An important, but often overlooked, part of any exercise routine is resistance training. It’s quite common for people to just focus on cardio without really looking into other forms of exercise.
Now, don't get me wrong ... aerobic and cardiovascular workouts are among the best ways to care for your heart, lungs, and muscles. But resistance training can help with isolating and strengthening certain muscle groups. This allows you to train your body in different ways for different purposes.
For example, if you want to build muscle, you need to do some form of resistance training. Some examples would be free weights, machines, barbells, and even bands. Traditional cardio isn’t going to add muscle like resistance training will ... if any at all.
So, incorporating some amount of resistance training is important for your muscles and your entire body. Your bones, connective tissue, and metabolism will thank you.
Once you realize this and decide to start doing some resistance training ... the question often becomes this:
"Well, what muscles should I train together in each workout?" My honest opinion is more complicated than a clear black-and-white answer, but we’ll get to that.
In this article, I will go over different muscle groups and how you can pair them together when you work out to get the most out of your training efforts.
Muscle Groups You Should Work Out Together: Quick Summary
This is a guide to pairing muscle groups in resistance training for better results, recovery, and workout efficiency.
Who is This Article For?
- Beginners learning how to structure weight training sessions
- Intermediate/advanced lifters wanting to improve efficiency and recovery
- Anyone with goals of building muscle, improving strength, or enhancing sports performance
Key Points in the Article
Why resistance training matters: Builds muscle, strengthens bones and connective tissue, and boosts metabolism.
Major muscle groups include: Chest, back, arms, core, legs, and shoulders.
Training Principles
- Muscles are rarely isolated: most exercises work multiple muscle groups at once
- Match workout structure to your goals (strength, size, performance)
- Pair “synergistic” groups for efficiency (e.g., push, pull, legs)
- Pair “opposing” groups for frequency (e.g., chest & back, quads & hamstrings)
- Always account for recovery to avoid overtraining
Popular Pairings & Example Exercises
- Push (Chest, Triceps, Front Delts): Push-ups, bench press, tricep pulldowns, shoulder press
- Pull (Back, Biceps, Rear Delts): Chin-ups, rows, curls, reverse fly
- Legs, Glutes, Abs: Squats, glute kickbacks, deadlifts, sit-ups
Rest guidance: Larger muscle group training (full body) requires more rest days than split training. Recovery and rest determine long-term progress.
In This Article:
- What Are Muscle Groups?
- What Muscle Groups Should You Work Out Together?
- Training Schedules For Muscle Groups To Work Out Together
- The Importance of Rest
- How to Earn The Best Results
What Are the Major Muscle Groups?
There are three types of muscle tissue in the body:
- Skeletal Muscle — voluntary muscle attached to bones and responsible for movement
- Cardiac Muscle — found only in the heart
- Smooth Muscle — found in organs and blood vessels
When people talk about training muscle groups, they are referring to skeletal muscle.
Of these skeletal muscles, the fitness community tends to group them into these 6 primary groups. Let's cover these muscle groups, starting with the upper body:
Shoulder Muscles
The shoulder muscles consist of the deltoids, rotator cuff muscles, and various stabilizing muscles. They allow for movements of the shoulder joint, including abduction, flexion, extension, and rotation.
Chest Muscles
The chest muscles, or pectorals, include the pectoralis major and minor. They are responsible for movements such as pushing and adduction of the arms.
Back Muscles
The back muscles encompass a variety of muscles, including the latissimus dorsi, trapezius, rhomboids, and erector spinae. These muscles are crucial for maintaining posture, spinal stability, and various pulling movements.
Arm Muscles
The arm muscles consist of the biceps brachii, triceps brachii, brachialis, and brachioradialis. These muscles facilitate movements of the elbow joint and contribute to activities such as lifting, pulling, and pushing.
Abdominal Muscles
The abdominal muscles comprise the rectus abdominis, external obliques, internal obliques, and transversus abdominis. They provide core stability, support the spine, and assist in flexing and rotating the trunk.
Leg Muscles
The leg muscles are among the largest in the body and include the quadriceps, hamstrings, gluteal muscles, adductors, and calves. These muscles work together during compound lower-body movements such as walking, running, jumping, and squatting.
When we break these groupings down further, such as focusing on specific parts of your legs, you may want to focus your workout on your calves, but you'll likely want to work out your upper leg muscles, too.
The same focus can be applied to your arms, back, shoulders, glutes, and other muscles.
What Muscle Groups To Work Out Together
There isn’t necessarily a strict right or wrong way to combine specific muscle groups when you work out. However, there are several principles that can guide your workout schedule to optimize both your energy and results.
Let’s take a look at some of these principles as well as a couple of other factors to consider in your training program...
