What muscles does the deadlift work?

The glutes and hamstrings drive it by straightening your hips. Your lower back, traps and lats hold your position without shortening, and your quads hold the knee. If your lower back is what feels worked afterward, your hips rose before the bar did.

Is the deadlift bad for your back?

Not inherently. It loads the back in the position it is built to hold, which is the point of doing it. A deadlift stops being trainable when the weight is heavier than the position can be held against, which is a load problem rather than an exercise problem. If something hurts and keeps hurting, that is a question for a physiotherapist.

Should the bar touch your legs?

It should stay in contact with or very close to your shins and thighs the whole way. A bar that drifts forward puts your back on the end of a longer lever, which is the most common reason a deadlift is felt in the wrong place.

Conventional or sumo deadlift, which should I do?

Whichever your hips let you set a good position in. Sumo shortens the bar path and keeps the torso upright, so it asks less of the lower back to hold. Conventional puts more of the work on the hinge. Try both rather than picking on principle.

Should you lower the deadlift slowly?

Under control, but you do not need to fight it down. Hinge the hips back and let the bar travel down your legs the way it came up. The lift is the part you are training; a slow lower mostly adds fatigue.

How do you know if your deadlift form is wrong?

Watch where you feel it and watch the first inch. If your hips rise before the bar leaves the floor, or your back rounds as it does, the position broke before the lift started. Feeling it in your glutes and hamstrings is the sign it went right.

Back to the library

Barbell · intermediate · back

Barbell deadlift

Also called Conventional deadlift, Barbell deadlift, Conventional barbell deadlift.

The short answer

The deadlift is a hip hinge: you push the floor away and straighten your hips to bring the bar up your legs. Your glutes and hamstrings are the muscles that should be doing the work. Your lower back, traps and lats hold your position without shortening, and they work hard doing it, so a tired lower back after deadlifts is not by itself a sign anything went wrong.

How to do it

Step oneStand with feet hip-width apart and a loaded barbell over your mid-foot.
Step twoHinge at the hips and bend your knees to grip the bar with hands just outside your legs.
Step threeTake a deep breath, brace your core, and keep your chest up with a flat back.
Step fourDrive through your heels to lift the barbell, extending your hips and knees simultaneously.
Step fiveStand tall at the top, then hinge at the hips and bend your knees to lower the bar back to the floor in a controlled manner.

What usually goes wrong

Each starts with what you would notice.

Your lower back is what aches the next day, and your glutes feel nothing.

WhyThe hips rise before the bar does, so by the time the weight leaves the floor you are lifting it with a straightening spine rather than with your hips.

FixTake the slack out of the bar and start the pull with your hips and shoulders rising together. If the hips shoot first, the weight is too heavy to hold position against.

The bar drifts away from your legs on the way up.

WhyThe bar is starting over your toes rather than your mid-foot, or the lats are not holding it in, so it swings out where your back has to hold a longer lever.

FixSet the bar over your mid-foot and think about dragging it up your shins. Squeeze your armpits down as if holding a newspaper under each one, and the bar stays close.

You round over as the bar leaves the floor.

WhyThe position was never set before the pull began, so the back gives up the range that the hips and legs were meant to provide.

FixSet your chest and brace before the bar moves, and pull the slack out until you hear the plates settle. If the back still rounds at that weight, the weight is your answer.

You lean back and hitch the bar up your thighs to finish.

WhyTreating the top as a place to keep pulling rather than a place to stand still, usually because the hips finished early.

FixThe rep ends standing tall with the hips underneath you. There is nothing to add past that, and leaning back loads the spine at the one point the glutes should have taken over.

Deadlift or squat

A squat sits you down between your feet and stands you back up, so the knees travel a long way and the quads do a large share of the work. A deadlift keeps the shins much more upright and moves the hips backward instead, so the hamstrings and glutes take the load and the quads mostly hold the knee.

That is why they are not interchangeable even though both are heavy leg exercises. If you want the front of your legs, squat. If you want the back of them, hinge.

They also fail differently. A squat that is too heavy pins you at the bottom; a deadlift that is too heavy simply does not leave the floor, or comes up with a rounding back. The second is the one to be careful with, because it will let you complete the rep.

Conventional or sumo

Conventional puts your feet about hip width with your hands outside your legs. Sumo puts your feet wide with your hands inside. Both are deadlifts and both are legitimate.

The wide stance shortens the distance the bar travels and lets you keep your torso more upright, which shifts work toward the hips, quads and inner thighs and asks less of your lower back to hold position. The narrow stance puts more of the job on the hinge itself.

Hip shape decides this more than preference does. If sitting into a wide stance feels like it jams at the hip, that is anatomy, not weakness, and conventional will suit you better. Try both before deciding which one is yours.

The claims it earns and the claims it does not

The deadlift attracts bigger claims than any other lift. It is called a full body exercise, a core exercise, and the one lift you would keep if you could only keep one. Some of that is fair and some of it is not.

What is fair: it loads more muscle at once than almost anything else, it teaches you to hold a position under real weight, and it carries over to picking things up, which you will do for the rest of your life. What is not: it is not a back exercise in the sense people mean when they say it builds a wide back, and it will not train your quads meaningfully. Rows and pulldowns build the back you can see; squats build the front of your legs.

It is also the lift where ego costs the most. Every other exercise makes it obvious when the weight is too heavy by not moving. This one lets you complete the rep badly, and a back that changes shape under the bar is the signal that the weight is past what the position can hold.

What it is for

The barbell deadlift is a hip hinge targeting the glutes and hamstrings, which straighten the hips to bring the bar up your legs. The lower back, traps and lats hold your position under load without shortening. It is the movement that loads the most muscle at once and teaches you to hold a position against real weight.

Questions people ask

What muscles does the deadlift work?: The glutes and hamstrings drive it by straightening your hips. Your lower back, traps and lats hold your position without shortening, and your quads hold the knee. If your lower back is what feels worked afterward, your hips rose before the bar did.
Is the deadlift bad for your back?: Not inherently. It loads the back in the position it is built to hold, which is the point of doing it. A deadlift stops being trainable when the weight is heavier than the position can be held against, which is a load problem rather than an exercise problem. If something hurts and keeps hurting, that is a question for a physiotherapist.
Should the bar touch your legs?: It should stay in contact with or very close to your shins and thighs the whole way. A bar that drifts forward puts your back on the end of a longer lever, which is the most common reason a deadlift is felt in the wrong place.
Conventional or sumo deadlift, which should I do?: Whichever your hips let you set a good position in. Sumo shortens the bar path and keeps the torso upright, so it asks less of the lower back to hold. Conventional puts more of the work on the hinge. Try both rather than picking on principle.
Should you lower the deadlift slowly?: Under control, but you do not need to fight it down. Hinge the hips back and let the bar travel down your legs the way it came up. The lift is the part you are training; a slow lower mostly adds fatigue.
How do you know if your deadlift form is wrong?: Watch where you feel it and watch the first inch. If your hips rise before the bar leaves the floor, or your back rounds as it does, the position broke before the lift started. Feeling it in your glutes and hamstrings is the sign it went right.