thursday and your Squat Monday was three sets (weight x reps) 145x10, 145x8, 145x6 then on Thursday you would look to increase your reps with the same weight. If on Thursday you then did three more sets of 145x14, 145x12, 145x10 then you are now reaching the 15 repetition threshold and should increase the weight by about 10 pounds for bigger compound lifts (ie. squat) or 5 pounds for smaller lifts (i.e. bicep curl). This may vary, but do your best. As you can see, the formula is to increase reps until your first step reaches roughly 15 reps, then increase weight so that the reps drop back down closer to 7 for your first set on the next workout day. Rinse and repeat.

What about technique? How do I avoid injury if I don't have a training partner?

ExRx has an Exercise Directory with technique demonstrations and instructions. That being said, it's not in depth and it isn't perfect. I can't go into depth here, either, so I will give you the most basic and essential advice on technique. Learn your natural range of motion. Most injuries, I would estimate, come from overreaching in one form or another (too much weight, or not in natural range of motion). Don't use more weight than you can comfortably control (usually in the 7-15 rep range) and don't extend beyond your comfortable range of motion. Learn what a neutral lifting posture looks like with shoulders back, back tight, chest up, core tight, deep breath in, back straight, neck straight.

If you don't have a training partner, use safety bars on racks for things like bench press and squat, where you can't easily drop the weight without injury.

A proper warm up will also help. A proper warm up includes 5-10 minutes of light cardio and a warm up set with light weight for each exercise.

Why should I listen to you? How much do you bench? Do you even lift bro? How big are your arms?

Don't listen to me, listen to ExRx, or experts like Dr. Mike Israetel and coach Mark Rippetoe. I am just a friend to help you sift through all the options out there and start, sooner rather than later, with a basic exercise and diet plan that is common sense and will help you achieve your goals. There are better and smarter coaches out there than me, but if you were willing to do the work to find them, you wouldn't be reading this would you?

As an individual, I have about 1 year of lifting experience and a personal trainer certification. I'm not selling you anything, and this anonymous Reddit account won't make me any money based on the number of people who read it, so I have nothing to gain except trying to offer some help for beginners that I wish someone, anyone, would have offered me when I first started. Even with my PT cert I was still totally lost and made a lot of mistakes early on, so I understand how confusing and difficult it can be. To be honest, I am still confused about a lot of the more advanced lifting concepts, and will continue to be a humble student for a long long time. The most important thing is to START SOMEWHERE and this article is about offering beginners a reasonable, common sense approach to do just that. This is not about me, it's about you and taking away the excuses not to start lifting today.

I don't know enough to choose my own exercises, it's too much info, what would a sample routine look like?

  1. Every 3 days
  2. Wxx (i.e. Workout Monday, rest Tuesday and Wednesday, workout Thursday, etc.)
  3. Full Body Workouts: Alternating Push / Pull
  4. Rest 3 minutes between sets
  5. Warm up for 5 minutes on treadmill and do 1 light warm up set of each exercise before the heavy set
  6. Start with one set per exercise, this is called low volume training and it is scientifically supported for beginners. As long as you can add weight every session you are improving, but when you can no longer add weight or do several more reps each session you will switch to a PPL routine with higher volume (3-5 sets per exercise) broken up over multiple sessions instead of the full body workout. The reason you require lower volume (fewer sets) with a full body workout is because as a beginner your body can't handle as high of a work load and if you did three sets each you would end up with 27 working sets on top of the fact that you have several heavy lifts (squat, deadlift, bench press, bent row) that tax your nervous system
  7. With lower reps you should be using heavier weight so that when you hit the number of reps you are fatigued and unable to comfortably do more, 1x8 does not mean use light weight and do fewer reps
  8. If you do not like the exercise, please go to ExRx's Exercise and Muscle Directory and select a different one that you are more comfortable with for that muscle group.