The Best Training Frequency for Muscle and Strength

• Training frequency refers to how often you train a particular muscle group or engage in physical exericse within a given period, typically measured weekly,
• Contrary to popular belief, training frequency might not be such a big deal for strength and muscle growth.
• Training frequency can still be a valuable tool to boost your gains, but not through any magical powers of its own.

One of the most frequently asked questions about building muscle and strength is how often to train.

The answer isn’t as straightforward as you might hope, as it depends on several factors, including your fitness goals, training experience, and recovery capacity.

But don’t worry; in this article, I will flex my knowledge muscles and help you understand the ins and outs of training frequency for optimal strength and muscle growth.

What Is Training Frequency?

Training frequency refers to the number of times you engage in a specific exercise or workout routine within a given period, typically a week. You want to train often enough for each session to produce maximum gains while allowing enough time for optimal recovery.

It’s a key factor in designing an effective workout program and can significantly influence your results.

Here are a few definitions based on context:

1. General Fitness: Training frequency is the number of exercise sessions per week. For example, if you work out three times a week, your training frequency is three.
2. Specific Exercise: It can also refer to the number of times you do a particular exercise or train a muscle group. For instance, if you have three weekly leg days and squat on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, your training frequency for squats is three times per week.

Strength training programs are either full-body workout routines or split routines.

In the first, you do full-body workouts, training every major muscle group every time you hit the gym. Full-body routines are ideal for beginners because they target all major muscle groups for balanced development and allow you to practice the exercises often to learn proper echnique. However, you can grow with them, as they remain effective as you gain training experience.

A split routine, on the other hand, is a workout plan where you divide your training sessions by muscle groups or body parts. Instead of working your entire body in one session, you “split” it up.

Common Split Routines

1. Upper/Lower Split: One day you focus on upper body exercises (chest, back, shoulders, arms), and the next session is all about the lower body (quads, hamstrings, glutes, calves).
2. Push/Pull/Legs Split (PPL): One day is for pushing exercises (chest, shoulders, triceps), another for pulling exercises (back, biceps), and a third day for legs.
3. Body Part Split: Also called a bro split, this is the bodybuilding classic where you dedicate each day to one or two muscle groups. For example:
   • Monday: Chest
   • Tuesday: Back
   • Wednesday: Legs
   • Thursday: Shoulders
   • Friday: Arms

• With a full-body routine, your training frequency for a muscle depends on how many times you exercise per week. For, example. if you do three weekly session, your training frequency is three.
• Upper/lower splits involve a training frequency of two for each muscle group if you do it the standard way: two upper body and two lower body sessions. One or three upper and lower sessions per week are also viable.
• With the PPL split, your training frequency for each muscle is either one or two times weekly depening on whether you take a rest day between each training session or work out six days in a row.
• Lastly, with the body part split, the training frequency for a particular muscle is typically only once weekly.

What Is the Best Training Frequency for Muscle Growth?

In theory, a high training frequency should beat out a low for several reasons.

• Muscle protein synthesis (MPS) rates elevate after resistance training for up to 48 hours. Thus, training more frequently can consistently keep MPS rates elevated, leading to greater muscle growth over time.
• As you gain training experience, the boost in MPS after a workout is reduced to ~24 hours. Also, some research suggests that you can only do so many sets per workout before any more sets don’t stimulate further growth, so doing those stimulating sets more often might be the more effective approach.^{1 2}
• Total training volume (sets x reps x weight) is critical to muscle growth. Training more frequently can increase overall volume without excessively fatiguing your muscles in a single session.
• Frequent training can lead to more frequent spikes in anabolic hormones like testosterone and growth hormone. They contribute to an anabolic environment that could be conducive to muscle growth (although research has consistently failed to demonstrate any significant effect from these short-lived spikes).

