The Top 10 Best Exercises For Building Mass

If your goal is to pack on quality muscle mass across the board, knowing the right exercises to do can make attaining that goal a lot easier and a lot faster. The following 10 exercises, one for each major muscle group, are the best when it comes to building quality mass muscle but also at maximizing muscular power and strength.

Best for Chest: Barbell Bench Press

Why It’s the Best:

Bench press is the universal exercise for chest and gets the most out of your pecs. With some help from your delts and triceps, you’re able to move greater loads with this lift than on any other chest exercise and thus taxes your pecs sufficiently.

When to use it:

Incorporate bench press into your existing workout split as the first exercise or second exercise in your routine by performing 3-4 sets of 6-10 reps.

Tip:

Avoid bouncing and jerking the weight up using momentum, instead use a smooth and controlled motion. Avoid locking elbows at top of movement. For variety and maximum growth in your chest, perform negatives or rest pauses on your last two sets.

Best for Biceps: Standing Barbell Curl

Why It’s the Best:

Standing Barbell Curl is a compound move that builds overall size, peak, and width in your biceps by targeting both the inner and outer muscle of biceps.

When to use it:

Use a weight that allows you to perform 8-12 reps with strict form for 3-4 sets first in your bicep routine.

Tip:

Keep your elbows in place and your back straight to elicit the greatest gains. Do not lift excess weight and use momentum to swing the barbell up. Keep the form strict and the bicep curl movement slow and controlled. For variety you can use different types of grips to work the bicep muscles at different angles. A close grip works the outer heads of the biceps while wide grip works the inner. For intensity, use forced reps in your first sets or use drops sets or 21’s in your last set.

Best for Back: Barbell Row

Why It’s the Best:

Best back exercise to add thickness and size to your back. It also allows you to really load up on the weights, making it great for overall back development.

When to use it:

Perform barbell row first in your back routine, doing 8-10 reps for 4 sets.

Tip:

Minimize the amount of momentum you use to avoid back injury. For variation, change your grip width or angle of pull. A narrower grip will involve the lower lats to a greater degree, while a wider grip hits the upper lats and middle back harder. Pulling the bar toward your sternum also recruits the upper lats more, while pulling more toward your lower abs targets the lower lats. For intensity, perform forced reps, rest-pause, or drop sets to elicit even greater gains out of your back.

Best for Forearms: Seated Wrist Curl

Why It’s the Best:

Seated wrist curls are a great way to increase the strength and size of your forearms, working the front and back of the arm.

When to use it:

Performing 3-4 sets of 10-15 wrist curl exercises as your first or second exercise in your workouts.

Tip:

To get the most out of seated wrist curls, Keep your upper arms in contact with the bench at all times and allow the bar to roll as far out onto your fingertips as possible before curling the weight back up as high as possible. Keeping your thumbs underneath the bar, not wrapped around it, allows for a greater range of motion. Do reverse wrist curls to target the back of the forearms.

Best for Quads: Leg Press

Why It’s the Best:

While the squat is the king of all lifts, especially for your legs. Squats calls upon nearly every major muscle group in the body to execute properly, leg Press on the other hand allows you to isolate your quads using heavy loads while minimizing involvement of the hips, glutes and adductors, making the quads the main mover. So for overloading the quads, nothing beats the leg press. You can leg press more weight than you can squat.

When to use it:

Use leg press as the second exercise in your leg workouts by performing 3-4 sets of 12-15 reps.

Tip:

Don’t let your lower back roll off the pad, have it pressed against it at all time. For variety, you can also alter your foot placement for a different emphasis. Placing your feet close together emphasizes the outer quads while placing them wide focuses on the inner quads. Placing your feet lower on the platform emphasizes the front quads. For intensity, add drop sets or rest pauses in your last set.

Best for Shoulders: Barbell Overhead Press

Why It’s the Best:

Overhead barbell press is the ultimate mass-builder for delts. It allows you to go heavier, which means you can better overload the target muscle and therefore instigate more muscle growth an size.

When to use it:

Do 6-8 reps per set, 3-4 sets of barbell presses as the first exercise in your shoulder workouts.

Tip:

Focus your eyes straight ahead as you perform the movement and maintain a strong contraction through your core muscles to help keep you from rocking back and forth. Move slowly through the exercise and let muscle rather than momentum power the movement. For intensity and variety, use drop sets and rest pauses two of the best techniques stimulate maximal growth in your shoulders.

Best for Calves: Standing Calf Raise

Why It’s the Best:

The standing calf raise develops the overall mass of the calves by targeting the outermost muscle that is responsible for the shape and size of your calves.

When to use it:

Do it as the first exercise on your calf workouts, when your calves are the strongest. Do 3-4 sets of 10-15 reps.

Tip:

Keep your legs as straight as possible. Make sure you allow for a stretch at the bottom and hold the top position as you flex for 2 seconds for maximum contraction. To target different parts of the calf region, perform the exercise using different foot positions. Point your toes inward to involve the lateral outer head of the calf. Point your toes outward to place emphasis on the medial head of the calf. For intensity and maximal growth, use drops sets and supersets in your calf routine.

Best for Traps: Dumbbell Shrug

Why It’s the Best:

Dumbbell Shrug targets several large muscles in your upper back, including your traps and rhomboids. Using dumbbells for the shrug exercise provides you with more grip and movement options than using a barbell. The movement is short but you can use significant amount of weights.

When to use it:

Do Dumbbell shrugs at the beginning of your trap workouts by performing 3-4 sets of 8-12 reps.

Tip:

Use a full range of motion for optimal muscle recruitment. Be sure you don’t pull the weights up with your arms by flexing your elbows; this prevents you from executing a full shrug and pulling your shoulders back. For variation, hold the dumbbells in front of your thighs with your palms facing you, which more closely mimics a barbell shrug. You also can hold the dumbbells at an angle, not completely in front of your thighs but not completely to the sides of your thighs. Use straps to reinforce your grip if necessary.

Best for Hamstrings: Romanian Deadlift

Why It’s the Best:

One of the best exercises for hitting the glutes and hams. This deadlift removes the knees from the equation, so the emphasis is all on the hams and glutes. The Romanian deadlift also allows you to go fairly heavy and place a lot of overload on your hamstrings and glutes.

When to use it:

Do it first in your hamstring workouts. Your best bet is to perform the romanian deadlift on leg day to target the hamstrings and glutes. Do 3-4 sets of 6-12 reps at the start of your ham workouts.

Tip:

By bending slightly at the kness and moving at the hips, you engage the hamstrings from top to bottom, providing you with much greater growth than you’d get with leg curls alone.

Best for Triceps: Weighted Bench Dip

Why It’s the Best:

A great exercise for developing overall tricep mass and strength. Triceps Dips hit all three heads of the triceps. It is also an exercise that allows for great range of motion and muscle overload to target your triceps for maximum growth and strength.

When to use it:

Perform weighted bench dip as the first exercise in your workouts by doing 6-12 reps for 3-4 sets.

Tip:

Keep your elbow shoulder-width apart and don’t lean forward. Lower your body without overstretching your shoulders. For maximum contraction of the triceps, rise as high as you can and completely straighten your arms. Add weight plate on your lap as you go and perform drop sets for maximum growth and pump in your last two sets.