Arnold split: a 6-day chest and back, shoulders and arms, legs workout plan

Choosing your starting weightEmerging evidence

Warm up, then pick a weight you think you could lift about 10 to 12 times at most. Do the bottom of the rep range (for 8 to 12, do 8) and ask: how many more could I have done with good form? Two or three more: that is your weight. Five or more: go up one step next set. None or one: go down one step.

For bodyweight moves, choose the version (the easier or harder option on each move's page) where you reach the bottom of the rep range with 2 or 3 reps to spare.

In the first two weeks, stop each set with 3 or 4 reps to spare. Most people misjudge how many reps they have left by about one, and you are still learning the movements.

Sources 1, 2, 3

Progressing week to week: double progressionEmerging evidence

Each exercise has a rep range, such as 8 to 12. Keep the weight the same and add reps, set by set and session by session, while still stopping 1 to 3 reps short of failure.

When every set reaches the top of the range, add the smallest weight step you have (roughly 2 to 10%, smaller jumps for the upper body and small muscles) and go back to the bottom of the range. Adding reps and adding weight both work; this rule uses both.

With body weight, add reps, then slow the lowering, then move to the harder option. If a lift stalls for 2 or 3 sessions, hold the weight, check your sleep and food, and consider a lighter week.

Sources 4, 3, 1

How hard each set should feelStrong evidence

You do not need to train to failure. Stopping 2 or 3 reps short, often written as 2 to 3 reps in reserve (RIR), gives similar results for most people.

Big lifts stay at 2 to 3 reps in reserve, so Tuesday's shoulders and arms start fresh after Monday's presses and pulls; the last round of raises, curls and extensions can go to 0 to 2.

Sources 1, 5

Rest between setsEmerging evidence

Heavy compound lifts in sets of 5 to 8 (squat, deadlift, bench press, overhead press, chin-up): 2 to 3 minutes. Other compound lifts in sets of 8 to 12: about 90 seconds to 2 minutes. Isolation moves such as raises, curls, extensions and calf raises: 60 to 90 seconds.

For muscle growth, resting more than about a minute gives a small advantage, with no clear extra gain past about 90 seconds. For strength the evidence on rest is mixed: 1 to 2 minutes is enough for beginners, and trained lifters may do better with longer rests on heavy lifts.

Short on time? Pair two moves that do not compete, such as a press with a row or a leg move with a core move, and rest after the pair. Supersets like this cut session time by about a third to a half while keeping the sets.

Sources 6, 7, 1, 8, 9

Lighter weeks (deloads)Mixed evidence

Not compulsory, especially for beginners. Take one in week 7, as planned here, or sooner if your performance drops for two sessions in a row and you feel run down or achy: same days, same exercises, about half the sets, and weights that feel easy (4 or more reps in reserve). Then restart at your previous weights.

Deloads are common practice: in a survey of competitive strength and physique athletes they lasted about a week, roughly every 5 to 6 weeks. Direct evidence is thin: three small trials. In trained adults, a full week off mid-programme did not change muscle growth but slightly reduced strength gains. In one small trial in 19 untrained men, with no control group, two lighter weeks neither held back nor added to gains; the second came just before testing, so it also worked as a taper. After very high-volume training, a lighter week and a week off gave similar results in 30 trained men. So a lighter week looks better than a week off if strength matters.

Sources 10, 11, 12, 13, 14

Warm-up and cool-downEmerging evidence

Warm up with 3 to 5 minutes of easy movement, the moves listed at the start of each session, then 1 or 2 lighter sets of the first lift. A short warm-up specific to the exercise is enough.

The cool-down is optional. Its stretches are there for comfort and flexibility; they do not add strength or muscle.

Source 8

Missed days, soreness and when to stop

Missed a session? Do the next one in the order rather than doubling up. Muscle soreness for a day or two after a new exercise is common and fades as you repeat it.

Stop and get medical help for chest pain or pressure, unusual breathlessness, dizziness or fainting. If a joint pain is sharp, gets worse during a set or lingers into the next day, swap to the move's easier option, and see a clinician if it persists.

