How Many Sets Per Muscle? We Examine the Science

welcome to the house of hypertrophy how many sets do you need to optimize hypertrophy there's somewhat been a Resurgence of hit training with its proponents believing lower sets could be superior however others standby the believe higher sets are the path to maximal gains in this video we'll be critically breaking down the overall scientific research on how many sets may be needed to build muscle effectively before diving in know that we'll be exploring how many sets per week you may want to be performing per muscle so if you perform three sets of squats on Monday three

sets on the leg press on Wednesday and three sets on the leg extension on Friday that's nine weekly sets for the quads in all the studies each set is repetitions performed at least three reps away from failure which as detailed in the previous video is virtually ideal for hypertrophy warm-up sets are not included in these weekly set counts let's dive [Music] in this meta analysis published in 2017 combined the results of all the studies at that time finding performing nine or more weekly sets per muscle produced greater muscle gains than fewer than nine sets the

researchers also split the numbers like this indicating that 10 or more weekly sets per muscle produced greater gains than 5 to9 and fewer than five weekly sets per muscle it may be worth emphasizing although higher sets built more muscle the lower num still produced respectable gains there are two considerations to this meta analysis the majority of studies involved untrained subjects and did not involve more than 12 weekly sets this raises the question what about trained individuals performing more than 12 weekly sets per muscle a 2022 meta analysis helps us out based on available data they

were able to compare how intrainstitutional difference in gains between moderate and higher volumes but for the triceps higher volumes did produce Superior growth at face value these results indicate between 12 to 20 weekly sets may be sufficient to maximize biceps and cord growth in trained individuals while more than 20 weekly sets may be needed for the triceps however I believe there's an important limitation to this meta analysis the researchers combin studies using shorter and longer rest durations between sets which might not TR truly be appropriate why longer rest might make each set more effective for

building muscle meaning fewer sets are needed to optimize gains illustrating this concept this paper found when performing three sets on the leg press quad hypertrophy was better when resting for 3 minutes between sets compared to one however performing five sets with one minute of rest produce similar quad hypertrophy to the three sets with 3 minutes of rest therefore sh rest appear to make each set less effective perhaps meaning a higher number of sets may be required to to optimize gains indeed when analyzing the studies using short rest intervals they all find more sets produced more

growth up to quite high 30 to 45 weekly sets per muscle it's worth noting all three studies had subjects divide these sets across three days per week we need to mention both compound and isolation exercises contributed to these sets that is one set on the bench press was treated as one set for the triceps in the same way that one set on triceps push Downs would likewise one set on the row was treated as one set for the biceps in the same way that one set on CS would the show Ando study actually just had

compound exercises for the biceps and triceps while for the other two studies in blue are the weekly set numbers from isolation exercises for the biceps and triceps moving forward to studies that have used longer rests between sets as longer rest may make each set more effective we may hypothesize that higher sets aren't necessarily needed indeed all three studies find growth was optimized in the 12 to 18 weekly set per muscle range with no clear benefit to more it's worth noting all three studies had subjects divide these sets mainly across two days per week again this

data counts both compound and isolation movements here are the set numbers in blue if we just counted isolation sets for the triceps and [Music] biceps before discussing individual differences let's sum up some of what we've covered with additional key points if you're using short rest between sets very high set numbers May optimize gains but the sustainability and practicality of this long-term is questionable all three studies mention that all subjects perform their sets to momentary muscular failure and I know there are some people who are skeptical of this truthfully I don't know if all subjects did

this and it could have varied across subjects what I do know is that in practice training with the necessary proximity to failure is much more challenging when using short rest with a high number of sets especially with lower body AC exercises the cardio challenge May mask and impair your ability to get close enough to True failure furthermore I would like to bring up this study it had trained individuals train the biceps and triceps with quite High volumes 28 weekly sets for each muscle from isolation exercises and 46 weekly sets if we included the compound exercises

short rests were also used one group actually stretched between sets of the first and final exercises in a session while the second group rested normally here are some GR depicting how each individual grew their arm muscles in both groups there were some cases of people growing well but there were a number of cases of people experiencing very little gains including cases of some people decreasing their size potentially due to excessive muscle damage this study didn't have any other groups performing different set numbers but I bring it up to demonstrate not everyone experiences positive gains from

