Table of ContentsView AllTable of ContentsBenefitsDisadvantagesHow-ToMuscles WorkedSquat Variations
Table of ContentsView All
View All
Table of Contents
Benefits
Disadvantages
How-To
Muscles Worked
Squat Variations
Squatting is a foundational movement pattern humans learn at a very young age. The muscles used in a squat help you power through your daily tasks. Adding them to your workout could decrease your risk of injury and keep you moving easily throughout the day. The health benefits of squats include improving strength and flexibility and burning calories.
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1. Reduces the Risk of Injury
Squats are compound exercises, meaning they target multiple joints simultaneously. They enhance strength, flexibility, and coordination.As a result, they can improve balance and your ability to move easily and reduce your risk of injury.
2. Strengthens Core
Squats help strengthen your core, which stabilizes your trunk and spine. During a squat, your abdominal, low-back, and gluteal muscles in your buttocks all contract to keep your torso in position.
3. Burns Calories
As a compound exercise, squats activate multiple muscles simultaneously. Muscles require oxygen to contract, and the body burns five calories for every liter of oxygen used during activity.Compound exercises use more oxygen, burning more calories overall.
4. Strengthens Lower Body
Most people do squats to strengthen the muscles in their lower body since this movement targets muscles in the buttocks, thighs, and lower legs.A strong lower body improves your ability to do everyday activities, such as getting in and out of the car, retrieving objects from the ground, and standing up from a chair.
5. Boosts Strength and Flexibility
Squats increase the range of motion and flexibility in your lower back, hips, knees, and ankles. However, flexibility also has an impact on how deep you can squat.The more you practice this movement, the more flexible you will become.
What Are the Disadvantages?
It is vital to learn the proper squat technique with just your body weight before adding resistance, such as a barbell or dumbbell. When done incorrectly, squats can lead to back and knee injuries.
Factors that contribute to your risk of injury while performing a squat include:
Talk to a healthcare provider, such as aphysical therapist, about adding squats to your fitness routine. A physical therapist can assess whether squats are appropriate for you and show you modifications to accommodate conditions such aslow-back pain,knee pain, orosteoarthritis(wear-and-tear arthritis) in your leg joints.
How to Do a Squat
To perform a body-weight squat with proper form, follow these steps:
What Muscles Do Squats Work?
Squats primarily target muscles in the legs, but they also strengthen your core—the muscles in your abdomen and back. Muscles you work during a squat include:
What Benefits Can You Get From Squat Variations?
Wall Squats
Wall squats with a stability ball (done as follows) are an excellent squat option for beginners:
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Box Squats
Box squats can be done using a sturdy box that you briefly sit on at the bottom of your squat. This modification helps you shift your weight backward and reduces pressure on your lower back and ankles. Box squats are helpful for people who want to learn the proper technique for back squats used in powerlifting.
Choose a box that you can sit on and stand back up on with your feet flat on the floor without relying on your arms. This will allow you to progress to variations of this technique, such as this barbell back squat:
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Jump Squats
Jump squats (explained here) are a more advanced exercise that you should only do once you can perform a basic squat with proper form:
Goblet Squats
Goblet squats are an intermediate exercise that allows you to add extra resistance once you’ve mastered the basic squat, as follows:
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Lateral Squats
Lateral squats improve side-to-side movements often used in sports and strengthen leg muscles used for shuffling and jumping.
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Pistol Squats
Pistol squats (done as follows) are an advanced exercise that requires significant flexibility and excellent balance:
Back Squats
Back squats are performed using a barbell, as follows:
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Overhead Squats
Overhead squats require balance and a good range of motion in your shoulders. Practice this exercise without added resistance until you can perform it correctly and safely. To learn the form, you can use a PVC pipe or broomstick, and once you’ve mastered the movement, you can add a barbell. Do it as follows:
Summary
Squats are a multi-joint exercise with many potential benefits, such as stronger leg and core muscles, improved flexibility, and increased calorie burning, which can aid with weight loss. Start with body-weight squats until you master proper form. Then, try other squats, such as back, lateral, or pistol squats, for an added challenge.
12 SourcesVerywell Health uses only high-quality sources, including peer-reviewed studies, to support the facts within our articles. Read oureditorial processto learn more about how we fact-check and keep our content accurate, reliable, and trustworthy.American Council on Exercise.5 benefits of compound exercises.Ronai P, Gendron K.The barbell back squat exercise.ACSM’s Health & Fitness Journal27(4):p 65-73, 7/8. 2023. doi:10.1249/FIT.0000000000000884Kim S, Miller M, Tallarico A, Helder S, Liu Y, Lee S.Relationships between physical characteristics and biomechanics of lower extremity during the squat.J Exerc Sci Fit. 2021 Oct;19(4):269-277. doi: 10.1016/j.jesf.2021.09.002Straub RK, Powers CM.A biomechanical review of the squat exercise: Implications for clinical practice.Int J Sports Phys Ther. 2024;19(4):490-501. doi:10.26603/001c.94600American Council on Exercise.How to squat properly: body type breakdown & anatomy considerations.American Council on Exercise.Stability ball wall squats.Swinton, PA, Lloyd, R, Keogh, JWL, Agouris, I, Stewart, AD.A biomechanical comparison of the traditional squat, powerlifting squat, and box squat.Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research26(7):p 1805-1816, July 2012. doi:10.1519/JSC.0b013e3182577067American Council on Exercise.Squat jumps.American Council on Exercise.Goblet squats.Sato K, Liebenson C.The lateral squat.J Bodyw Mov Ther. 2013;17(4):560-562. doi:10.1016/j.jbmt.2013.09.005American Council on Exercise.Pistol squat workout.Amercian Council on Exercise.Back squats.