WHO notes that people without contraindications generally do not need medical clearance before light or moderate activity. If you have a heart, lung or metabolic condition, are pregnant, or have osteoporosis with fractures, ask your clinician first.

Source 15

What the Arnold split is

Chest and back, then shoulders and arms, then legs, each twice a week over six days. It's named after Arnold Schwarzenegger's training as he described it in his newsletter: a two-a-day "double split" by body part, chest and back, shoulders and arms, legs and abs, repeated through the week.

This plan is our own, not his routine: one session a day, built from our workouts and doses, and we're not connected with him.

Source 16

Twice a week is a schedule choiceStrong evidence

With the same weekly sets, training a muscle once, twice or three times a week built about the same muscle in 25 studies, and in a larger analysis of 67 studies, the effect of frequency on growth was close to nothing. The 2026 position stand of the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) found no difference in growth between 1 and more than 5 sessions a week when the total work was the same.

Strength does rise a little with more frequent training, mostly because it adds sets. So the Arnold split's twice-weekly rhythm is a good way to fit the sets in, not a requirement.

Sources 17, 18, 1, 19

Six days a week: what the trials showEmerging evidence

Two trials in trained men compared 3 and 6 sessions a week with the same weekly sets, for 6 weeks each: in 27 men and in 28 men, strength and muscle size rose about the same either way. That's about 55 men in all, over 6 weeks, so six days is a reasonable choice if you like it, not a better one.

Sources 20, 21

Chest with back, biceps with tricepsEmerging evidence

Pairing moves for opposing muscles kept the reps and weight lifted the same as normal sets and cut sessions by about 37% on average, in a review of 19 studies of 313 mostly young, trained adults, and opposing pairs even allowed a few more reps. In single studies, 16 and 15 trained men lifted more in alternating press and pull sets than in straight sets, with more fatigue in the second. A 2026 review of 14 short studies found that keeping the usual rest after each move raised the work done, while squeezing the moves into the rests saved more time but sometimes cost reps.

Only 3 long-term trials exist: they found similar strength and muscle gains, not bigger ones, and in one, 15 trained men alternating bench presses and bench pulls for 8 weeks matched normal sets in about half the time. Supersets feel harder, so rest a full 2 to 3 minutes after the heavy pair, and if the gym is busy, do the pairs as normal sets: you lose time, not muscle.

Sources 9, 22, 23, 24, 25

Back-to-back days for the arms and shoulders: our inferenceEmerging evidence

Tuesday follows Monday, so your triceps, biceps and the front of your shoulders work two days running. In 15 trained men, rows before curls tired the biceps more than bench presses did, which is why the arms come last on Tuesday.

In 10 trained men, sets taken to failure needed 24 to 48 hours to recover, against faster recovery when sets stopped short, and in another 10 trained men, a second day of training on leftover soreness didn't make recovery worse. From those two small, short-term studies, we infer that stopping 2 or 3 reps short on Monday's big lifts keeps Tuesday manageable; no trial has tested this week. If your arms are still sore and weak on Tuesday, swap Tuesday and Wednesday.

Sources 26, 27, 28

Long sessions don't add muchEmerging evidence

More weekly sets build more muscle, with diminishing returns: in 34 trained men, the most sets in one trial (30 a week for the arms, 45 for the thighs) grew three of four sites more than fewer sets over 8 weeks, while strength rose the same. But across 111 studies in men, more sets in a session went with slightly smaller gains, a weak signal. This plan keeps each session to 45 to 60 minutes and spreads the sets over the week.

Sources 29, 30, 18

How much training this isStrong evidence

Counting direct sets in the build phase, this plan gives about 16 hard sets a week each for the chest and back, about 9 for the side of the shoulders (6 direct, plus overhead presses as half sets), 6 for the back of the shoulders, 10 direct sets each for the biceps and triceps (about 18 and 19 if you count pulls and presses as half sets), 18 for the quads, 12 for the glutes and hamstrings and 6 for the calves.

More weekly sets build more muscle, with diminishing returns that arrive sooner for strength than for size. The 2026 ACSM position stand saw extra growth from about 10 or more sets per muscle a week, and a review of time-efficient training suggests about 4 hard sets a week as a reasonable floor for busy people.