very high sets and short rests moving on we know in studies using longer rest between sets there's no clear benefit to more than 18 weekly sets per muscle and even 12 weekly sets were sufficient for Quad gains in one study however we've just been speaking about the average results from the studies but luckily some of them provide individual data here's how each individual in each group in the show andf study group which was one of the papers finding more average growth from more sets with short rests between sets some trained individuals still saw respectable hypertrophy

with the lowest set numbers in fact some subjects in the lowest number groups saw similar or more gains to others in the higher set groups here's how each individual in each group grew in the heel grave study which was one of the papers finding biceps hypertrophy was best with 18 weekly sets when longer rests were used again some trained individuals still saw respectable hypertrophy with the lowest set numbers with some subjects in the lowest set group growing similar or more versus the highest set groups now this data does not necessarily prove these subjects grow best

from lowest set numbers because if if these subjects were in the highest set groups they could have grown even more fortunately though some clever studied designs can tell us if some people grow more from lower set numbers or vice versa three studies provide Insight this recent study by Van vossel was actually analyzed in our last video it had 21 untrained men perform 6 to eight weekly sets per muscle with one side of their body but 9 to 12 weekly sets per muscle with their other side of their body average Squad hamstrings biceps and triceps growth

was Superior with the 9 to 12 weekly sets and actually the large bulk of individuals aligned with the average seeing more growth from the 9 to 12 weekly sets there were only a few cases of similar gains between both and even fewer cases of better gains with the 6 to8 weekly sets however another study by Damas had 19 untrained men performed 6 to9 weekly sets for the quads with one leg and 15 weekly sets for the quads with the other leg the results of this study were a little more mixed around 32% of subjects grew

better with the 15 weekly sets another 32% better with the 6 to9 weekly sets while the remaining 36% experienced similar Hy pery between both finally a Norwegian study had 34 untrained individuals perform six weekly sets for the quads with one leg and another leg performed 18 weekly sets for the quads 13 individuals saw a clear benefit from their 18 weekly sets while three individuals saw a clear benefit from the six weekly sets the rest saw fairly similar hypertrophy between both collectively considering this data some degree of individual differences appears to exist certain individuals may not

always see additional benefits the highest set numbers there are some caveats with this data firstly the van vossel and Damas papers also involved different training frequencies secondly all three studies involved untrained individuals but I'm unaware of any strong reason to believe this concept wouldn't extend to trained individuals it's currently not clear why some may grow more more from lower or higher sets and there's no established method you can use to know what you may respond best to at least yet I would just keep this information at the back of your mind if you're really struggling

to make progress with your current program you could try lower or higher sets depending on your preference and perception speaking of progress tracking your own training progress over the long term can be very useful our high quality partner the alpha progression app can save you time by automatically generating graphs that track your progression with all areas of your program which could help you understand what may work best for you some of you might also find it confusing and challenging to create a training program and I'm glad to say that app has a seriously impressive custom

workout generator that can tailor an evidence-based program to your precise desires and needs in less than 1 minute there are more than a quadrillion input combinations on which your plan is based with a touch of a few buttons you can customize things further like changing set numbers there's also a huge exercise dat database with concise text and video instructions on each try everything out free for 2 weeks with a link in the comments and description and if you like it and decide to go beyond the link gives you 20% off a subscription the app is

truly top tier with a review speaking to this in summary we saw this 2017 meta analysis finding that nine or more weekly sets per muscle led to Greater gains than fewer sets the majority of the day dat behind this was conducted on untrained individuals and did not exceed 12 weekly sets and I do think 9 to 12 weekly sets per muscle is a solid recommendation for beginners with trained individuals assuming longer rest between sets are used the current data indicates there's no clear benefit to performing more than 18 weekly sets per muscle and even 12

weekly sets were sufficient for Quad gains in one study all of these are averages which are solid General guidelines however there is some data pointing towards individual differ differences some people may grow more with higher or lower sets as a result if these average values don't work for you one tool in your toolbox is to try reducing or increasing sets depending on your preference and perception finally you may be wondering about gradually adding sets across weeks a recent study has examined this and it's caused quite a stir across social media mainly as it involved the

highest set numbers reported in the literature to date in the next video at the house of hypertrophy we'll be deciphering this paper and its potential takeaways