Theory and Real-Life Results Don’t Always Jive

If you look at competitive bodybuilders, most of them train each muscle only once per week in 5–6 sessions. Almost no one trains them more than twice.^{3 4}

Looking at the big guys, you’d think split routines are superior for muscle growth. And by the way, in surveys of competitive bodybuilders, natural athletes train the same way as those using anabolic steroids. Hence, it’s not a drug thing, as many think.

Research Suggesting a Higher Training Frequency Is Better

On the other hand, many studies over the past few decades suggest the opposite. A higher training frequency, but with less training volume per workout, is the bee’s knees for building muscle. In fact, a 2016 review and meta-analysis concluded that you should train each major muscle group at least twice weekly to maximize muscle growth.⁵

Also, at this time, the internet was ablaze with anecdotal evidence from people who had gotten fantastic results from higher training frequencies.

Thus, the classic bro split fell out of favor for a while. Bodybuilders didn’t care and continued training each muscle group once weekly as they had for decades. However, there was a noticeable shift in attitudes towards split routines among coaches and trainees.

More Research and New Findings

Fast-forward another two years and another meta-analysis from several of the same authors as the 2016 review was published.⁶ During this time, research on the optimal training frequency progressed at a rapid pace, and numerous additional studies on the topic were published.

With 25 studies available instead of the 10 analyzed in the 2016 review, a very different conclusion appeared. The researchers found little to no association between training frequency and muscle hypertrophy.

Training Frequency Doesn’t Seem Awfully Important for Bigger Muscles

In other words, how often you train a muscle group matters little. Once a week, twice a week, or more. But there is a caveat. That conclusion only applies as long as you do the same total weekly training volume.

Let’s say you do six sets of chest training per workout, three times per week, but want to switch to a bro split with only one dedicated chest day. In that case, you must do close to the same total number of chest sets that one day to get the same results. You can’t do six sets in that one workout and expect the same muscle growth as when you did six sets thrice weekly.

Up-to-date research suggests that, on a volume-equated basis, there are no significant differences in muscle hypertrophy between higher and lower training frequencies. This holds true across various measures, including direct imaging techniques like MRI, CT, and ultrasound.

Higher frequencies show a slight advantage in muscle hypertrophy in studies that do not equate training volume. However, the overall effect size was modest, suggesting practical relevance only if the difference in training volume is significant, like the six vs. 18 sets I mentioned above.

A Higher Frequency Can Help You Train More and Harder

Now, there is a possible exception.

Suppose you do 18 weekly sets of leg training. That falls within the recommendations for optimal training volume to maximize muscle growth (it’s too much for beginners, but as you gain training experience, you need more sets to keep growing).⁷

If you did all 18 sets in one workout and did most of them close to failure, your legs would likely be fried before the end of the session. That means your last handful of sets might not be as productive as they could have been. In this case, splitting your leg training into two leg days would allow you to go all-out for nine sets and still recover to do it all over again relatively soon.

Because hypertrophy is primarily influenced by total training volume, not training frequency per se, you should focus on ensuring you get enough quality sets (10+) per week. You can achieve that set goal through many frequency configurations, allowing flexibility based on your preferences and lifestyle.

Training frequency can be important for muscle growth if it allows you to perform more sets while keeping intensity high. At the same time, increasing your training frequency will also place greater demands on your recovery.

If you have an entire week to recuperate, most people can recover from even 20 sets in one workout. But not everyone can recover from four weekly workouts for the same muscle, even if you “only” do five challenging sets each session.

Balancing training frequency, volume, and recovery can be complicated. If you are new to training programming or don’t want to spend the time and energy, it can be a good idea to follow a program that takes all these things into account.

Training Frequency for Muscle Growth: Conclusion

In summary, one or more weekly training sessions per muscle group produces similar gains in muscle mass if you do the same number of sets.

Whichever training frequency you prefer is usually the best, as long as your workout routine is well-designed and allows you to hit your target training volume and recover properly.