That's 10 or more sets for most muscles and close to the top of the useful range for the chest, back and quads: beyond about 10 sets a week each extra set adds less, and past about 20 the extra gain is small. The 3-day version gives about half of each, the 4-day version about two-thirds.

Sources 1, 31, 18, 8

Arnold split, push pull legs, upper/lower or bro split?Strong evidence

When weekly sets match, split and full-body routines build about the same muscle, in 14 studies of 392 people. So choose by your week: the Arnold split for six days with the arms on their own day; push pull legs for six days with the pushing muscles together; the 4-day upper/lower split for four days; the bro split if you like one body part a day. A missed day costs less when each muscle comes round twice.

Sources 32, 17, 18

Who it suitsEmerging evidence

Six sessions take about 5 to 6 hours a week, plus the recovery. The NHS says adults need 7 to 9 hours' sleep, and across 69 publications, losing sleep cut exercise performance by about 7.6%. If you're new to lifting, often miss sessions or sleep badly, a 3- or 4-day plan will serve you better.

Sources 33, 34

The shorter versions

Three days runs each session once a week: about half the weekly sets, which still clears the 4-set floor and reaches about 9 for the chest and back. Four days runs the sessions in order on four set days, so each comes round about four times in three weeks. You lose sets, not any special effect of training six days. Both versions are our editorial choices.

Sources 17, 18, 8

Women and the Arnold splitStrong evidence

The plan is the same for everyone: in pooled trials, women and men gained muscle at a similar rate relative to where they started; men gained slightly more in absolute terms, mostly in the upper body.

Sources 35, 36

Cardio does not cost you muscleStrong evidence

Doing cardio as well as strength training does not reduce muscle growth or maximal strength. It can blunt explosive strength, such as jumping, mainly when both are done in the same session; keep them at least 3 hours apart if that matters to you.

Source 37

Stop and get helpStrong evidence

Call 999 in the UK or 911 in the US for chest pain that feels tight, heavy or like squeezing, or spreads to your arms, neck, jaw, stomach or back; chest pain with sweating, feeling sick, light-headedness or breathlessness; severe difficulty breathing; or signs of a stroke, such as one side of the face drooping, weakness in one arm or slurred speech, even if they pass. Don't drive yourself to hospital.

Call NHS 111 (in the US, your doctor or an urgent care centre) if you're suddenly more short of breath than usual, or have chest pain with feeling sick or a heartbeat that races, skips or flutters.

Dark, red or cola-coloured urine, much less urine than usual, or very painful, weak or swollen muscles after unusually hard training can be rhabdomyolysis, a breakdown of muscle that can harm the kidneys: get medical help the same day.

Six days on little sleep with lasting tiredness, falling performance, low mood or frequent illness: take the lighter week now, and see a GP if it doesn't lift (our suggestion).

Sources 38, 39, 40, 41, 42

How to adapt it

Our suggestions, with the evidence where there is some:

• Five days: run the six sessions in order from Monday to Friday, so the cycle rolls into the next week.
• Short on time: keep the pairs as written and drop Pair C or the pullover on a busy day; pairs already save about a third of the time.
• No barbell or rack: dumbbell bench presses for the bench press, seated dumbbell presses for the overhead press, and the dumbbell leg workouts for legs; at home, dumbbell upper body workouts A and B replace the two upper sessions.
• Sore shoulders: neutral-grip dumbbell presses instead of the barbell, skip the pullover, and raise with your thumbs slightly up; see our shoulder pain guides.
• Sore elbows: triceps pushdowns instead of skull crushers, and hammer curls instead of EZ-bar curls; see our elbow pain guides.
• Sore knees or back: a shorter squat range and a lighter hinge, as our intermediate full-body plan suggests.
• Missed a day: do the next session in order rather than doubling up. Missed a week: one session at your last weights, then carry on; after two weeks or more off, go back to the weeks 1 to 2 doses.
• Cardio: on Sunday, or after a shoulders and arms day. Keep hard intervals away from the leg days if jumping or sprinting matters to you.
• Leaking with heavy lifts: it's common and treatable; see our pelvic floor guide, and a GP or pelvic health physiotherapist.

Source 9