12 Sources
Verywell Health uses only high-quality sources, including peer-reviewed studies, to support the facts within our articles. Read oureditorial processto learn more about how we fact-check and keep our content accurate, reliable, and trustworthy.American Council on Exercise.5 benefits of compound exercises.Ronai P, Gendron K.The barbell back squat exercise.ACSM’s Health & Fitness Journal27(4):p 65-73, 7/8. 2023. doi:10.1249/FIT.0000000000000884Kim S, Miller M, Tallarico A, Helder S, Liu Y, Lee S.Relationships between physical characteristics and biomechanics of lower extremity during the squat.J Exerc Sci Fit. 2021 Oct;19(4):269-277. doi: 10.1016/j.jesf.2021.09.002Straub RK, Powers CM.A biomechanical review of the squat exercise: Implications for clinical practice.Int J Sports Phys Ther. 2024;19(4):490-501. doi:10.26603/001c.94600American Council on Exercise.How to squat properly: body type breakdown & anatomy considerations.American Council on Exercise.Stability ball wall squats.Swinton, PA, Lloyd, R, Keogh, JWL, Agouris, I, Stewart, AD.A biomechanical comparison of the traditional squat, powerlifting squat, and box squat.Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research26(7):p 1805-1816, July 2012. doi:10.1519/JSC.0b013e3182577067American Council on Exercise.Squat jumps.American Council on Exercise.Goblet squats.Sato K, Liebenson C.The lateral squat.J Bodyw Mov Ther. 2013;17(4):560-562. doi:10.1016/j.jbmt.2013.09.005American Council on Exercise.Pistol squat workout.Amercian Council on Exercise.Back squats.
Verywell Health uses only high-quality sources, including peer-reviewed studies, to support the facts within our articles. Read oureditorial processto learn more about how we fact-check and keep our content accurate, reliable, and trustworthy.
American Council on Exercise.5 benefits of compound exercises.Ronai P, Gendron K.The barbell back squat exercise.ACSM’s Health & Fitness Journal27(4):p 65-73, 7/8. 2023. doi:10.1249/FIT.0000000000000884Kim S, Miller M, Tallarico A, Helder S, Liu Y, Lee S.Relationships between physical characteristics and biomechanics of lower extremity during the squat.J Exerc Sci Fit. 2021 Oct;19(4):269-277. doi: 10.1016/j.jesf.2021.09.002Straub RK, Powers CM.A biomechanical review of the squat exercise: Implications for clinical practice.Int J Sports Phys Ther. 2024;19(4):490-501. doi:10.26603/001c.94600American Council on Exercise.How to squat properly: body type breakdown & anatomy considerations.American Council on Exercise.Stability ball wall squats.Swinton, PA, Lloyd, R, Keogh, JWL, Agouris, I, Stewart, AD.A biomechanical comparison of the traditional squat, powerlifting squat, and box squat.Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research26(7):p 1805-1816, July 2012. doi:10.1519/JSC.0b013e3182577067American Council on Exercise.Squat jumps.American Council on Exercise.Goblet squats.Sato K, Liebenson C.The lateral squat.J Bodyw Mov Ther. 2013;17(4):560-562. doi:10.1016/j.jbmt.2013.09.005American Council on Exercise.Pistol squat workout.Amercian Council on Exercise.Back squats.
American Council on Exercise.5 benefits of compound exercises.
Ronai P, Gendron K.The barbell back squat exercise.ACSM’s Health & Fitness Journal27(4):p 65-73, 7/8. 2023. doi:10.1249/FIT.0000000000000884
Kim S, Miller M, Tallarico A, Helder S, Liu Y, Lee S.Relationships between physical characteristics and biomechanics of lower extremity during the squat.J Exerc Sci Fit. 2021 Oct;19(4):269-277. doi: 10.1016/j.jesf.2021.09.002
Straub RK, Powers CM.A biomechanical review of the squat exercise: Implications for clinical practice.Int J Sports Phys Ther. 2024;19(4):490-501. doi:10.26603/001c.94600
American Council on Exercise.How to squat properly: body type breakdown & anatomy considerations.
American Council on Exercise.Stability ball wall squats.
Swinton, PA, Lloyd, R, Keogh, JWL, Agouris, I, Stewart, AD.A biomechanical comparison of the traditional squat, powerlifting squat, and box squat.Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research26(7):p 1805-1816, July 2012. doi:10.1519/JSC.0b013e3182577067
American Council on Exercise.Squat jumps.
American Council on Exercise.Goblet squats.
Sato K, Liebenson C.The lateral squat.J Bodyw Mov Ther. 2013;17(4):560-562. doi:10.1016/j.jbmt.2013.09.005
American Council on Exercise.Pistol squat workout.
Amercian Council on Exercise.Back squats.
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