Training each muscle more times per doesn’t mean greater increases in muscle size, but it can make it easier to reach the target number of sets you need to optimize your muscle gains.

What Is the Best Training Frequency for Strength Development?

Now, let’s talk strength.

A Bigger Muscle Is a Stronger Muscle

First, muscle strength is closely associated with muscle size. A bigger muscle is generally a stronger muscle, with bigger pecs having a considerable relationship with a higher 1RM in the bench press, for example.⁸

If you build more muscle, you will also become stronger. And because training frequency doesn’t matter much for muscle growth, it shouldn’t matter for strength gains either, right?

Not so fast.

Strength gains are not solely about muscle size. Frequent training enhances neuromuscular adaptation, meaning your nervous system becomes more efficient at recruiting muscle fibers, leading to better performance and strength.

However, nervous system adaptations can only go so far, suggesting this is more important early in your strength training career.

Early Research: Train Often, Get Stronger

A 2003 meta-analysis found that athletes who trained a muscle group two or three times per week gained more strength compared to those who trained once a week.⁹ Beginners benefited the most from three weekly workouts, while more experienced trainees gained the most strength from two sessions.

Over the next 15 years, many additional studies contributed new data to the training frequency/strength picture.^{10 11}

A Higher Training Frequency Equals Greater Strength Gains, But Only If It Means You Train More

New findings suggest that, like with muscle hypertrophy, the total weekly volume is the significant driver of muscle strength, not training frequency in itself.

Some studies suggest a slight benefit of higher training frequencies for the upper body but not the lower. The reason is not specified, but it could have something to do with the need for longer recovery after training the legs. Conversely, you might be able to train your upper body again without needing many days off.

However, there is still something to be said for training a muscle group often. Intensity, meaning how heavy you train, is a critical factor for maximum strength gains.. While training load is not super important for muscle growth – anything between five reps using relatively heavy loads or 30 reps with light weights is equally effective as long as you challenge your muscles – it is for strength.

Training a Muscle Group Often Facilitates a Greater Training Volume

Splitting your workout into multiple sessions can allow for higher total volume without excessive fatigue in a single session.

Let’s say you’re doing 12 heavy sets of squats per week. Distributing those sets over three sessions will likely mean a higher training volume than doing them all in one go. Remember the sets x reps x weight equation? Even if weight is the only thing going up, your total training volume increases, and with it, the stimulus for muscle and strength gains.

Even if you do the same number of reps, a higher training frequency lets you maintain a higher intensity, as you’re not exhausting the muscles in one long session.

In addition, your warm-up sets might actually contribute to strength gains.

If we go back to those 12 weekly sets of squats, you’re not going to jump straight into your heaviest ones, and some of your ramp-up sets will likely involve serious weight. That means doing those ramp-ups thrice weekly before four heavy sets might contribute to your overall strength gains compared to doing them once weekly before one 12-set session.

Training Frequency for Strength Gains: Conclusion

In summary, there is likely very little difference in strength gains depending on training frequency, at least if you’re past the beginner stage.

However, that conclusion entirely depends on the fact that your training volume per muscle group remains the same regardless of how often you hit the weights. And that’s not a given at all.

If you train heavy – as you should if your goal is maximum strength gains – a higher training frequency makes it significantly easier to accumulate the training volume and the quality sets you need, without excessive fatigue.

Practical Recommendations

Armed with this knowledge, how do you structure your workouts to optimize training frequency for muscle growth and strength? Here are some practical tips and examples.

The most essential factors to consider when designing a training program are your (or your client’s, if you’re a coach) training experience, fitness level, and training status. A beginner does not necessarily thrive on the same training frequency as a high-level bodybuilder or athlete.

Your first step is to factor in your recovery.

For general strength and fitness, that means at least one day of rest between days of training a particular muscle, but not more than three or four.

