How many sets and reps when bulking? When bulking you should be making use of reps in the 3-6 range for strength and then reps ranging from 8 – 12 for hypertrophy. Total working sets for a session should be between 12 – 18 sets depending on what body parts are being worked that session.
When it comes to bulking I’ve seen some genuinely confusing advice floating around the internet and particularly the forums where people arguably need the best advice as there is no filter.
Just as an example I’d seen someone recommend doubling your sets and reps when on a bulk, I don’t know where this 2 x approach came from but when it comes to building lean muscle mass a marathon set of 20+ for all exercises is not the way to go.
The is an advanced training technique known as the 20 rep squat however it’s advanced for a reason, therefore in this article I’m going to run though how many sets and reps you should be doing when bulking.
Table of Contents
Why Does Bulking Affect Sets and Reps
When bulking you will have a surplus of calories available to support your weight training in the gym. The goal of a bulk is usually to build as much muscle as possible during this phase, some might want to get stronger as well but the two goals are quite interchangeable.
For overall physique development however there are ideal sets and reps to follow, if you only focused on strength and trained with very low reps (1-3 reps) for strength then the carry over to muscle growth will be smaller.
The reason for this is that the nervous system plays an important role when training for strength so the muscular system does not get as fatigued and ultimately worked when training with low reps. It’s more about learning optimal movement patterns to move the weight and less about building the biggest muscle group.
A common misconception in the weight training world is that you should do low reps when bulking and high reps when cutting. There might be some truth to this however it should not be taken to the extreme and this is where the confusion occurs.
The average gym goer will misinterpret low and high reps and not program them correctly in a workout routine. This also doesn’t translate to muscle growth which should be the aim of a bulk, an ideal range for hypertrophy is 8 – 12 reps which would be considered moderate.
There is never a mention of training with moderate reps when on a bulk and it’s this terminology that makes choosing the correct rep and set schemes difficult.
How Many Sets and Reps When Bulking
Choosing your set range when bulking is crucial to make sure you are getting the most out of your workout but fully stimulating the desired muscle group and activating the process of protein synthesis (hormonal muscle building state).
It’s easy to get carried away on a bulk however, especially when calories and subsequently energy is high. What’s important however is to make sure you are training in an optimal range and avoiding overtraining.
Overtraining is a term used loosely here, for someone to be truly overtrained you would need to be training like an advanced level athlete minus a coach to manage your performance and recovery. Therefore when I say overtraining I simply mean training to a point where it negatively impacts your recovery capabilities.
One of the most crucial things about bulking is stimulating the muscle group and then resting and recovering so that it grows back quicker. If you perform too many sets in a given workout then this will negatively impact your ability to recruit that muscle group for the rest of the week.
The focus of a training session should be stimulation of the muscle group and not annihilation. Having DOMs for a week after training legs is not a good sign of a hard workout, it’s a sign of muscle damage that you are not able to efficiently recover from.
By all means you should train hard and with intensity but you want to train a muscle frequently to keep protein synthesis switched on and therefore need to be able to recover from session to session.
How many sets you do will depend on your training split however a good rule of thumb is 2-3 exercises per large muscle group (chest, back, shoulder, hamstrings and quads) and 1-2 exercises per smaller muscle group (biceps, triceps and calves).
Not including warm up sets in which you shouldn’t be training anywhere near to failure you should be looking at 2-3 working sets per exercise. It’s rare to see someone recommend 2 sets however if you’ve got a good understanding of muscle mechanics then an all out top set followed by a back off set is more than enough to stimulate muscle growth.
How many sets you do in total will depend on your training split however a good range will be between 12 – 18 sets in total for the workout. Take a pull session as an example, you could use the following split:
Back – 3 x exercises, 9 sets in total
Rear deltoid – 1 x exercise, 3 sets in total
Biceps – 1 x exercise, 3 sets in total
Total workout volume = 15 x sets
How Many Reps Should You Do When Bulking
When it comes to planning your sets and reps on a bulk the reps is when it gets more tricky to program. Getting stronger in a range of rep ranges is crucial for stimulating all the necessary muscle fibres of the muscle group as a fast twitch muscle fibre responds differently to a slow twitch muscle fibre.
You also want to increase your strength overall on the heavy compound movements in order to increase total body strength levels and handle heavier loads which are key for muscle hypertrophy, progressive overload is one of the best known methods for building muscle mass so you should look into this article as well:
How to increase weight with progressive overload
Therefore when looking at reps on a bulk you need to be working from two ranges in order to best make use of the surplus calories.