Principle 1: Muscles Aren’t Often Isolated In An Exercise
Keep in mind that there are very few exercises that target only a single muscle group, known as isolation exercises. This means most exercises are going to automatically work out more than one muscle.
The body likes to use surrounding muscles for support, and if it’s a heavy load ... then the body may recruit even more muscles to help.
For example, you may include squats in your workout to target your glutes. But squats don't only work your glutes ... they are also a great workout for your hamstrings and quads. So all three of these muscle groups get a good workout to perform that single action.
Principle 2: Create a Plan For Your Desired Results
When it comes to designing a workout program ... you can customize your workout routine according to your goals.
If you want to train for strengthening a particular exercise or muscle imbalance... then it makes sense to fill the rest of the workout with exercises that support your goal.
If you want to focus on building specific muscles ... then it might make sense to focus each workout on individual muscle groups rather than pairing them. This is also the point where many people wonder how many exercises per muscle group are actually necessary to see progress.
If you are training for a sport and need to focus on training a specific set of movements ... you can tailor your workouts to meet those needs too.
Principle 3: Work with Natural Muscle Pairings for Efficiency
The reason people split certain workouts into different days is so they don’t overwork one muscle group. The muscles being used in many exercises will often overlap, so it’s important to take this into account.
Keeping that in mind, the best way to set your schedule could be to pair those naturally close groups.
Take the previous squats example. Squats recruit your glutes and the muscles of your upper leg. So, it would make perfect sense to pair those muscle groups together.
Popular synergistic muscle group pairings could be:
- Chest, triceps, & front delts (front muscle of the shoulder)
- Legs, glutes, & abdominals
- Back, biceps, & rear delts (back muscle of the shoulder)
This type of workout split is also called push-pull-legs and is arguably the most popular way to train for many gym-goers.
So, from a functional standpoint, muscle groups can also be categorized by movement patterns:
- Push muscles move weight away from the body (chest, triceps, shoulders)
- Pull muscles bring weight toward the body (back, biceps, rear delts)
- Stabilizers help control movement and protect joints (core, rotator cuff, glutes)
Organizing training around these patterns helps improve efficiency and recovery.
This is a popular split because most chest exercises work the triceps and front portion of the shoulders, too. Most back exercises will also work the biceps and rear shoulders. Most leg exercises use the quads, hamstrings, and glutes together as well.
This allows for maximum efficiency in each workout and provides each muscle group with enough rest between workouts. Remember, recovery is just as important as the workout itself.
Principle 4: Work with Opposing Muscle Groups for Frequency
Another way to look at this is to do your strength training with “opposing” muscle groups.
In other words, working opposing muscles means working opposing muscle groups. An example of this could be training a chest and back day.
Working opposing muscles will likely train some muscles multiple times in different workouts. For example, many chest and back exercises will also train your biceps, triceps, and shoulders.
This means you’ll be training those muscles in 2 different workouts each week. This can be a good and a bad thing, but I’ll get to that later.
Popular opposing muscle groups to work out together include:
- Chest and back
- Biceps, triceps, and shoulders
- Glutes and abdominals
- Quads and hamstrings
The possible issue with this approach for some people, though, is the recovery aspect. This also depends greatly on how you choose to design the program.
Let's say you do a chest and back workout on Monday. You may do some chest pressing, pull-ups, front raises, and low rows.
But guess what? Those exercises work more than just your chest and back muscles. You'll also be working your biceps, triceps, and shoulders to an extent.
If you don't plan accordingly and choose to train your arms and shoulders the next day ... this can increase your risk of injury and hinder your recovery.
So, it’s important to design your workout schedule with recovery in mind, too.
Now, don't get me wrong ... training opposing muscle groups together can be a great option for many people. You just have to find what is right for you, and also make sure that you make recovery a priority.
Training Schedules For Muscle Groups To Work Out Together
Remember … you can always try different muscle group pairings to see what you like most. There is no master list with every possible pairing, but testing for yourself is a great place to start.
Here are some examples of exercise routines for each of the popular muscle groups to work out together...
Chest, Triceps & Front Delts
You can think of this muscle group pairing as a push workout.
Most of these exercises are some sort of press or pushing motion. If not, they are still working the right muscles.
Push-Ups
Push-ups target several muscle groups, including your chest, shoulders, and triceps. This is a very functional exercise that always has its place in any workout program.
Bench Press
Likely the strongest movement for your upper body. Your chest, shoulders, and triceps are going to appreciate this move.
Chest Fly
This exercise can help increase your chest flexibility and is a great way to isolate the chest.
Tricep Pulldown
This is a great exercise to isolate the triceps. The stronger your triceps get, the more support you have for other exercises, like the bench press.
