15 BEST Shoulder Exercises For Growth (And How To Use Them)

When properly developed, the shoulders help complete a powerful looking physique and contribute to creating that V taper we all want. But why is it that so few successfully achieve this well, do a quick Google search of the best shoulder exercises and you'll be met with an overwhelming number of exercises and workouts that all promise the same thing. But let's be honest, how many of you have hit your shoulders with everything in the book, yet are disappointed because they just won't seem to grow very well? Trust me, I know the frustration. What you need, and what I wish somebody told me back in the day is more structure behind your shoulder training. With the overwhelming number of options out there, though, this is much easier said than done.

Today, my goal is to simplify this for you. I'll break down the best exercises for each of the three regions of your shoulders, show you how to pick the right ones for your body and your equipment availability, and then show you how to combine them all into a weekly routine to make sure that you're growing the three areas of your shoulders and in a well rounded way over time. Let's start with the first region, the front delts. So take a look at the direction of its muscle fibers. They run almost 45 degrees to the side relative to your torso. This means that to best activate this muscle, you want to avoid the common mistake of flaring your elbows out to the sides during overhead pressing. This is not only a riskier position for your shoulder to be in, but it also fails to line up with the front delt muscle fibers. Instead, move your elbows into what's called the scapular plane, which is slightly in front of the body. Let's apply this little tweak to five of the best overhead pressing options.

The first exercise is a standing overhead press. This has been shown to activate the front delts very well, with levels even higher than that of traditional front raises. To perform the press, use a narrower grip that allows you to position your elbows directly under the bar and slightly in front of your torso into the position we talked about earlier. Squeeze your glutes, brace your core and then push directly overhead while keeping your lower back neutral. Here you'll want to use a heavier weight and aim for 6 to 12 reps. The recommendation for the next exercise comes from a 2013 paper comparing four different types of overhead presses. The standing dumbbell overhead press provided the highest activation with not only the front delts, but across all three heads of the shoulder. The downside with this exercise, however, is that it can get increased increasingly difficult to overload once you get to heavier weights. This is why here you'll want to do the opposite of what we did with the barbell overhead press. Choose a lighter weight and aim for about 20 to 30 reps per set. This way you can still take your shoulder muscles close to failure without letting your setup be the limiting factor. Standing shoulder presses are great and should not be left out of your routine, but the benefit of a seated press is that it provides a lot more stability for you. To really isolate the shoulders for these, press in the scapular plane and keep your elbows stacked directly under the dumbbells. This next move will help you work on any muscle imbalances you may have, especially if you tend to only do barbell work. It's also a great exercise for improving your shoulder health. And as an added bonus, because you're pressing the weight with one arm, your core will have to work hard to prevent your torso from rotating too far to the loaded side. This can translate to better strength in compound movements like the deadlifts and squat. As you perform these, think about reaching forward rather than just pressing up. Can you hit the front delts without any equipment? Yes. Just like the other exercises, pike push ups align the elbows in the way the front delt fibers run. To set it up, bring your feet close to your hands to make an upside down V shape and perform a press. If these are too hard, you can start out by performing these on your knees instead. On the other hand, if these get too easy for you after a while, feel free to elevate your feet onto a higher platform.

Next, the lateral head. The key to their growth is to use a variety of exercises that stress this area in different ways. I have done a past video that breaks down this concept in more detail with some unique exercises, and I'll leave that linked in the description box down below. But for now, here are five great options.

