As of: February 29, 2024, 5:37 p.m
By: Alexandra Grauvogl
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Push-ups are one of the classic fitness exercises - and not without reason.
They can be done almost anywhere and without any equipment and are extremely effective.
Everything about muscle building, calorie consumption and health benefits of push-ups.
Everyone has done them (or at least tried them): push-ups.
And even though many people hate push-ups, there are good reasons to love them and incorporate them into your fitness routine.
As a bodyweight exercise (exercise with your own body weight), they can be easily performed anywhere and without any equipment.
There is no excuse for training when you are traveling, the gym is closed or you don't have room for dumbbells etc. at home.
But what do push-ups actually do?
Which muscles are being trained and what about the calorie consumption and health benefits?
Building muscle with push-ups
The push-up, also known as push-up, is an effective exercise for the whole body.
When doing the push-up correctly and avoiding typical mistakes, both strength and endurance are trained, depending on the level of the athlete.
This means that beginners in particular can build muscle and strength, while advanced people can work more in the area of strength endurance with high repetition numbers.
However, the latter can also build targeted muscles with difficult versions of the push-up (e.g. Archer Push-up or Diamond Push-up) or with the help of additional weight.
The push-up primarily trains the muscles in the chest, arms and shoulders.
The stomach, back and deep core muscles are important for the support function.
© IMAGO/xDrobotDeanx
The question of whether you can replace the bench press with push-ups and achieve similar results is asked not only by many fitness enthusiasts, but also by scientists.
A small study with 20 trained test subjects from 2019 compared the movement sequence and muscle activity of eight muscles involved in bench presses and push-ups with a weighted vest.
No significant differences could be measured.
With the help of additional resistance - through weight plates on the back, weight vests or resistance bands - push-ups are an alternative to the bench press, even for trained people.
Download the 6-week “Learn Push-ups” training plan for beginners here – free of charge!
These muscles are used during push-ups
The classic push-up primarily uses the following muscles (target muscles):
Chest muscles: especially large and small pectoral muscles
(M. pectoralis major, M. pectoralis minor)
Shoulder muscles: especially the front part of the deltoid muscle
(M. deltoideus pars clavicularis)
Arm muscles: especially the back of the upper arm
(M. triceps brachii)
In addition, numerous muscles work to support the push-up to keep the body in a straight line.
The so-called auxiliary muscles or muscles subject to secondary stress include:
Abdominal muscles: rectus and oblique abdominal muscles (
M. rectus abdominis, M. obliquus internus/externus abdominis
)
Back muscles: erector spinae (
M. erector spinae
)
deep core muscles, e.g.
B. the transverse abdominal muscle (
M. tranversus abdominis)
Leg muscles: front of thigh (
m. quadriceps femoris
)
Gluteus muscle (
M. gluteus maximus
)
If you deviate from the classic push-up execution, for example by varying the width at which the palm of the hand is placed on the floor (narrow vs. normal vs. wide), the targeted muscles also change.
Push-ups: How many calories do push-ups burn?
When you do push-ups, you burn around 250 calories per hour (depending on body weight, gender and age).
Apart from the fact that only a few people would be able to do an hour of push-ups in one go, that's not very much - compared to running, for example.
Here you burn at least twice as much.
But if you do push-ups regularly, you build muscle and not only make your body more athletic, but also increase your basal metabolic rate.
Because more muscle mass means higher calorie consumption.
Push-ups can also increase your calorie consumption.
Calorie consumption: Calculate basal metabolic rate
“Harris-Benedict formula” for calculating the basal metabolic rate (approximation):
Women: Basal metabolic rate [kcal/24 h] = 655.1 + (9.6 x body weight [kg]) + (1.8 x height [cm]) - (4.7 * age [years])
Men: Basal metabolic rate [kcal/24 h] = 66.47 + (13.7 x body weight [kg]) + (5 x height [cm]) - (6.8 * age [years])
The benefits of building strong core muscles through push-ups
Strong core muscles improve posture and balance.
It plays a crucial role in a healthy back – without pain and tension.
Problems that plague around two thirds of Germans, according to a health report from the Robert Koch Institute.
If you train your core muscles with push-ups, for example, you can effectively prevent this in many cases.
The risk of other pain and injuries caused by poor posture or a lack of balance (such as frequent trips or falls) can also be reduced.
Push-ups are an effective alternative to the bench press
Several studies have compared muscle use and strength gains during bench presses and push-ups, two typical exercises that primarily target the chest, shoulder and arm muscles.
A small study from 2019 confirmed the similar movement sequence and almost the same muscle strain during the exercises.
20 people with strength training experience completed bench presses with a comparable additional load using weights or wearing weighted vests.
Another study from 2015 showed that subjects doing push-ups with resistance bands achieved similar strength gains to those with bench backs.
And “progressive push-up training”, in which push-up variants of different levels of difficulty are systematically integrated into a training plan, increased upper body strength comparable to the bench press (Kotarstky, C. et al. 2018).
Learn to do push-ups – download training plan for beginners
Can't do a single push-up yet?
Then download the training plan PDF for free HERE!
You will be introduced to the push-up step by step with preliminary exercises until you can perform it with clean technique.
You can learn to do push-ups – with the right training plan © Imago/Lian Fei
What the number of push-ups can say about the risk of a heart attack
In 2019, Harvard researchers looked at the connection between the number of push-ups you can do and heart health.
In a ten-year study of 1,100 firefighters, they came to an interesting result: adult men who could do 40 push-ups had a 96 percent lower risk of heart attack, stroke and other cardiovascular diseases.
The author is a former competitive athlete, certified fitness trainer and ski instructor.