Shoulder Press
A strong movement to focus on developing the shoulders. Still utilizes the chest and triceps quite a bit as well.
Back, Biceps & Rear Delts
You can think of this muscle group pairing as a pull workout.
These workouts are all pulling motions and involve the muscles of the back, biceps, and shoulders in some capacity.
Chin-Ups
This exercise is great for strengthening your lats (large back muscles), biceps, and rear delts.
Low Rows
This is a movement where you may be able to handle heavier loads than in many other exercises. It targets the lats, elbow flexors like the biceps, and the rear delts a bit as well.
Bicep Curls
This is a very simple and effective exercise to isolate the biceps. The stronger your biceps are, the more they can support other exercises, like chin-ups and rows.
Bent-Over Reverse Fly
This is a great way to directly target the often-neglected rear delt. Keeping these muscles balanced is important, too.
Lateral Raises
This exercise targets mostly the middle portion of the shoulder. It also involves the traps, which are a larger muscle on the back.
Lower Body: Legs, Glutes & Abdominals
You can dedicate your workout to glutes and abs, one of the most common muscle group pairings.
Squats
This is arguably the strongest compound exercise known other than the deadlift. Oftentimes, an experienced lifter can load up heavier weights with squats than with most other exercises.
Glute Kickbacks
It’s right there in the name; glute kickbacks are going to engage not only your glutes but your core as well (and your legs, too).
Sit-Ups
A classic exercise, sit-ups are going to be core-heavy. They can also help with increasing your range of motion through most movements.
Deadlifts
This exercise typically allows lifters to go much heavier, similar to squats. This really targets the glutes, quads, and hamstrings hard. Proper technique is key with this exercise, especially when heavier weights are used.
Romanian Deadlifts
This is one of the best ways to load the hamstrings and glutes with heavy weights. It is important for any athlete to do these to strengthen and protect the knee from injuries.
Example Weekly Training Structures
Beginner Full Body Split
| Day | Workout |
|---|---|
| Day 1 | Full Body |
| Day 2 | Rest |
| Day 3 | Full Body |
| Day 4 | Rest |
| Day 5 | Full Body |
| Day 6 | Rest |
| Day 7 | Rest |
Intermediate Upper/Lower Split
| Day | Workout |
|---|---|
| Day 1 | Upper Body |
| Day 2 | Lower Body |
| Day 3 | Rest |
| Day 4 | Upper Body |
| Day 5 | Lower Body |
| Day 6 | Rest |
| Day 7 | Rest |
Advanced Opposing Muscle Groups Split
| Day | Workout |
|---|---|
| Day 1 | Chest and Biceps |
| Day 2 | Back and Triceps |
| Day 3 | Legs |
| Day 4 | Rest |
| Day 5 | Shoulders, Arms, and Core |
| Day 6 | Legs |
| Day 7 | Rest |
Advanced Push/Pull/Legs
| Day | Workout |
|---|---|
| Day 1 | Push |
| Day 2 | Pull |
| Day 3 | Legs |
| Day 4 | Rest |
| Day 5 | Push |
| Day 6 | Pull |
| Day 7 | Legs |
The best split for you depends on your recovery capacity, schedule, and training intensity.
Don't Forget the Importance of Rest
Don’t forget to incorporate rest days in your program. Depending on how you split the exercises up, it might warrant more or fewer rest days.
It’s good to allow 1-2 days of rest at least for most programs, but here’s a good rule of thumb...
The more you split up and isolate the muscles as the focus for each workout, the fewer rest days you’ll likely need to take. The more muscles worked in each workout, such as a full-body workout, the more rest days you’ll likely need.
Earning The Best Results
There are so many ways to get moving and get the exercise your body needs. Pairing these different muscle groups to work together is a great place to start focusing your efforts for better results.
It’s also important to think about what specific goals you have in mind. You should try to tailor your workout program to achieve those desired goals.
Finding what muscle groups to work together may take some trial and error ... but it will be worth the time to find what works best for you and your lifestyle.
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Muscle Groups: Frequently Asked Questions
What are the major muscle groups?
The major muscle groups include chest, back, shoulders, arms, legs, and abdominals. These are all skeletal muscles responsible for voluntary movement.
What muscle groups should you work out together?
Common pairings include push (chest, shoulders, triceps), pull (back, biceps, rear delts), and legs (quads, hamstrings, glutes).
How many muscle groups should you train per workout?
Most programs target 1–3 muscle groups per session, depending on intensity and volume.
Can you train the same muscle groups every day?
Not recommended. Muscle groups typically need 48 hours of recovery after intense resistance training.
Are leg muscle groups the largest in the body?
Yes. The quadriceps, hamstrings, and glutes are among the largest and strongest muscle groups in the body.