Let's start with the dumbbell lateral raise. As I mentioned in my past videos, the best way to perform this for the most activation and safety of your shoulder joint is is to use a slight lean forward. Raise your arms in the scapular plane slightly in front of your body and with your thumbs positioned slightly above your pinkies. Remember when we talked about variety? For maximal growth, use an exercise that stresses the side delts in a way that your standard lateral raise just can't do. Now, the side delts only start becoming highly active once you're past the first third or so of the raise. So hang onto the cable machine with your non working arm and Slightly lean towards the direction of the raise to ensure the delts are working throughout the whole range of motion. If you don't have access to the cable machine, you could also just tie a resistance band to a fixture and use that instead. Although we're still using cables here, this exercise will provide a different stress to the shoulder by taking your side delts all the way to its fully contracted position. To perform it, grab the right cable with your left hand and vice versa to crisscross and then pull the cable up into a wide Y position. This movement will also highly activate your lower traps, which is a good thing. Now, if you don't have access to cables, here's an exercise that by playing with your body position, will replicate the effects of cables. It's also a great choice if your upper traps have a habit of taking over. To perform it, just set up a bench to about 45 degrees and raise your arms into a wide Y shape, holding onto light dumbbells or weight plates. Think about raising your arms out rather than up. You will feel this one quite a bit in your lower traps as well. And again, this is a good thing. Last but not least, upright rows, but the better kind that's safer for your shoulder. To perform it, widen your grip to about two times shoulder width. Raise your elbows only up to the level of your shoulders. And at the top position, ensure that your hands are not below your elbows, but are rather raised up to the same level. These can also be done with dumbbells instead.

Finally, we have a region of the shoulder that's key to balancing out the look of your front delts by rounding out the back of the shoulder. It's the rear delts. And if you take a look at the way these muscle fibers run, it's at a roughly 45 degrees angle. This means that the best target this muscle. You want to use exercises where your elbows can pull in this 45 degree arm angle relative to the torso. Here are five great options.

First up, what I call the rear delt swing. Grab a pair of light dumbbells and lay on an incline bench set at about 30 degree. Then swing your elbows back behind your body while keeping your arms straight and angled out at about a 45 degree angle.

Now.

Now what I want you to do here is push hard, do as many reps as you can, and then when you can do no more, we'll want to immediately drop set to the next exercise. Using the exact same setup and pair of dumbbells. You can take the rear delts to complete failure by turning the swing into a row by simply bending your elbows. With this slight modification, you'll be able to continue doing more reps until your rear delts are completely fatigued. Now we're going to move on to a barbell movement. The key to making these rear delts focus will be with your elbow angle and how high you pull the bar. Use an overhand, relatively wider grip that enables you to pull high to the level of your sternum and with your elbows angled out at about 45 degrees. And think about pulling with your elbows as you do so. Now this same form can be applied to a cable machine by using a wider attachment and that sweet spot 45 degree angle. Last but not least, an exercise I got from coach Paul Carter that trains the rear delts in its fully stretched position. This has recently been shown to be an important, important mechanism of muscle growth and is something that our previous exercises failed to do. To perform it, sit sideways next to a cable machine and adjust the pulley to a height where you're able to pull your arm into a 45 degree angle away from your torso. Think about reaching your arm to your opposite ear and then pulling your elbow across and then behind your body. You can also easily do these with a resistance band if needed.

Alright, so here comes the most important part. Putting everything together you've learned into a workout routine that'll give you the shoulder growth you're at.

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Research shows that the front delts are already highly activated in many of the pressing movements you're already doing. For example, this study in particular showed the chest and front delts to be activated to almost the same degree during a bench press. So since your front delts are likely already well developed, you're only going to pick one main front delt exercise to do throughout the week. You'll want to emphasize the side and rear delts more by picking two exercises from each of those categories. You can do three to four sets of each exercise and throw those into your existing workouts throughout the week or do it all in one shoulder workout. But once you find what exercises work best for you, stay consistent with those week after week. Only if your strength plateaus in any of those exercises or you simply get bored of them, should you then consider switching to another exercise from the list, which typically happens every four to eight weeks. Failing to have a d detailed plan of attack every time you work out is why so many people stay stuck despite years of training for a science based program that takes care of all the guesswork for you so that you can transform your body as efficiently as possible. Then simply head on over to built with science.com and take our analysis quiz to discover what program is best for you. In the meantime, you can always watch some more of my videos here. And don't forget to show your support by giving the video a like and subscribing to the channel. Thank you so much guys and I'll see you next time.