However, experienced trainees can train a muscle group only once weekly and make great progress. In those cases, muscles often overlap during the training week. For example, you might train your chest and triceps one day, then your shoulders four days later. Then, you activate your pushing muscles twice weekly even though you only have one dedicated chest day.

Beginners

A typical beginner workout routine consists of full-body training, and it’s likely the best option at this stage in your strength training career. With full-body training, it’s easy to space your training sessions out over the week with a high enough training frequency that your nervous system doesn’t forget the movements between workouts while allowing optimal recovery.

Two or three weekly full-body workouts are ideal for beginners. Take at least one day of rest between sessions, but at most three. So, if you train on Monday, your next workout should be on Wednesday at the earliest and Friday at the latest. In the latter case, you’re looking at two weekly workouts, while Monday, Wednesday, and Friday or Saturday make for a great three-day schedule.

Intermediates

Once you take the step from a beginner to an intermediate program, you’re typically looking at three to five weekly training sessions. In most cases, that means you train two or more days in a row. However, full-body routines are still perfectly viable. You can continue with an every-other-day full-body approach, only with an increased training volume per workout.

One of the most popular and effective intermediate-level programs is the upper/lower split, where you train on Monday and Tuesday, rest on Wednesday, and then train on Thursday and Friday before taking the weekend off. This workout split balances training frequency, recovery, and a training volume suitable for the intermediate trainee without making the workouts overly long.

Other great options are body part splits, where you train four or five days each week, splitting the body into muscle groups, body parts, or movement patterns (like a push/pull/legs split). You don’t have to be strict about doing a particular workout on the same weekday if you don’t want to.

Advanced

At this level, you likely already know what you prefer and what works best for you. Or you have a coach who does.

A typical advanced training program for strength or muscle mass involves four to six workouts per week, often using a body part split or a push/pull/legs-type of routine.

Bodybuilders often train according to an “X days on, one day off” plan, where the X can be anything from two to six, although three to five are the most common approaches. This type of routine means that your workouts will be on unspecified weekdays and not the same every week and that you train each muscle one or a maximum of two times weekly.

An advanced powerlifting routine can involve three or more weekly workouts, with the difference from a bodybuilding routine being that they often focus on fewer lifts, mainly the bench press, the squat, and the deadlift, along with whatever accessory work you need to improve the big three lifts.

Advanced powerlifters often benefit from high-frequency training, doing each lift several times per week with a well-structured plan to manage volume and intensity.

For example, with a 3-day powerlifting routine, you might bench press all three workouts, squat two workouts, and deadlift only once, as determined by how long it typically takes to recover from each lift.

Conclusion: Consistency is Key

Training frequency is a key part of a well-designed training program, but the science does not supports claims that one training frequency is automatically more effective for strength and muscle growth than another.

Instead, training frequency is primarily a way to balance training volume and recovery. As long as your training program provides sufficient training volume to maximize gains and allows you to recover optimally, how often you train a specific muscle group does not seem to matter much.

A higher and lower frequency can be equally effective, and you can let personal preference dictate your choice to a large degree.

Whether you opt for full-body workouts, an upper/lower split, a push/pull/legs routine, or some other training split, the key is to find a frequency that allows you to train consistently and recover adequately. And enjoy your training.

Remember, there’s no one-size-fits-all approach. Experiment with different frequencies, listen to your body, and adjust as needed. With consistency and smart programming, you’ll be well on your way to achieving your fitness goals.

Find Your Training Program in StrengthLog

In the StrengthLog app, you’ll find programs that cover all possible training frequencies, from 2-day full-body workout routines to 6-day bodybuilding splits.

Or you can make your own, with the perfect training frequency for your specific goals!

All programs are available in our workout log app. The beginner programs are always 100% free, but he more advanced ones require a premium subscription. You can try StrengthLog premium for 14 days by activating your free trial in the app. No strings attached. It’s like a personal trainer in your pocket.

Download StrengthLog for free with the links below:

Thank you for reading, and good luck with your training!

References

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