The first range is going to be the 3-6 rep range with a focus on strength, the real strength work is usually done in the 1-3 rep range by powerlifters etc.. however the 3-6 rep range is a good range to build strength whilst still creating some time under tension for the muscle group.
For this you should be using this method on one exercise per workout and this will be your heavy compound movement like squats and deadlifts. High rep training on these movements, especially the deadlift, is not ideal because once form breaks down you are at more risk of injury.
These exercises are also multi joint movements that use multiple muscle groups, therefore the strength potential is higher so should be used to maximally recruit the fast twitch muscle fibres which respond the best to muscle growth.
The remainder of your exercises should then be in the 8-12 rep range which is an ideal range for muscle hypertrophy. There are a few reasons for this and these include:
- An increased time under tension with sets lasting 45-60 seconds which is an ideal range for muscle hypertrophy
- You can train at 80% of you 1 rep max meaning you can still use heavy weight whilst also using a higher rep range
On certain exercises you can go as high as 12-15 reps though where possible try to keep the exercises outside of your compound lifts in the 8-12 rep range on a bulk.
Should You Lift Heavy When Bulking
Whether or not you should lift heavy on a bulk is the wrong approach from a mental viewpoint as this then gives the impression that you should train lighter on a cut. This simple psychological viewpoint has a huge impact on how you approach a training session and ultimately a physique.
When on a bulk you will need to lift heavier weights from session to session in a progressive overload manner. This is a tested method for muscle growth however the important thing to note is heavier and not necessarily heavy.
You want to lift more weight using the exact same form as previous weights, this is a true indicator of a strength progression. This isn’t however my main point, the key point is that eventually you will progress to a level where you have increased your muscle mass and strength in the gym.
Your body will have been forced into adaptation for the training sessions however it’s important to note that these adaptations are to handle a certain stimulus on the body. If you train heavy for 6 months and then all of a sudden decrease the loads by 50% then your body will have no reason to maintain the higher muscle mass.
It’s not as simple a process as that in reality however the basic premise is true, when bulking you should get to a certain strength level and then try to maintain that level during a cut. This will be difficult to do when calories are low but you should continue to do what you did to build the muscle in the first place!
Best Rep Range for Size and Strength
There is not a single best rep range for size and strength unfortunately, training in the rep range of 1-3 means that you get stronger in the rep range of 1-3, similarly training for 20+ reps a set means that you get strong at… the 20 rep range.
Of course there will be some carryover however your rep range will depend on your goals. The ideal range for muscle hypertrophy (size) is between 8-12 reps on average and this would be if you could only do one rep range for the rest of your life.
In actuality you need a split as mentioned earlier, using 3-6 reps for strength training and then 8-12 reps for hypertrophy is the best method you can employ to get a good balance of training aimed to improve strength and size.
You could include sets for absolute strength of 1-3 reps however that is a much more advanced method of programming that involves the use of periodisation over multiple weeks, if you just want to look better with your top off then stick to 3-6 and 8-12 reps for the majority of your workouts.
How Many Sets and Reps Should You Do When Bulking
So just to quickly round off and sum up how many sets and reps you should do when bulking I’ve put a quick summary below. This is not by any means the best way to approach a bulk however it’s a good general guideline that will see results.
Exercise 1 (compound movement)
3 sets x 3 – 6 reps (an additional 1-2 sets or more needed as a warm up)
Exercise 2-3 (primary muscle)
6 sets x 8-12 reps (3 sets per exercise)
Exercises 4-5 (secondary muscles)
6 sets x 8-12 reps (an additional exercise for each secondary muscle group)
If you’ve found this article helpful then also check out:
How many sets and reps when cutting
Bulking up for natural lifters
What Next
If you are looking to make changes to your physique by either losing body fat, building muscle or looking to maintain a lean physique then sign up to my weekly newsletter below. Each week I send out actionable tips to help you lose that extra 1lb of fat or build that extra 0.5lb of muscle mass on a weekly basis.
If you sign up now you’ll also receive my 28 day body recomp program completely Free. This ebook will be sent straight to your inbox and will provide an intense 28 day program aimed at helping you lose up to 8lbs of body fat whilst also building 2lb-4lb of lean muscle mass in just 4 weeks.
Don’t worry if you’re not ready for an intense program just yet, my weekly newsletter will give smaller tips that when implemented daily, will stack up over time and see you transform your body with seemingly minimal effort!
